And there goes another one

Jim Baker, incumbent Conservative in Labrador west announced today he won’t be seeking re-election in the fall.

Baker claims he made the decision in 2007.  Odds are you’d have a very, very hard time finding anyone who voted for Baker or the Pavement Putin who can recall that they announced their intentions before polling day in 2007.

More importantly, though, Baker is another sign that the December deal is crumbling.  Back then, all the incumbents would have sworn on a stack of His Speeches that they’d run again. 

Now?

They are walking to the exit, one by one. 

Baker’s an interesting one though because he only has a few years in office.  He won first in a by-election in 2007 and then got re-elected in the October 2007 general election.  In other words, Baker doesn’t appear to be eligible for a pension.

- srbp -

Hard to put some black top on that

While the poll goosing machine may have tried to convince the good burghers of Labrador West that they would be seeing pavement before the snow flew, the wise people of the community likely knew far better.

At least this past week, they had the pleasure of listening to transportation minister Trevor Taylor explain why about a month an a half after he and cabinet colleague John “The Shoveller” Hickey  - left, doing his takogo kak puddin’ routine - promised the whole paving thing would be “accelerated”, they would like not be seeing much pavement this year on the Trans-Labrador Highway.

Seems that the contractor on the current tender ran into some problems shipping the equipment up from Sept Isles;  something about too big for the tunnels, so they had to unscrew some bits and dismantle some others.

And if all that wasn’t bad enough, it seems that there was a problem finding enough aggregate – crushed stone to you and moi – to go with the asphalt. 

But that didn’t just shag up the schedule for this year. 

Hoooo, no.

As Trevor told the whole of Labrador via Labrador Morning [mp3 link] that lack of aggregate meant the “accelerated” tender was actually not even out yet.

Trevor insisted though that the direction to the contractor was to do everything possible to get some pavement on the ground this season, even though the daily temperatures in Labrador this time of year hover around the “no go” temp for laying asphalt successfully. 

Apparently, Trevor  - on the right there,  looking over some ice control equipment - wants to make the people of Labrador west know that “we are serious” about the project.

Between the shag-ups with the road and the on-again, off-again hospital it will take a lot more than a teaspoon of hardened tar to convince some people that what they just saw the past couple of months from Hickey and Taylor wasn’t open mike night at Yuk-Yuks.

As it turns out though, the road work will not be accelerated, as anyone with half a clue could have told you. It was always planned for next year, planned that is by the people who do the work and know what they are talking about.

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Carry over

One of the great budgetary practices of the current administration is something called carry over.

Projects are budgeted and announced in one year and then they don’t get started, let alone finished.

Government gets multiple good news hits out the practice. 

First, they get the warm fuzzy media coverage from announcing the spending in the first place.  Sometimes they keep announcing the spending even though it hasn’t happened.  Second, if by some chance work does start, they can announce that and keep it up until the thing is finished.  it’s not unusual to see things started four years continue to appear  in releases as if it was part of current spending.

Like say a hospital in Corner Brook that was tossed into the “stimulus” counter-measure even though it was begun and should have been finished long before anyone even thought of a recession.

Now when the project doesn’t happen, there is never an announcement of the bad news.  Not likely.  The money budgeted but not spent becomes “surplus” and is part of the announcement of the record “surplus” in the spring.

Then the project is carried over into the new budget and re-announced.

If the delay has caused increased costs, this is not something to be chagrined about.  Not on your life.  Any politician worth his or her salt will trumpet the fact the same project will now cost even more because of the delay.  If any one of us mere mortals missed the chance for a good deal and had to pay 30% more for the same thing, we’d be kicking ourselves for being so stunned.  When politicians drop the ball; and it costs you 30% more for the same thing, that is a great investment in the local community.

And if it jumps 71%, as in the St. Alban’s aquaculture centre?  Well, that is just “stimulus”.

Carry over is very big in the current provincial government administration.  They carry over lots of things. 

Like in Labrador West, where a new hospital was promised just in time for a by-election in late 2006/early 2007 and the thing is still in the planning stages the better part of three years later.

Or a new campus for the College of the North Atlantic.  Tender went out on May 4 with a closing date of June 17.  (Well, the initial news release in early May said the thing was going to tender.  A “stimulus” announcement in June said the thing would be tendered in June.)

The tender was awarded three weeks ago – i.e. about a month or more after the tender closed – and as we slide easily into Labour Day, Jim Baker, the local MHA has no idea when the thing will get started. But Baker can assure residents of the area that the project costs have climbed from $18 million to $22 million and that no steel framework will be done this year.

None.

But they might get the site prepared and concrete poured.

Maybe.

So the campus project will be carried over until next year.

Just like the hospital.

or the aquaculture centre.

When was they supposed to be finished again?

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Unaccelerated

Remember that news release claiming that work on the Trans-Labrador Highway was being “accelerated” when it actually wasn’t.

Well, it wasn’t and now there is the excuse to go with it, courtesy of Jim Baker the Tory MHA for Labrador West:

"Given the time it got started, the preparation work that needed to be done and the time it took to get mobilized, I'm pleasantly surprised by how much has been done," he stated. "Next year obviously, when they get started, everything will be ready to move. All the crushing will be done, so all they'll have to do is lay out the blacktop."

And that blacktop will be laid next year as originally planned back in June when they let the first tender go.  Had they waited on the second tender until next year, the work would have been done…

wait for it…

next year.

As planned.

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