{"id":7449,"date":"2024-06-12T09:48:09","date_gmt":"2024-06-12T12:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/?p=7449"},"modified":"2024-06-13T12:59:30","modified_gmt":"2024-06-13T15:59:30","slug":"region-of-queens-to-cover-cost-overruns-funding-shortfalls-for-play-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/2024\/06\/12\/region-of-queens-to-cover-cost-overruns-funding-shortfalls-for-play-park\/","title":{"rendered":"Region of Queens likely to cover cost overruns, funding shortfalls for play park"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Region of Queens councillors plan to cover cost overruns and funding shortfalls for the Queens universally designed play park in Brooklyn. (Rick Conrad)<\/p><\/div>\n

The Region of Queens plans to pick up the tab for almost $51,000 that\u2019s still owed on the universally designed play park in Brooklyn.<\/span><\/p>\n

The $630,000 playground opened in October 2023<\/a>. Named Etli Milita\u2019mk (pronounced ed-a-lee milly-dumk), it was the initiative of Queens County resident Debbie Wamboldt, who led private fundraising for the park and who first approached the region in 2015 about supporting it.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s designed to be accessible and inclusive of everyone, regardless of age or ability.<\/span><\/p>\n

The park includes ramped decks, braille and audio elements as well as a spray pad with sprinklers, a fountain, filler buckets and jet spray units.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wamboldt and other volunteers raised about $100,000 toward the park\u2019s construction. Autism Nova Scotia issued charitable tax receipts and held the money in trust to pay the region for construction as invoices were submitted.<\/span><\/p>\n

The region initially contributed $111,773 from its community investment fund and it donated the land near Queens Place Emera Centre.<\/span><\/p>\n

ACOA and the Nova Scotia government topped up funding.<\/span><\/p>\n

The region also agreed to own, operate and maintain the playground.<\/span><\/p>\n

On Tuesday, however, councillors were told that project costs exceeded revenue. Autism Nova Scotia said fundraising was lower than expected and the ACOA contribution was less than budgeted.<\/span><\/p>\n

And there were construction cost overruns with the project such as the material and installation for the rubber surfacing in the park.<\/span><\/p>\n

Because of that, Autism Nova Scotia asked the region to absorb that extra cost of $50,962. Just under $6,000 of that is the accumulated interest on the unpaid bill.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mayor Darlene Norman said she and the rest of council were aware of the shortfall only last week.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a dream to have this universal play park,” Norman said in an interview. <\/span><\/p>\n

“Autism Nova Scotia agreed to be the body that would look after the accounting and the monies as they were collected with the agreement that it becomes the property of the region. It was at that point or sometime later, I\u2019m not certain, that it was evident there may be a shortfall.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Autism Nova Scotia told the region’s staff that it believed that the municipality agreed to cover any cost overruns or funding shortages.<\/span><\/p>\n

District 1 Coun. Kevin Muise said he was involved in those negotiations and he doesn\u2019t recall any such agreement. He said he wasn\u2019t opposed to picking up the tab, but that council hadn\u2019t agreed in advance to do that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Other councillors said they were conflicted about the issue. They said the local fundraising group went \u201cabove and beyond\u201d in their efforts to get the park built and councillors didn\u2019t want to ask them to raise more money.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe majority of council felt it was very unfair … understanding the valuable work that Autsim NS does, it would be very unfair to ask them for another $51,000 because of all they\u2019ve done, and also felt it very unfair to ask the local fundraising committee to raise another $51,000.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Norman said it\u2019s money well spent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t imagine why anyone would question why the municipality should pay the remainder of the cost on something that we own. It’s a lovely play park that as region taxpayers, we paid $161,000 for. And there will always be the dissenters and the naysayers who will say it\u2019s the region\u2019s fault. It\u2019s a beautiful play park, and it\u2019s a lot of money to construct it, however it belongs to the region and the region is paying that outstanding amount.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The issue will come back to council\u2019s June 25 meeting, where they will vote on taking the money from their accumulated budget surplus.<\/span><\/p>\n

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Listen to the audio version of this story below<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/parkcostoverrunjun1124.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Region of Queens plans to pick up the tab for almost $51,000 that\u2019s still owed on the universally designed play park in Brooklyn. The $630,000 playground opened in October 2023. Named Etli Milita\u2019mk (pronounced ed-a-lee milly-dumk), it was the initiative of Queens County resident Debbie Wamboldt, who led private fundraising for the park and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5],"tags":[583,48,2326,79,1334,794,39,2064,214,351,2062,24],"class_list":["post-7449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community-news","category-news-posts","tag-autism-nova-scotia","tag-brooklyn","tag-cost-overruns","tag-darlene-norman","tag-debbie-wamboldt","tag-kevin-muise","tag-liverpool","tag-play-park","tag-playground","tag-queens-place-emera-centre","tag-queens-universally-designed-play-park","tag-region-of-queens"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7449"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7473,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7449\/revisions\/7473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}