Unforeseen issues prompted Kimberley city council to approve a budget increase for renovations at Centre 64.
City officials said it was boosted from $50,778 to $162,400 to broaden the roof upgrade project.
“It’s a fairly old building, and once we got into tearing things apart to fill them back in again, we found some issues that were not originally identified,” said Mayor Don McCormick. “Given the severity of a couple of these things, we needed to put some additional money in to fix those problems as well.”
The additional funding is meant to encompass the work needed to fix the issues.
“This is less about a cost increase and more about expanding the scope of work that needs to be done on Centre 64,” said McCormick. “You just never know what you’re going to find until you start tearing it down.”
McCormick said the money was taken from Kimberley’s reserve funds.
“The repair has no impact whatsoever on our tax rates or any costs from the taxpayer, apart from those reserves already generated from our taxes,” said McCormick.
The decision was made during an in-camera council meeting in August and made public on Oct 23.