THUNDER BAY – In a seven to five vote, Thunder Bay council has decided to recycle the James Whalen Tugboat and save the entire deck at the request of the Transportation Museum of Thunder Bay.
Wally Peterson, Chairman of the Transportation Museum of Thunder Bay, told Newswatch they are happy that council had voted in favour of recycling the James Whalen.
“We want to try and preserve as much of it as we possibly can and hopefully in the future that it would come to our site and then we could be the ones maintaining and looking after it,” said Peterson.
After a short presentation by Manager of Parks and Open Spaces Corey Halverson explaining this historical significance and outlining the specific area that the park department would like to salvage and restore for a future monument, a lengthy discussion followed with many councillors weighing the cost-benefit of recycling versus disposing of the tug.
Halverson took his report off of the Sept. 9 council agenda because further information was presented by stakeholders about preserving more of the tugboat.
Halverson wanted to make sure that his report reflected that information, while still meeting the intended recommendation in the agenda.
His revised report included that after consulting with the Transportation Museum of Thunder Bay they are recommending council consider the entire deck be preserved in one piece.
In light of the conversation with the Transportation Museum, Halverson still recommends that council consider recycling the James Whalen, but adds the Transportation Museum recommendation that the entire deck of the James Whalen be installed at Fisherman’s Park West, but on the condition that the cost would be no greater than 10 per cent above the costs for abatement, environmental remediation, and recycling of the vessel.
Halverson estimates costs for the necessary abatement, remediation and recycling, including the retention of selected pieces, to be approximately $135,000 for abatement and $155,000 for vessel recycling and preservation.
He noted that this estimate can vary, positive or negative, by 30 per cent.
However, the total cost can not exceed greater than $415,000.
“We're looking at approximately $300,000 to preserve select pieces and an EOI to determine whether or not we can include the deck or a reasonable cost, which is 10 per cent of the recycle of the restoration cost,” Halverson told council.
The total cost of disposing of the tug was estimated at $250,000.
Councillor Brian Hamilton was the first to ask Halverson what the final product would look like once the project was completed and the James Whalen found a home, but he wasn’t the last.
Nearly all the councillors around the table wanted to know where the monument's exact final resting place was, if there were any extra funding opportunities to help supplement the cost of construction, and even if the tourist attraction could be monetized.
City Manager John Collin put all inquiries to rest several times by simply stating that city staff did not know and reminded council that they couldn’t proceed to the next phases of the project until a decision on the recommendation was made.
Staff were asked to provide council with a recommendation on what to do with the historic tug.
Collin pointed out that phase three of the asset management plan was a year away.
“Council will regrettably have to continue to just balance decisions based on public need versus their understanding of the relative impacts of the decision they make," Colling said.
“I cannot give you any more than that in the coming months as to the relative ways of this will go because we just don't know yet.”
Councillors Mark Bentz and Trevor Giertuga thought the cost was too high on an asset that has been in disrepair for many years and essentially bleeding infrastructure dollars from more important projects.
“I'm all for heritage and I really appreciate the Transportation Museum wanting to maintain these assets," “Bentz said. "But, when you have an infrastructure deficit of over $30 million per year and in a total of billion dollars, we're told, do we wanna be spending $300,000 on a tug boat?
“That's saying obviously we weren't maintaining it. It's saying it cost us a million dollars to bring it from the bottom. And now we're gonna be spending a half million more.”
Bentz and Giertuga all noted that they would rather see the tug disposed of than recycled. Giertuga went as far as to ask for a motion disposes of the tug before council had a chance to attempt to defeat the recommendation.
Hamilton stated that the disrepair of the tug falls council's shoulders because of a lack of interest; particular, in his “lap” as the councillor of the Mackellar ward for the past six years.
“It's never come up in any budget to actually invest in the James Whalen before. I wouldn't rest that up an administration. Those budget directions are ours to own as a council," Hamilton said.
“So, I think when you're talking about the fault of the sinking and that expenditure that would fall on council and our ability to kind of have that vision. How we could have had that vision I don't know how we could have.
“But we didn’t choose to invest in it. We choose to keep taxes low. We chose to invest in other things and what, but ultimately, that falls on us and then to some degree of community.”
