Charles Dickson, editor

Funded by the Local Journalism Initiative

A proposal to develop a business plan for a garbage
incinerator project in MRC Pontiac has been approved
by mayors at a special meeting held at the MRC’s
Campbell’s Bay office last Wednesday.
In a 12-to-6 vote, the Council of Mayors passed
a motion authorizing consulting firm Deloitte to
proceed with the implementation of its proposal
under a contract for $120,000.
The Deloitte proposal describes its envisioned
work as “completing an initial business case (IBC)
that is intended to review the costs of the Pontiac
EFW [energy-from-waste facility] against a base-line
landfill option, and to recommend a plan that will
outline key steps needed to confirm waste supply,
obtain approvals and funding, and to execute the
procurement of the Pontiac EFW.”
The proposal identifies Danish company Ramboll
as a subcontractor that, with Deloitte, will form
an “integrated advisory team that will deliver the
services to complete the IBC.”
Last week’s decision to proceed with the Deloitte
proposal follows a decision taken by mayors at a
special meeting in August which, also in a 12-to-6
vote, set aside $100,000 from the MRC’s accumulated
surplus for a sole-source contract with Deloitte, in a
resolution that required “that this sum be committed
only after Council has approved the proposal
submitted by Deloitte for the production of the
business plan.”
An additional $20,000, all that remains of a $50,000
budget set aside four years ago for consultation on
the energy-from-waste project, was also allocated to
the development of the business plan, bringing the
total to $120,000, just under the $121,200 maximum
allowable under provincial rules for a sole-source
contract.
In the Council’s regular public meeting on August
16, the warden explained that Council had decided
to reduce the budget from
the previously-envisioned
$200,000 down to $120,000,
and that it would be solely
for the development of a
business plan and not include
an environmental assessment.
In her remarks at the
meeting of mayors last
Wednesday, Warden Toller
thanked mayors Donnie
Gagnon and Colleen Lariviere
for bringing to the Council’s
attention the requirement for
a vote on whether to establish
a contract with Deloitte based
on the company’s proposal, as
required by the August resolution.
“It is a fact that for any contract to move forward,
there has to be a resolution, so I thank Mayor Lariviere
and Mayor Gagnon for
calling this meeting today
so that we can vote properly
on the resolution,” said the
warden.
The warden then offered
the floor to mayors Lariviere
and Gagnon but, before
either could speak, a motion
was quickly proposed,
seconded and voted on to
shift the meeting to an in-
camera session. Over the
protests of several mayors,
the warden declared that
the motion had passed, the
Council would now continue
its meeting in private and the media, members of the
public and staff were asked to leave the room. The
better part of an hour had passed before the public
was invited back into the meeting.
Prior to the vote on the resolution to engage
Deloitte, comments from mayors were invited and
were largely favourable. The only dissenting views
were expressed by Litchfield Mayor Colleen Lariviere
who registered her disagreement with the allocation
of $100,000 from the MRC’s accumulated surplus to
this purpose, which she said could have been funded
from other sources, and Chichester Mayor Donnie
Gagnon who added “any money we spend here at the
MRC has an effect on all the municipalities.”
The vote was then taken with Alleyn-Cawood,
Allumettes Island, Bryson, Calumet Island, Campbell’s
Bay, Fort Coulonge, Mansfield and Pontefract, Portage
du Fort, Rapides des Joachims, Shawville, Sheenboro
and Thorne voting in favour of the resolution, and
Bristol, Chichester, Clarendon, Litchfield, Otter Lake
and Waltham voting against.
In a media scrum following Wednesday’s meeting,
the warden explained that the contract with Deloitte
would be split 50/50 with Ramboll, with $60,000 going
to each company. Asked why Ramboll’s participation
was required, given the warden’s earlier description of
Deloitte’s expertise in the field as sufficient justification
for a sole-source contract, the warden explained that
“Deloitte’s expertise is in the financial model, more
the financial business, how it’s all going to work with
the partners, the governance. What Ramboll will
give is the environmental, the technologies available,
what technologies would build different parts of the
incinerator, what it’s going to cost.”
Pressed on why Deloitte had been given a sole-
source contract rather than creating an open bidding
process in which other companies such as Ernst and
Young, KPMG, PriceWaterhouseCooper, among others,
could conceivably have brought forward proposals,
the warden said Deloitte was chosen because it had
done the business plan for Durham-York, the one
energy-from-waste facility that she and the mayors
had toured, “And we were impressed with it,” she said.
“We feel we are in good hands with Deloitte,” she
said.
The warden explained that Deloitte “opened
our eyes” to the fact that the project would need
additional expertise, and proposed three companies
for consideration by the Council: HDR, WSP and
Ramboll. Asked why Ramboll was chosen and
whether the warden and mayors had ever met with
Ramboll, the warden said “We had a couple of virtual
meetings when we were first reviewing the business
plan, and then, for the mayors, when we had our
plenary meeting, they were on the screen,” she said,
explaining that of the three recommended companies,
only Ramboll was granted the opportunity to join the
mayors via in their private plenary meeting earlier in
October via the internet.
“So, we’re still paying $120,000 but we’re actually
getting a lot more for the money than I had expected,”
said Toller.
“I thought at first it was just going to be like a
financial business plan. Bill McCleary raised the
concern about ‘is environment going to be mentioned
enough?’ Yes, it is. When you get your own copy, you
are going to see that the environmental part is going
to be covered well by Ramboll,” she said.
Asked about the timeline for the development of
the business plan, the warder said, “There is going
to be a preliminary report given to us in November
and then we’ll have a final report later, probably into
2024.”
Remo Pasteris of Bristol and Christine Anderson of
Thorne, members of the local citizens’ group Friends
of the Pontiac, made interventions during the public
question portion of the meeting.
Pasteris asked whether the planned environmental
assessment will take into consideration the potential for
public liability, citing cases in other jurisdictions where
toxic contaminants found in the environment led to
class action lawsuits resulting in the payout of millions
of dollars and what this could mean for tax payers. In
her response, the warden said the first step is to conduct
a business study and to identify the cleanest technology
available, with an environmental assessment to come
later. She said that while this is the first time she has
heard of environmental assessment and liability “going
hand in hand”, as Pasteris had put it, she said “that will
be something we will follow up with.”
Anderson said that a petition opposing the
incinerator project had already garnered more than
500 signatures, suggesting that support for the
initiative “it’s not the 100 per cent consensus that
you might think.” The warden replied that she had
never said she expected there would be 100 per cent
support for the project.
“It’s never 100 per cent, but a majority of people I
believe today have placed their hope in an opportunity
like this to look after our waste and be a leader in
Quebec,” she said.