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June 12, 2019

GOVERNMENT SERVICES COMMITTEE

Pursuant to Standing Order 68, Andrew Parsons, MHA for Burgeo - La Poile,

substitutes for Sarah Stoodley, MHA for Mount Scio.

Pursuant to Standing Order 68, Derek Bennett, MHA for Lewisporte - Twillingate,

substitutes for Pam Parsons, MHA for Harbour Grace - Port de Grave.

The

Committee met at 5:30 p.m. in the Assembly Chamber.

CLERK (Barnes):

Good evening, everyone.

I'm the

Clerk of the House. Before we get started, since this is the first meeting of

the Government Services Committee for this General Assembly, we will need to

elect a Chair and a Vice-Chair.

So,

with that, I will call for nominations from the floor.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I nominate Derek Bennett.

CLERK:

He's substituting tonight

for, I think, Ms. Parsons (inaudible).

MR. A. PARSONS:

Okay. I nominate Pam Parsons

then.

CLERK:

Okay.

All

those in favour, 'aye.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CLERK:

Okay, could I have a

nomination for Vice-Chair, please?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Elvis Loveless.

CLERK:

No, it's usually a Member

from the Opposition.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Is it? Well, definitely

Barry Petten.

CLERK:

Mr. Petten?

Okay,

so it's the Member for Conception Bay South.

All

those in favour, 'aye.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CLERK:

As Mr. Bennett is

substituting for Ms. Parsons, could you assume the Chair, please?

CHAIR (Bennett):

Okay.

Good

evening, everyone. We're here for the Estimates for Transportation and Works.

We'll start off by asking the Members of the Committee and staffers to introduce

themselves. We will start on the far end of the building.

So,

when you're ready, Sir.

MR. MORGAN:

Ivan Morgan, Researcher, NDP caucus.

MS. COFFIN:

Alison Coffin, MHA, St.

John's East - Quidi Vidi.

MR. RUSSELL:

Brad Russell, Director of

Research and Policy with the Official Opposition.

MR. PETTEN:

Barry Petten, MHA for CBS.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Loyola O'Driscoll, MHA for

Ferryland District.

MR. LANE:

Paul Lane, MHA for Mount

Pearl - Southlands.

MR. LOVELESS:

Elvis Loveless, MHA for

Fortune Bay - Cape La Hune.

CHAIR:

Just wait for your mics to

come on.

MR. LANE:

Okay, all right. I'll try

again.

Paul

Lane, MHA, District of Mount Pearl - Southlands.

MR. LOVELESS:

Elvis Loveless, MHA for Fortune Bay - Cape La Hune.

MR. BRAGG:

Derrick Bragg, MHA, Fogo Island - Cape Freels.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Andrew Parsons, MHA, Burgeo - La Poile.

CHAIR:

Thank you.

I'll

ask the minister to introduce his staffers and then we'll (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

I'll let the staff introduce themselves.

Steve

Crocker, Minister of Transportation and Works.

MS. KING:

Tracy King, Deputy Minister.

MR. MORRISSEY:

Patrick Morrissey, Departmental Controller.

MS. ANDERSON:

Eilanda Anderson, Executive Assistant to Minister Crocker.

MR. BAKER:

John Baker, Assistant Deputy Minister of Air and Marine Services.

MR. DUNFORD:

Joe Dunford, Assistant Deputy Minister of Operations.

MR. GRANDY:

Cory Grandy, Assistant Deputy Minister of Infrastructure.

MR. SCOTT:

Brian Scott, Director of Communications.

MR. BUTLER:

Greg Butler, Manager of Budgeting.

CHAIR:

Thank you.

For

Hansard, each time someone goes to speak, we'll ask you to make sure you say who

you are and make sure your light is on.

We'll

start off with Minister Crocker for opening remarks. We'll give you up to 15

minutes.

CLERK:

Will we be proceeding by

subhead, so the first subhead would be Executive and Support Services?

CHAIR:

If that's okay with the Members of the Committee, we can do 10 minutes. If we're

finished the subhead, we can vote or however you guys want to do it.

CLERK:

So we'll organize it by

subhead? Okay.

Subhead

1.1.01 through 1.2.06 inclusive.

MR. CROCKER:

I'm going to dispense of the opening remarks because I'm a big fan of anything

that New England can possibly win; primarily Super Bowls, but I'll take a

Stanley Cup. So, I'll dispense with opening remarks.

We will

do our best to answer whatever questions we have tonight. We'll actually record

anything that we can't answer and get you that information. We will provide an

electronic copy of our Estimates to the three groups opposite at the end of the

meeting.

Let's

go.

CHAIR:

We'll be starting from the Official Opposition. So, open with questioning and

we'll give you 10 minutes.

CLERK:

Fifteen to start.

MR. CROCKER:

Fifteen minutes, sorry.

MR. PETTEN:

Thank you very much.

I'm a

New England fan, too. I'm a Boston Bruins fan, actually, and I like the

Patriots, too.

I got

some questions I'm going to ask first, if you don't mind –

MR. CROCKER:

Sure.

MR. PETTEN:

–before we get to line by line.

Minister, are you still applying zero-based budgeting? Is that still –

MR. CROCKER:

We are.

MR. PETTEN:

You are? Okay.

There

are no errors in the public's Estimates book? That's just a question just for

the record. Not that you know of?

MR. CROCKER:

Certainly not that I'm aware of.

MR. PETTEN:

No, that's right, okay.

Is the

attrition plan still being followed?

MR. CROCKER:

We are following our attrition plan.

MR. PETTEN:

Are there any savings from this last – 2018-2019? Or any number of positions of

savings, do you have an idea of that?

MR. CROCKER:

I will be deferring some of these questions –

MR. PETTEN:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

– to staff, obviously.

Yes,

$809,000 would be our attrition target for this year.

MR. PETTEN:

So, in savings, like a number of positions for this year past, do you have the

positions or …?

MR. CROCKER:

Twenty-four less positions.

MR. PETTEN:

Twenty-four less? Okay.

Minister, how many contractual positions do you have in the department?

MR. CROCKER:

I can give you the breakdown if you wanted the full department and then you'll

have all your employee numbers.

Right

now, as of March 31, we had 1,653 employees. Sorry, 1,652; 84 of those would be

13-week assignments; 1,493 are unionized, non-management; 159 would be

management.

Did

that get your question, Barry?

MR. PETTEN:

Yes, I'm good.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay.

No,

sorry, I didn't – 10, sorry. Contractual was your question.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

There are 10 contractual employees.

MR. PETTEN:

Ten?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes; 517 temporary.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

What

did we say on positions going to be reduced through attrition, for this year,

what's the plan, for this year coming?

MR. CROCKER:

$809,000 in 24 positions.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay. That's the target for

this year, right?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

So,

Minister, are there any vacancies in the department that are not being filled?

Do you have an idea?

MR. CROCKER:

No.

MR. PETTEN:

No?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, there maybe vacancies waiting, just your normal vacancy rate –

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

– waiting to go to competition.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

The

Corner Brook hospital, when is the tenders for that going to be let, do you know

or do you have an idea?

MR. CROCKER:

We're in the RFP stage right now, that's being concluded, and we should have an

announcement on the Corner Brook hospital in the coming weeks.

MR. PETTEN:

Coming weeks? Okay.

Another

thing, too, there's a contractual position within your department that was

recently added. We went through ATIPPA and I know the name of the person but

that's irrelevant now, but we were trying to figure out – there was no

competition for this position. It was a position of a senior person with a

construction company in the city; I think you know who I'm talking about.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

There was no position; there

was no competition that was noted. Where does that fit into the equation? How

was that created? How did that come to be?

MR. CROCKER:

That's a contractual

position. That's a senior position coming in to fulfill some of the needs in

management of highway construction. We're always looking for good talent;

somebody who had left the private sector and was willing to come to the public

sector.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

There was a need. They had a

(inaudible) shortage staff issue?

MR. CROCKER:

Absolute need, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

What is the salary for that

position?

MR. CROCKER:

It's HL-23. We can get you

the salary but it's HL-23.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

One

other thing I don't think I got clear on: What was the attrition savings from

last year? We got it for this year's target, what was last year?

MR. CROCKER:

Approximately $1.2 million.

MR. PETTEN:

$1.2 million? Okay.

How

many positions?

MR. CROCKER:

In the department?

MR. PETTEN:

No, the last year, the

savings. Do you have the number of positions?

MR. CROCKER:

Can we get you that number?

MR. PETTEN:

Okay, sure.

One

other quick question, too: The Shoal Harbour causeway in Clarenville, is there

money set aside for engineering work on that? Is that in the Estimates?

MR. CROCKER:

That's not a TW project,

that's a municipal-owned piece of infrastructure.

MR. PETTEN:

TW is attached to it. Is

there some kind of –?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, when the initial

closure occurred –

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

– we provided some

engineering support –

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– just as a gesture as much

as anything. We did work with Clarenville on a few options that were available

at the time. We looked at a Bailey bridge for example. It didn't work. We

weren't able to get there, but my understanding that's a project that's been

applied for under Municipal Capital Works.

MR. PETTEN:

But there's no monies being

provided by your department to this.

MR. CROCKER:

It's not a TW asset.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay. I'll get to some of

the line-by-line stuff now.

In the

1.1.01, the Minister's Office, why the discrepancy in the Salaries? It's not a

big amount but what would be the change in that?

MR. CROCKER:

Would that be step for

Nancy?

MR. PETTEN:

From budgeted to revised

(inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, that would be step

increases.

MR. PETTEN:

Pardon me?

MR. CROCKER:

Step increases.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

There

are still people getting step increases in the staff there, I'm assuming,

obviously.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

I'm not sure exactly where

the step is. It could be as simple as a step for the EA or – probably not the

admin assistant but –

OFFICIAL:

No, it's Eilanda.

MR. CROCKER:

It's Eilanda. It's the EA.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

Minister's Office, Professional Services; it's not that common to have

Professional Services in the Minister's Office. Can you explain what that money

was spent on? Again, it's not a big amount but it's just –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, what line are we on?

MR. PETTEN:

It was $2,600 but it was not

budgeted any other time.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, that was the

minister's blind trust.

MR. PETTEN:

What's that?

MR. CROCKER:

The minister's blind trust.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

That was the legal fees for

my blind trust.

MR. PETTEN:

Gotcha.

Under

Transportation and Communications as well, the revised 2018-'19 Estimates saw an

increase of $17,000 spending over what was budgeted. In 2019-'20 Estimates it is

$11,100 less than what was spent. What's the increase over last year's budget

amount? Why the increase, I guess.

MR. CROCKER:

In travel?

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, Transportation and

Communications. Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah,

higher-than-anticipated travel requirements. We're working with Infrastructure

Canada and Transport Canada on some of the new bilateral agreements. It would

have been primarily trips to Ottawa.

MR. PETTEN:

Gotcha.

Under

1.2.01, Executive Support, Salaries, why has it increased by $45,000? Was there

a position added or …?

MR. CROCKER:

Step increases.

MR. PETTEN:

Step increase for that too?

MR. CROCKER:

The media relation's

position was vacant for part of the year but it's now filled.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

So, previously, the position

was vacant, now it's filled.

MR. PETTEN:

You have a director of

communications and a media relations person?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. PETTEN:

Under 1.2.02, Administration

and Support Services, under Salaries there was an increase of $1,008,000 in

spending over what was budgeted. This year it's back $286,000 less than what was

spent in 2018. Why the fluctuation?

MR. CROCKER:

It's a 28 per cent overage.

Overrun mainly due to attrition management target being taken from one activity.

Savings had to be achieved in other areas of the department to offset the

overrun and there are unfunded severance payments of $208,000 included in this

overrun.

MR. PETTEN:

$208,000 was severance?

MR. CROCKER:

Overrun and severance payments of $208,000.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

This was a part of the overrun.

MR. PETTEN:

But the rest that you're saying was through attrition? I'm not sure I follow it.

MR. CROCKER:

Do you want to …?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah, sure.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

The attrition management target for last year was all booked in one activity and

throughout the year it was put around the department as the attrition happened.

This year, we were able to budget that amount in the correct places.

MR. CROCKER:

Just to add to that, you'll probably recall that when the Estimates book was

done last year we had just completed our restructuring. This year, a lot of the

changes are realignment and adjusting budgets to reflect the changes that were

made.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay. I think I'm with you.

Under

Transportation and Communications, Estimates saw a decrease of $89,000 compared

to what was budgeted. 2019-'20 Estimates have this line item as $63,000 more

than what was spent. Again, can you explain the discrepancy there?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, the budget was rightsized during budget '19-'20. There are savings

projected for 2018-'19; however, this could vary on demand for such things as

inspections of Planning and Accommodations employees and travel for Occupational

Health and Safety employees. Postage costs were reallocated in the fiscal year

to 1.2.03, Strategic and Support Services.

MR. PETTEN:

Professional Services; again, the discrepancy there has gone up. I guess the

increase of $132,000 was spent and it's gone back to $5,800. What was the

reason? What was that $132,000 amount?

MR. CROCKER:

132,000? Yeah, overruns are due to the mobility procurement advisory service

required in 2018-'19. We actually secured a new mobility contract late last year

or early this year?

OFFICIAL:

Early this year.

MR. CROCKER:

Early this year. Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible) soon, but –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Which will achieve

substantial savings for the province.

MR. PETTEN:

On mobility?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah. We're going back to flip phones.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, I was wondering what you were going to go back to, a land line.

MR. CROCKER:

Just letting you know.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, that was my next question.

OFFICIAL:

It's more reliable.

MR. PETTEN:

Under Purchased Services there was a decrease of $17,000. Now, this year it's

$14,000 more than what was spent. I guess there are discrepancies in the

purchased, yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

The savings were savings on shredding and advertising costs. The $14,000 this

year is mostly due to advertising and shredding costs that were actually down in

2018-19.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

And

what's the revenue there, Minister? It went from $2.3 million down to $600,000.

What was that?

MR. CROCKER:

Sorry, $2.3 million?

MR. PETTEN:

The revenue line there, it is $2.3 million revised, and it was at $600,000

(inaudible) $1.7 million.

MR.

CROCKER: Sorry, I'm on the wrong

page.

The

revenue line is related to forfeited security bids, late salt delivery

penalties, payments from other Crown corporations related to reimbursement of

travel and salary costs for infrastructure projects in the prior year. The

increase in revenue is mainly due to insurance claims. We had a claim, actually,

on the Veteran that we recovered $1.4 million.

MR. PETTEN:

Oh, is that right? Do you get a lot of fees for late delivery of salt, a lot

late payment fees?

MR. CROCKER:

Well, we have toughened our policies on all contracts, actually, over the last

couple of years, whether it's liquidated damages for construction projects or

anything we do in order to keep a check on deliveries and make sure things are

getting in on time. We have been a little more diligent and a little more

forceful to our suppliers.

MR. PETTEN:

So this triggers my mind to another thing – and of course, I'll be all over the

place here. What was your spend on cold patch last year? What's your budget for

cold patch?

MR. CROCKER:

It's in the range of $600,000 to $700,000.

MR. PETTEN:

That's what we spent in a cold patch?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Has that been reduced now since we've got the asphalt recycler? See where my

interest levels go here.

MR. CROCKER:

I'm not sure, actually – Joe?

OFFICIAL:

We've been fairly consistent.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, that number has been fairly consistent.

MR. PETTEN:

It's consistently that price even with the asphalt recycling?

MR. CROCKER:

Even with the asphalt recycling. Asphalt recycling is good, but it really works

only in the very shoulder season.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

Because if you think about it, at that dead of winter, asphalt recycling is

tough and as soon as we can get hot asphalt, as soon as the plants come up in

late May, we switch to hot asphalt and we buy from local suppliers because – my

opinion, obviously – the worst thing you can put in a pothole is cold patch.

MR. PETTEN:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

Next thing would be recycled asphalt, but the best thing you can do is hot mix.

So as soon as we get availability of hot asphalt, we go to hot asphalt.

MR. PETTEN:

I would consider cold patch the biggest waste. It lasts for a day. It don't even

get a day sometimes.

MR. CROCKER:

I totally agree.

MR. PETTEN:

My time is up now, so I'll let my colleague go.

Thank

you.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, thank you, Sir.

CHAIR:

Ms. Coffin, if you're ready?

MS. COFFIN:

Yes, please. Thank you.

I think

most of my questions – the first part seems to have been answered, so I'll move

on to 1.2.04, Air Subsidies. Why the move? This was in 4.1.01, how come it got

moved over to Executive and Support Services?

MR. CROCKER:

That was the different areas of the department and it got moved over to

Corporate Services; it was more in line with the activity.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

Why are

there an extra $200,000 in Grants and Subsidies? What's that for?

MR. CROCKER:

Approximately $200,000 is required for Normans Bay. We've removed the ferry

service to Normans Bay and replaced it with helicopter service, and there's also

some funding in there as well with the changes that we made to the Black Tickle

ferry service.

MS. COFFIN:

How do you get cars on a helicopter?

MR. CROCKER:

There are no cars in Normans Bay.

MS. COFFIN:

I know, just kidding. I've been at Fogo Island an awful lot.

What

we're seeing now, Admin Support, we had an addition of almost $150,000 in

Property, Furnishings and Equipment. And then it went back to $100. What did you

buy? What was the tangible asset?

MR. CROCKER:

I'm sorry –

MS. COFFIN:

1.2.05, Admin Support, Property, Furnishings and Equipment.

MR. CROCKER:

You got it? Go right ahead, Tracy King.

MS. KING:

Through the year, we purchased more highway cameras for Lumsden and Rocky

Harbour, Cold Brook and St. George's. So we accumulated some savings in other

areas of the department, and this is the account that we paid for the capital

assets from.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. All right, what's the funniest thing you've seen on the highway cameras?

MS. KING:

I don't know.

MR. CROCKER:

Can I go on a tangent for a second?

MS. COFFIN:

Of course.

MR. CROCKER:

During the campaign I was actually going to stand out in front of the new

highway camera in my district like this, just because they freeze frame them for

a few hours.

MS. COFFIN:

They do, right?

MR. CROCKER:

I didn't do it, but …

MS. COFFIN:

You didn't? Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

No.

MS. COFFIN:

Well, we're going to be watching for that during the next campaign.

MR. CROCKER:

Next election.

MS. COFFIN:

Land Acquisition got an extra $250,000. What are we going to buy? Are we gonna

buy a bridge?

MR. CROCKER:

So, as you can see, we budgeted $2 million in –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, and did you spend –?

MR. CROCKER:

What it was, there was less than anticipated purchases in '18-'19. We didn't

expend our entire $2 million; we only spent $1.75 million.

MS. COFFIN:

Was there anything in particular you were planning to spend?

MR. CROCKER:

No, we buy land obviously, and we still have a lot of land settlements that are

out there from many, many years ago. One of the biggest contributors to that,

every year, has been Team Gushue. We're paying for land that was expropriated

for Outer Ring Road back 30 years ago.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, it is expropriated land.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, it's not we're gonna buy, I don't know, a wetland and put a hospital on

it.

MR. CROCKER:

No. We didn't have to buy

that.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

Let

see, what else do I have here? I notice that you did a slightly different

accounting of attrition than they had in Justice. In particular, in Justice I

think what they did was they took their savings and just took a portion off all

of their salaries.

You're

saying you had a slightly different approach to that, where you actually had

identified the positions and pulled the salaries out of each respectively – is

that correct?

MS. KING:

We took the target at budget

time out of one account and then, through this budget, as attrition came through

the year – so this year we budgeted in the places where we found the attrition

savings last year. We took them from a central location and then as we realized

the savings –

MS. COFFIN:

As the positions were finished.

MS. KING:

That's right, yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Can you give me an overview of the types of positions that – I'm trying to do a

past tense of attrition now.

MR. CROCKER: ' Attritted.'

MS. COFFIN:

There we go, we'll go with 'attritted.'

MS. KING:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

You've been 'attritted.'

MS. COFFIN:

The new Webster's, okay.

So were

they part-time positions or were they mostly Executive Support positions? Were

they internal positions? Were they Road Maintenance?

MS. KING:

They generally weren't Road

Maintenance. We've really tried to keep our staffing levels consistent in Road

Maintenance, so there are some in Administrative Support, I think there's some

Building Maintenance and there are some in Information Management. So we've

tried to spread it out across the department while keeping the front-line

service as full as possible.

MS. COFFIN:

This is what I was concerned about, the front-line service.

MS. KING:

We've also tried to look at

it through some of the reduction in overtime and call-back services to find some

of the funding that way.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. All right, excellent.

I think

that may be all of my questions in this section, and I think we're going to

finish up a

section at a time. So that was my questions in this section. I don't

know if the other …

CHAIR:

With the Committee's

approval, I'll give Mr. Lane an opportunity to ask some questions.

All in

favour?

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

Go ahead, Paul.

MR. LANE:

Thank you for that. And

thank you, Minister, for the opportunity.

I don't

have a lot of questions. I'm not going to be asking line-by-line questions –

MR. CROCKER:

Okay.

MR. LANE: –

because my colleagues can do

that. I have more general questions in a couple of areas.

The

first thing I do want to say though, Minister, before I start, is I don't have

the opportunity to have a lot of dealings with your department because of the

nature of my district, it's location and so on and primarily being the urban

area, other than from time to time Pitts Memorial Drive, the ramps coming on and

off Pitts Memorial Drive going into Southlands and going into Mount Pearl and so

on, and we have, from time to time, issues with potholes and now there's an

issue with line painting and all that stuff.

I just

want to say for the record, I don't want his head to swell too much, but Mr.

Dunford there has been my contact for the last three years. He's been very, very

co-operative and responsive and, in my opinion, he's the top of my book. So, I

do say that. He's doing a good job.

MR. CROCKER:

Now Salaries is gone up.

MR. LANE:

That's not to take away from anybody else, but that's the man I deal with when I

deal with Transportation and Works, and I do appreciate –

MR. CROCKER:

Just while you're looking, just to add to that, before I went in the House

today, he updated me on line painting for Costco.

MR. LANE:

Exactly.

MR. CROCKER:

It'll be done before Costco opens.

MR. LANE:

Exactly. (Inaudible) about

that, exactly. I hope that gets done before Costco opens because I suspect there

are going to be a lot of traffic snarls, for sure.

Anyway,

Minister, I don't have a lot of questions on this section. I do want to ask,

though, and I think it's the appropriate place because we're talking here about

– somewhere in here it talks about realty and so on, under this section.

MR. CROCKER:

(Inaudible.)

MR. LANE:

So, in terms of realty, I guess it sort of triggers a question in my mind: What

do we have outstanding? How have we done in terms of selling off unused

government assets? I'm not sure if this is exactly where it would fall but it's

close enough.

MR. CROCKER:

I can answer –

MR. LANE:

I'm just wondering where we are with that.

MR. CROCKER:

I guess we've done well. If you take the light vehicle fleet, as an example.

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

We've reduced the light vehicle fleet by – I think last year this time we were

around 1,100 vehicles in the light vehicle fleet. We're now down to –

OFFICIAL:

Under 1,000.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, so now we've come under 1,000.

The

reality is there's not a lot of cash in that because, obviously, you can only

imagine what we're –

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– for 100 light vehicles we took out of aren't really worth a lot, but,

obviously, they're worth a lot for the department because, obviously, we're

taking old stuff out that hasn't got to be – it's practically, I guess,

disposable. So, there's been savings there.

MR. LANE:

I'm thinking more about schools and –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE:

– office buildings and all that kind of stuff, more so than vehicles.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah. Okay.

So,

last year, we were able to get revenue of $555,000. For example, we sold the CNA

campus in Springdale for $336,000; Come By Chance mill building, $81,000; Fogo

Island public building $10,000.

I'll

give you an example, just in, I guess, this fiscal year we unloaded, I'll say,

or the Harbour Grace courthouse, we actually sold the land for about $56,000;

sold the building for a dollar, but, obviously, when you think about that, what

we're doing is getting rid of, in a lot of cases –

MR. LANE:

Expenses.

MR. CROCKER:

Well, expenses, and not only that, the liabilities on those properties.

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

And the fact of us even keeping the lights on, in a lot of cases. I think the

estimate on the Harbour Grace courthouse was probably in the $4- to $5-million

range for us to –

OFFICIAL:

To do – yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, for us to do something with the Harbour Grace courthouse, it was $4 to $5

million –

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– just to get it back. So, we're able to actually take that business and

actually sell it to a company –

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

– that now is going to use it, hopefully, for some economic benefit to that

region.

MR. LANE:

Yeah. So it's not just the revenue generated, but it's the money that's –

MR. CROCKER:

Right.

MR. LANE:

– saved on, whether it be power bills or whether it be security or whether it be

MR. CROCKER:

Insurance.

MR. LANE:

– insurance and all those things, right?

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely.

MR. LANE:

So, I imagine there are still quite a few facilities out there on the list that

could and probably should go. Am I right?

MR. CROCKER:

Right. One of the things we did – and I think Harbour Grace courthouse was the

first example of this –

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

– was we actually went out with an expression of interest, because what we heard

is that lots of times these old buildings were being sold to the lowest bidder;

public tender, lowest bidder wins it and they remain monuments to decrepitude in

a lot of cases.

So what

we've done now is we go out – and we're about to do the same thing in Carbonear

now with a couple of former long-term care homes. We're going to go out and ask

for an expression of interest and actually evaluate what can happen there. The

same as Harbour Grace. We had a company that came in and said this is what we

want to do with the property. We looked at economic benefit and employment

opportunities of growth.

that's the way we're looking at it more now. Instead of just going out to a

disposal tender and the lowest bidder getting it; it's how these buildings can

be actually reused.

Another

one we were able to remove last year from our inventory was Lab West hospital

and we're looking at a similar process right now for the Grace property, is go

out, have an expression of interest to see what somebody would – or the other

option, too.

What

government hasn't done in the past is involve a broker, a real estate agent to

go out and actually try and broker a deal to sell these properties. So that's

something we're looking at.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

I guess

that kind of leads to me to another question about the disposal properties and

the method that you're taking.

I think

it's good, particularly in some of the rural areas, to look at what can be done

with that property that makes good economic sense. Not just for the government,

in terms of the sale and off-loading some of the costs, but what makes sense for

the community and opportunities for economic development. I think that's right

on the money, as far as I'm concerned.

Certainly, in the urban area, the St. John's area, I'll say, one of the concerns

I've heard – and perhaps it's people speculating and not knowing all the

information, of course, but it's this whole idea of – I know, for example, I

thought I heard on the news last week or the week before that the Hoyles

Escasoni property is now up for sale for something like $3 million or

$3-point-something million.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE:

And of course the first thing you're saying is: That was a sweet deal. Someone

picked that up for a dime and is flipping it for three. I know the same thing

with the school on Bennett Avenue, it had asbestos in it and there are cost.

It's not as simple as just a flip. I understand that, but people do sort of

wonder sometimes about that –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE:

– is there a process in place to make sure that we're not just off-loading the

property, but we're getting reasonable value for the property in terms of what

it's actually worth and that someone is not making a fortune off of it.

MR. CROCKER:

You make a good point because that's the normal reaction on the street is –

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

– you got – I think we got $600,000 from those buildings?

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MS. KING:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

But we're talking – and we looked at repurposing those buildings but the cost

was astronomical, and these buildings are for sale now but they'd been fully

remediated.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

For example, those buildings, when somebody actually purchased those buildings,

they're purchasing the liability as well.

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

So you don't know what you're getting into. If you crack the ground and there

are hydrocarbons –

MR. LANE:

You're stuck with it.

MR. CROCKER:

– you're stuck with it.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE:

Yeah, and I guess the point being, again, is that I would think that if you're

going to put out an expression of interest or whatever it might be and somebody

comes in with a real low-ball number, you're saying: B'ys, even with the

problems, we're giving this away.

I would

hope that there will be some evaluation to say: Do you know what? We'd rather

hang on to it – and we're not going to settle for any price, it has to be a fair

price. Albeit, it would be nice to offload it, but we're not going to just give

it away and let somebody make a huge profit when –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE: – the

taxpayer should have gotten a better return on it, if you know what I'm saying.

MR. CROCKER:

Right. I think that's why we've started to do two things; number one was the

EOI.

MR. LANE: Yeah.

MR. CROCKER: So

you see what the building can become and what it has the possibility of

producing.

MR. LANE: Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

And the other one is where we want to go now with using a broker where we

actually go and hire a real estate company or a real estate agent to actually

take, for example, the Grace property –

MR. LANE: Yeah.

MR. CROCKER: –

and put it on the market.

MR. LANE: Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

And we're just trying to find a mechanism to actually do that as a way of –

MR. LANE: With

a fair appraisal process obviously.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, absolutely, and then if you hire a broker –

MR. LANE: Yeah.

MR. CROCKER: –

the broker's desire is get every single cent out of it because the broker is on

commission.

MR. LANE: Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

Right? So you've got somebody who wants to get the most value.

MR. LANE: Sure.

Thank you for answering that.

With that said, that's the only question that I have in

this sections. So, we'll move on with the vote, I guess, or you can vote.

CHAIR: Any

further questions to

section 1.1.01 to 1.2.06?

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, I do. Yeah.

CHAIR: Mr.

Petten.

MR. PETTEN:

Minister, 1.2.04, under Air

Subsidies.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

What were the emergency

situations? Under that heading it's for emergency situations. What would you

consider? What would be emergency situations in this one?

MR. CROCKER:

Do you want to speak to that, John? That would be any time a ferry is down.

OFFICIAL:

It's always mechanical breakdowns.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, if we have – is that where the Strait of Belle Isle would be now?

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

If you think about the ice conditions in the Strait of Belle Isle this winter,

when we used to have to put on air service, that's where that would be.

MR. PETTEN:

It's just like with the Qajaq this

past winter.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, or Mud Lake –

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

– or even Fogo. There are

times throughout year we got a fierce –

MR. PETTEN:

Or when the flooding

happened down in Fortune Bay - Cape La Hune those ferries that get isolated or

bridges wiped out.

MR. CROCKER:

Exactly. There are times we

had to put air support on to Fogo. I think last year we had to put air support

on to Fogo at one or two points.

MR. PETTEN:

Right on, emergency

situation, too, (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Exactly, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

Okay,

I'm good. That's it for this

section for us.

CHAIR:

Any further questions?

CLERK:

1.1.01 through 1.2.06.

CHAIR:

Shall 1.1.01 to 1.2.06

inclusive carry?

All

those in favour, 'aye.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

Opposed?

Carried.

motion, subheads 1.1.01 through 1.2.06 carried.

CLERK:

2.1.01 through 2.4.03.

CHAIR:

Shall 2.1.01 to 2.4.03

carry?

Ms.

Coffin, we'll let you lead off the questioning.

MS. COFFIN:

Thank you.

Starting with 01, Salaries, what we noticed is that there was an increase in

Salaries from '18 to '19 from budget to revised. That looks like it's a little

over $1.1 million. Then, the comparison between 2019 and 2018 budgets, there was

an increase of $370,000. That does not seem to reflect attrition particularly

well.

MR. CROCKER:

So the $1.1 million, the first –

MS. COFFIN:

2.1.01.01.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, the $1.1 million –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– increase is due to payment

of – there was $265,000 for reclassification of our maintenance and project

supervisors. They applied for reclassification. Their jobs were reclassified.

MS. COFFIN:

Did they get retro?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, okay, so that's what

captured some of that?

MR. CROCKER:

Obviously, that's a process

that every public employee can go through.

MS. COFFIN:

Absolutely.

MR. CROCKER:

The deficit also can be

attributed to unfunded severance payments of approximately $154,000. $347,000

was due to winter maintenance overtime and the other $338,000 relates to various

positions funded from other areas of the department.

MS. COFFIN:

Did you say there was an

unfunded severance?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, all severance is

unfunded, right?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Didn't we see other

severances in Employee Benefits? Have I seen them elsewhere in other

departments? Did I see that in Justice?

MR. CROCKER:

In other departments, but

all –

OFFICIAL:

Severance is budgeted within the department.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, all severance is

budgeted in the department –

OFFICIAL:

Not budgeted, is charged.

MR. CROCKER:

– and it's all unfunded, I

think, is it?

OFFICIAL:

Right, you have to (inaudible) that.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, no matter what –

MS. COFFIN:

No, I know it's unfunded;

I'm sitting on Public Accounts.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, true. Good point.

MS. COFFIN:

That's why they were getting

rid of it. But, no, I thought that the severance came under Employee Benefits

and not in Salaries.

MR. CROCKER:

Tracy?

OFFICIAL:

Sorry.

MR. CROCKER:

I'm sorry, Alison asked a

question – severance came under Salaries not –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, under Benefits and not

Salaries.

MR. CROCKER:

Under Benefits, not

Salaries.

OFFICIAL:

No, severance is budgeted under Salaries –

MS. COFFIN:

Oh, okay. I thought –

OFFICIAL:

– throughout the department.

MS. COFFIN:

– last night it was under

Benefits.

OFFICIAL:

No.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. All right, that's

reasonable.

Transportation and Communications, a big jump there: $127,000. Justice had an

issue with postage stamp increases. What's going on with you guys?

MR. CROCKER:

It's primarily attributed to

increased communication costs for internet services in the depots. There are

additional charges for the radios for remote locations and satellite phones in

Labrador. On the Trans-Labrador Highway we use satellite phones; we actually

lend satellite phones to the travelling public.

MS. COFFIN:

You bought extra or they

were extra expensive?

MR. CROCKER:

It's an increased cost in

usage.

MS. COFFIN:

Oh, people are using them

more.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah and it would continue

as the Trans-Labrador Highway becomes more –

MS. COFFIN:

Because it's becoming more

travelled.

MR. CROCKER:

Right.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, very good.

Did we

lose a position in Summer Maintenance and Repairs or more than one position in

Summer Maintenance and Repairs, Salaries?

MR. CROCKER:

2.1.02?

OFFICIAL:

2.1.02.

MS. COFFIN:

Is that another attrition

because I notice again it spiked a bit by – what is that ballpark, $400,000?

OFFICIAL:

So that's the (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Right here? Yeah, projection

includes, again, unfunded severance payout of $179,000 and overrun mainly

attributed to increase in summer maintenance requirements.

MS. COFFIN:

From '18-'19 for budget to revised, yeah, and then you had the drop.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

It doesn't seem like they did all right in severance or they didn't do very well

in severance, if your overall salary budget is $9 million and the payout is –

did you have a lot of new employees who got their severance?

MR. CROCKER:

That could be summer

maintenance.

MS. COFFIN:

It's just summer maintenance, right?

OFFICIAL:

Right, it's just summer

maintenance.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, these are just

summer maintenance.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, they would be less

eligible, hey?

MR. CROCKER:

Right. A lot of these summer

maintenance employees would be, actually, employees that are employed during the

winter as well, but they actually take a step back in the summer seasons. For

example, if you're an operator typically in the winter season, in the summer

season not everybody, but a lot of those operators, actually –

OFFICIAL:

Are labourers.

MR. CROCKER:

– fall back to labour.

They're given an option to stay on in summer maintenance as labourer positions.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. All right, so they

would get year-round employment, but not in the same –

MR. CROCKER:

Classification.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

What kind of Professional

Services do you get for $13,600? I noticed it's obviously not something that you

use regularly because it wasn't even budgeted.

OFFICIAL:

Railways, do you see it?

MR. CROCKER:

Railways.

OFFICIAL:

Railways, because railways

in Labrador.

MR. CROCKER:

Oh, okay, yeah. I just had

to do a double take because the word “railway” was there.

MS. COFFIN:

There was what?

OFFICIAL:

Railways.

MS. COFFIN:

Oh.

MR. CROCKER:

It's engineering consultant

services, including inspection services for railways and legal and engineering

services through the summer season. I had to take –

MS. COFFIN:

Why would we inspect

railways?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, we would.

MS. COFFIN:

Oh they still have them?

OFFICIAL:

Lab West.

MS. COFFIN:

Oh right.

You

guys still have a railway? Way to go. Okay, no, I'll take that, no problem.

Yeah, I am good; I'm totally good.

MR. CROCKER:

So it's a railway system.

MS. COFFIN:

Are they solid good?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, all right. That's

good. Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

They're used by the mining

industry.

MS. COFFIN:

All right, no problem. Sorry

everybody.

You

were expecting almost $50,000 in revenue. What do you make from revenue in

summer maintenance programs? How do get $200,000 in the summer maintenance? Are

you selling the wood chips on the side of the highway to the pellet plants?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible) guardrails.

MR. CROCKER:

Oh okay, gotcha.

MS. COFFIN:

What's going on? There's an

idea, right?

OFFICIAL:

Some work for

municipalities.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, so we do some small

work for municipalities if we're in an area.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

Also, in the summertime, if

you have an accident in the winter on the Outer Ring Road and you damage our

guardrail, we actually go after your insurance company for repairs to our

guardrail –

MS. COFFIN:

All right.

OFFICIAL:

And highway access fees

which is the biggest part.

MR. CROCKER:

– and highway access fees.

If you're building – primarily, I guess that will be in rural Newfoundland.

OFFICIAL:

Well, Route 60.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

What's that?

MR. CROCKER:

Just leave Barry out of this

conversation.

MS. COFFIN:

Totally. Cover your ears.

MR. CROCKER:

So if you want access to a

highway, we actually charge for that service.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

Yeah, the highway access

fees.

MR. CROCKER:

The highway access fees.

MR. PETTEN:

(Inaudible) cordoned off.

MS. COFFIN:

Oh yeah, tell me more.

MR. PETTEN:

I could tell you, I could write books on that.

MR. CROCKER:

It was the only thing –

MR. PETTEN:

(Inaudible.)

MS. COFFIN:

Oh.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, and he wrote it, and

now he don't like it. He couldn't even get Brazil to change it.

MR. PETTEN:

I got lots of plans for that.

MS. COFFIN:

Once upon a time, 2.1.02 was called the Sign Shop.

MR. CROCKER:

2.1.02?

MS. COFFIN:

No, you won't find it there because it was once upon a time.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay.

MS. COFFIN:

It is no longer it seems.

MR. CROCKER:

The Sign Shop?

MS. COFFIN:

Where did the Sign Shop go?

MR. CROCKER:

Joe, can you –?

MS. COFFIN:

Are there no more signs –

MS. KING:

Oh no, I got it.

MS. COFFIN:

– which would explain why I am so ticked off with some of the stuff going out to

Holyrood.

MS. KING:

It's just realigned in the department under Equipment Maintenance to fit the

structure of the department, that's all.

MS. COFFIN:

Right, okay, just curious about that.

MR. CROCKER:

Alison, when you ticked off

where a road sign that you see you don't like, or that needs to be repaired,

pull over, take a picture and send it to Joe. I do it all the time.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

As an

example, my favourite sign so far is the sign for The Shoppes at Galway, and the

two agents that you can contact are Jim Pushie and Verna Bulley. Just so you

know, in case you want to get a shop there.

Here we

go, how about this? We're moving on to Snow and Ice Control now. It looks like

we're getting some extra money from revenues there?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MS. COFFIN:

The $4 million goes up to $4,040,000, although we didn't –

MR. CROCKER:

So revenue on snow clearing

is primarily revenue from municipalities. We receive about $1 million from

municipalities for snow clearing. We receive about $2.2 million from sales of

salt and sand to municipalities, and we also receive $840,000 for snow clearing

and ice control in the national parks.

MS. COFFIN:

You get that from the feds for the national parks?

MR. CROCKER:

We do.

MS. COFFIN:

They have much better highways than us.

Okay,

let's go to Snow and Ice Control. As it's written, our impression is this was an

easier year than most for snow clearing, and it certainly seemed to be.

Traditionally, this line item is a big number. Interesting to see that it's $4.6

million more spent than anticipated. Last year you were over budget by $4.3

million.

How

does the department make your projections – Farmers' Almanac?

MR. CROCKER:

We do it based on an average

because obviously, as you can appreciate, that's one thing we can't predict. We

got hammered this past winter on the West Coast and the Northern Peninsula –

absolutely hammered. So we make an estimate, based on previous years, but you

never know.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, I had assumed that.

Does

the department have any way of counting how many times the Plow Tracker has been

accessed? And, if so, can we get a breakdown of those numbers?

MR. CROCKER:

We can get you the Plow Tracker number; it's not as impressive as the highway

camera –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, I totally look at the highway cameras –

MR. CROCKER:

Eight hundred and eleven thousand views on the highway cameras this past year.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, that makes sense. I check them three times before I head out over the

highway.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Plow Tracker not so much?

MR. CROCKER:

Plow Tracker's numbers aren't there, but we're trying to build awareness of Plow

Tracker. And early Plow Tracker, we ironed out some bugs, we're getting there.

But it is a service that we want people to –

CHAIR:

Your time is expired, Ms.

Coffin. I'm going to ask Mr. Petten and Mr. O'Driscoll.

MR. PETTEN:

Thank you.

Under

2.1.01, Grants and Subsidies, there's an increase of $100,000 in spending over

what was budgeted. Could you provide what was or an itemized list of those

(inaudible)?

MR. CROCKER:

That was a one-time grant to the Grand River Snowmobile Club for enhanced

snowmobile safety in Northern Labrador, construction of safety shelters,

because, obviously when you get onto the north coast trail markings, there's a

lot of activity in the winter months. That's their roadway is snowmobile trails.

So it was safety enhancements. It's a budget 2018 commitment.

MR. PETTEN:

But is that a normal thing that's included in budgets – is that a normal thing

we provide monies for, snowmobile trails?

MR. CROCKER:

It was a one-time – but remember, this is not –

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. CROCKER:

Right, it's typically done through Labrador Affairs, but it's not really

recreational snowmobile trails we're talking about here. We're talking about

people commuting from Makkovik to Nain or from Nain to Natuashish, so it's

really about personal safety.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

I am just wondering, the Team Gushue Highway, is that set to be finished this

year?

MR. CROCKER:

It's not set to be finished this year. We're committed to working the next

phase, the subgrade work this year. The challenge we have right now is we're

looking at the final reconfiguration of it and the engineers are going back.

Because if you look Team Gushue Highway, I think it dates back three or four

decades, the original scoping of the plans.

It was

only today I had a conversation with the MHA for Mount Pearl North about how we

concluded there. So we're actually revisiting the plans that would've been made

decades ago to see what can be done. And we've actually gone back to the federal

government asking, even though this project is funded and was funded many years

ago for completion, if there are opportunities to actually tie it more directly

into the Harbour Arterial, Route 2.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

Because there is some structural work that's going to have to happen on Route 2

in coming years and this may be an opportunity to bring it all together.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

I guess the other one I would ask: The Witless Bay Line, is there anything in

the future that you have planned for Witless Bay Line?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah. So we actually forwarded the Witless Bay Line to Ottawa under the trade

and transportation fund. They came back and told us that it's not something that

they wanted to put forward for funding. But we haven't given up on trying to

fund it through that.

We're

going to change our business case a bit because the trade and transportation

fund that's available through the federal government is based on international

trade, exports. And we're making the argument that Bay Bulls has become an

industrial hub when it comes to the oil industry.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

So we're looking at this as an opportunity not only to upgrade the Witless Bay

Line to a better highway – not only resurface it but a better highway because of

the activity that's likely to be seen there in the future.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

The problem with that is sometimes I hear that it's considered a secondary road

rather than a primary road. How did that change, I wonder?

MR. CROCKER:

I think that's why we're trying to actually elevate it into the trade and

transportation to actually be able to do not only resurfacing, but if you look

at the road it's actually a secondary road.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

It has become, I think, a trade link.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

It was, yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

But it's becoming a trade link. If there is anything heavy coming out of Bay

Bulls right now, industrially, it's coming up through there. We've seen that

with Bull Arm –

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Bull Arm, Pennecon.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

And the same issue with the crab trucks and stuff like that, this is the main

highway that cuts off –

MR. CROCKER:

Right, absolutely. It is certainly a road that your predecessor kept it on the

agenda and I'm sure you will too.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Yeah, thank you.

MR. PETTEN:

Under 2.2.01, Salaries,

there is an increase of $671,000.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

That

was a part of Budget 2018, when we took all of government's fleet into the

department. Every department in government would've had somebody managing their

portion of the fleet. When we took the entire government fleet into TW, this was

for a light vehicle coordinator, a maintenance coordinator and a clerk III.

OFFICIAL:

Three positions, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Three positions.

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible) say that last part because (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Tracy just tells me I need to say the last part.

OFFICIAL:

Because they weren't

(inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Also, there was an error

made as some positions were funded under this activity instead of snow and ice

control. This does not represent an increase in positions.

MR. PETTEN:

So those three positions, they weren't new positions? The three positions the

minister just referred to?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah, we used other

vacancies.

MR. CROCKER:

We use other departmental vacancies. This activity will be realigned now once we

get the fleet totally integrated into the department.

MR. PETTEN:

How many vehicles are in that fleet now?

MR. CROCKER:

Slightly under a thousand.

MR. PETTEN:

Right and TW are administering all the vehicles for all departments now.

OFFICIAL:

Except the RNC.

MR. CROCKER:

Except the RNC.

MR. PETTEN:

Except the RNC.

MR. CROCKER:

It's getting to a point we're trying to get to almost a rental car-type

operation. What we found when we reviewed the fleet, we had some government

departments with vehicles with 10,000, 11,000 and 12,000 kilometres on them and

then we had some other departments, like FLR and TW, with 300,000 on them;

bringing the fleet in and having somebody coordinate and coordinate maintenance.

The

Auditor General questioned the fact that government wasn't even taking advantage

because of coordination of warranties on vehicles. We weren't getting our

vehicles back to dealers for warranty. By bringing it in, we're trying to

operate it more like you would see at a car rental.

MR. PETTEN:

2.2.01, I guess I'm going to answer my own question maybe, but in Transportation

and Communications there's an increase of $477,000. Is that all to do with

vehicle fleet?

MR. CROCKER:

No, that's additional communications costs associated with RWIS and the AVL

units in the department's fleet.

MR. PETTEN:

Under Purchased Services, 2018-'19 Estimates saw an increase of $864,000 in

spending over what was budgeted. In 2019-'20 the Estimate was at $1.934 million

less than what was spent 2018-'19. There's a discrepancy there.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, so the $884,000 represents overruns due to additional costs required for

repairs on light vehicles and heavy equipment. Costs can vary based on

availability of house staff and the complexity, obviously, of the work, labour,

materials. We actually had an early start to winter this past year, resulting in

additional repairs to the heavy equipment fleet on the West Coast.

Your

$1.9 million represents a variance due to the department's reallocation of funds

to its equipment fleet. As a result, we'll be adding heavy –

OFFICIAL:

Right, so we're taking

funding out of this account to buy more (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Right, okay.

What's

happening down here in the $1.9 million is we're taking funding from this line

to actually – we're moving to a capital lease program on some of our heavy

equipment. That's going to enable us, actually, to renew the fleet quicker than

we would have had traditionally.

MR. PETTEN:

Are you buying any new tow plows this year?

MR. CROCKER:

I don't think we are. Are we, Joe?

It's

not in that particular (inaudible). Yeah, we haven't had any. No, I don't think

so.

MR. PETTEN:

Don't think? How many do we have now, two?

MR. CROCKER:

Two, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

Under

2.2.02 in Equipment Acquisitions, there's an increase of $632,000 over what was

budgeted.

MR. CROCKER:

This relates back to what we just talked about. This relates back to –

OFFICIAL:

This is the reallocation.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, it's a reallocation of funds from the equipment maintenance budget to

enter into capital leases to increase our heavy equipment fleet. We also added

$632,000, this allocation, again, for the entering into capital leasing.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay. A quick one now before my time is up for this round.

Revenue; there's a large increase in the revenue from what was in the budget. It

went up by 320,000.

MR. CROCKER:

Right. We actually consolidated a lot of our old equipment that was around in

yards and actually had an auction this year where we got $320,000.

MR. PETTEN:

That's the sale of old equipment.

MR. CROCKER:

Sale of – and I mean old – equipment.

MR. PETTEN:

How do you do that, through tender?

OFFICIAL:

We did an auction.

MR. CROCKER:

No, we did an auction.

MR. PETTEN:

Auction (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Well, actually, I think we used Roche, was it?

OFFICIAL:

I don't remember.

OFFICIAL:

Oh yeah, Roches, yeah.

OFFICIAL:

We did have an (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, I think we used –

OFFICIAL:

Roche's actually.

MR. CROCKER:

I know we did one in Clarenville; we did it on the West Coast and –

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

OFFICIAL:

PPA managed them for us.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, Public Procurement Agency actually managed the auction for us.

MR. PETTEN:

Proof you can sell anything.

MR. CROCKER:

What?

MR. PETTEN:

It is proof you can sell anything.

MR. CROCKER:

Well, I can tell you, you need to look back through Roche's auctions and see

what it was they had there. There's proof that you can sell anything.

CHAIR:

Your time has expired.

Ms.

Coffin, do you have any further questions?

MS. COFFIN:

Oh, I'm sorry –

CHAIR:

1.101 to 2.4.03?

MS. COFFIN:

Yes, I do. I am very sorry;

I didn't quite hear you say my name. I thought you said someone named Scott or

something – very confused.

Go back

to Snow and Ice Control here. Has the review for the tow plow pilot project –

this is hard to say – been completed? If so, what are the results? Or if not

done, when will it be done? Can we see the report, please?

MR. CROCKER:

I don't think there was a

report completed. We purchased our first tow plow and it went into service the

winter of '17.

MS. COFFIN:

I spent several hours behind

it.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes. Unfortunately, most

people do when you get caught behind it, but that is the reality of safe roads.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, totally.

MR. CROCKER:

It was successful and we

actually, in this year, brought the second one into service. We now have two tow

plows in the province.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, so there has been a

review?

MR. CROCKER:

Well, yeah, obviously we

reviewed it. It was successful. We purchased the second one.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, no report. Okay, very

good.

Where

am I now? Snow and Ice Control is done. Let us go back to Equipment

Acquisitions, 2.2.02, Property, Furnishings and Equipment.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

What do we get for $632,000?

That's the extra.

MR. CROCKER:

That's capital leases,

right?

OFFICIAL:

That's been (inaudible).

MS. COFFIN:

Is that the extra tow plow?

Are we getting a new one next year?

MR. CROCKER:

No, that's the allocation

for our new capital leasing program. I think that primarily, at this point,

reflects – what is it – 16 loaders?

OFFICIAL:

Twenty.

MR. CROCKER:

That reflects our going in

the capital leasing program. So far we've acquired or procured 20 new loaders

for next season.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

Let's

go back to the capital leasing program. If it is being leased, then the person

from whom you lease this piece of equipment does the maintenance on it?

MR. CROCKER:

I am going to defer to Joe.

I don't think so.

MR. DUNFORD:

I'd have to check the terms

and conditions for our lease, but my understanding is it's for those first four

years, yes.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, so we can confirm that

for you, but Joe's understanding or his recollection on this is it does for the

first four years. We can confirm that.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, so will that affect

our staffing levels in the maintenance?

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely not.

One of

the challenges we always have – you can look at the job board any time at all –

we are always advertising for heavy equipment technicians constantly. We cannot

MS. COFFIN:

Are they underpaid?

MR. CROCKER:

Do you know a journeyperson

heavy mechanic?

MS. COFFIN:

I do.

MR. CROCKER:

Send him our way.

MS. COFFIN:

She's awesome and she has an

apprentice now and she is also a really good hockey goalie.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

I'll send any more that I

know along the way. Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, we're always hiring heavy equipment technicians.

MS. COFFIN:

Awesome. Okay, that's good to know.

Let's

go 2.3.01, Salaries. Did we lose positions there that was also attrition?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, that's the attrition management plan.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

Leased

Accommodations, Purchased Services, we saw an addition from '18-'19 from budget

to revised of an extra $440,000, that was a surprise. What did they surprise you

with?

MR. CROCKER:

Well, in 2018, we were given the financial responsibility for all the government

leases, as of April 1. During this process, the lease funding from core

government departments was transferred to TW, and due to an oversight during the

process, the department did not receive the entire expenditure funding for some

of the leases. As a result, the funding was provided to the department to right

size the budget.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

Alterations and Improvement to Existing Facilities, we see Grants and Subsidies,

someone got $140,000. Who was subsidized for that? I also see, I don't know if

this is related at all, the revenue there, as well. You have a chunk of revenue

come in?

MR. CROCKER:

There was an old fish plant on the Northern Peninsula in Sandy Cove that, for

whatever reason, government owned, and we were able to reach a cost-shared

agreement with the feds for the demolition.

MS. COFFIN:

They paid you? The Grants and Subsidies or the revenue?

MR. CROCKER:

The demolition was around $300,000, and we gave the feds $140,000 towards that.

MS. COFFIN:

We gave the feds $140,000 and then – okay, the revenue is then what? Those are

unrelated things, are they?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, excellent, so the revenue came from …?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, the revenue came from the properties that I mentioned earlier, I think, to

Mr. Lane's questions around Springdale CNA, Come By Chance mill building, Fogo

Island building and other –

MS. COFFIN:

This is where everything falls in here?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, so when we are divesting ourselves of things, it falls under Alterations

and Improvements or divesting?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, interesting.

2.3, do

I have anything here? Low Carbon Economy all of a sudden disappeared. Perhaps

high-helium economy?

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, yeah, so we're going to get into a lot of this as we go through.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, look at that, because the Low Carbon Economy continues into 2.3.06.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, so this is the current account, and what you're going to find is when you

go forward to the capital accounts, our expenditures now are gone, primarily,

into the capital account versus the current account.

MS. COFFIN:

So, we're buying capital? What's – hang on now.

MR. CROCKER:

So the –

MS. COFFIN:

Cost shared –

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. CROCKER:

So, obviously, the current account is primarily maintenance.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

But the money is gone into capital because, obviously, the improvements to the

buildings are more capital improvements rather than current improvements.

They're substantial improvements to buildings. That put –

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

– them back as an asset.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, okay. Because sweeping the floors and patching a roof or mowing the grass

is current, but if you are –

MR. CROCKER:

We're putting back some book value.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. All right. So, that's why it's got moved.

Are you

using green technology here?

MR. CROCKER:

We would have to, actually, because this is a federal-provincial agreement,

again.

MS. COFFIN:

This is under the federal-provincial, okay.

MR. CROCKER:

So, we would have to make sure that we're meeting the requirements of the

bilateral agreement.

MS. COFFIN:

Right. So, one would hope that there's not going to be as much mould in these or

asbestos.

MR. CROCKER:

Right.

Primarily, a lot of this fund from Transportation and Works' perspective, we're

going to use it to electrify some of our public buildings, getting them off

fossil fuels. CNA campuses, I think, are one example.

OFFICIAL:

On of the biggest.

MR. CROCKER:

One of the biggest examples that we're taking is the CNA campuses off oil and

putting them onto electricity.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. Is that going to be part of rate mitigation?

MR. CROCKER:

I think it's considered in rate – yeah, it is. It's a very small factor in rate

mitigations, but it is about electrification and using green energy.

MS. COFFIN:

Here's a question that's going to transcend a couple of departments then.

So,

would the College of the North Atlantic – do you know if they're going to get a

greater subsidy or are they just going to get electrification and a rate shock

and less funding?

MR. CROCKER:

We already paid our utility bills.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, for college. All right. Okay. MUN complained about that type of thing,

right?

MR. CROCKER:

We don't handle MUN (inaudible).

OFFICIAL:

No.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

But just to your point, Alison. We don't pay MUN's utility bill. We pay CNA's

utility bill.

MS. COFFIN:

I know.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay.

MS. COFFIN:

I looked at MUN's books and

they go: We have utilities and they're going up. I've had that conversation a

number of times as well.

Airstrip Operations, perhaps far more concerning than the Professional Services

that have gone up. Were those Professional Services used to study the Nain

airstrip?

MR. CROCKER:

Professional Services – is that the $151,000? Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

I've got $250,000 under 2.4.01.01, Professional Services.

MR. CROCKER:

That's increased consultant costs?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

That's increased funding for consultant cost for ֹ'19-ֹ'20 to comply with

Transport Canada regulations.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. So, has there been a study of the Nain airstrip or the potential for that

or the –?

MR. CROCKER:

So, there was an update to –

Ottawa and the Nunatsiavut Government, last year, updated an older study, and

right now it's my understanding that Nunatsiavut Government has again applied to

ACOA, or to the federal government for, I guess, the next phase of that study,

which would lead to further studies. Well, a more, I guess, on-the-ground-type

study, but –

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. So the first study was

about feasibility and –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, the first –

MS. COFFIN:

– the second study will be

about location and timing, perhaps?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah. So the first study was

an update to a study that was done –

OFFICIAL:

More than five years ago.

MR. CROCKER:

– more than five years ago.

MS. COFFIN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

So that study got dusted

off. That study now leads to – exactly what you said – a more detailed study. I

think it's valued somewhere around the $250 million mark and –

MS. COFFIN:

So is that what is budgeted

for? No, it's not.

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely not.

MS. COFFIN:

When is that budgeted?

MR. CROCKER:

The Nain airport –

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

We can be clear that the

Nain airport is the responsibility of the federal government.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. So that's why they're

going through –

CHAIR:

Ms. Coffin, your time has

expired again.

MS. COFFIN:

All right.

CHAIR:

We're having fun; time

flies.

MS. COFFIN:

It does.

MR. PETTEN:

Thank you.

2.3.02

under the Leased Accommodations.

MR. CROCKER:

2.3.02, yeah, sorry, go

ahead there.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

How

many leases does the provincial government currently have?

MR. CROCKER:

Tracy –?

OFFICIAL:

Tracy will get it shortly.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

Two hundred and forty-eight (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Two hundred and forty-eight.

MR. PETTEN:

Six –?

MR. CROCKER:

Two hundred and forty-eight.

MR. PETTEN:

Two hundred and forty-eight.

What is

the normal lease term when the department goes to tender?

MR. CROCKER:

Typically, it's a five and

five.

MR. PETTEN:

Five year with a five-year

renewal option.

MR. CROCKER:

Five year with a five-year

option, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

That's okay.

The

extension option is five years always, isn't it?

OFFICIAL:

Generally.

MR. CROCKER:

Generally, yes.

MR. PETTEN:

But they always have an

extension option, don't they?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, we always ask for an

extension option.

MR. PETTEN:

It's an option, right?

MR. CROCKER:

I think the majority of the

time we exercise our option.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

What

sort of circumstances do you normally use an extension option? Like, what's –?

MR. CROCKER:

A quick-market sounding.

OFFICIAL:

Quick market, like, if you think the market price is good.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, right. So, obviously,

it's not really difficult when you're in a market. For example, if you take St.

John's, you know what your market is. If it's $27 today and you have a $25

option, you take your option. If the market were –

MR. PETTEN:

Based on the market.

MR. CROCKER:

Based on the market at the

given time.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

So do

we have any leases right now outside the normal lease terms?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, we do.

OFFICIAL:

Definitely.

MR. CROCKER:

Definitely.

MR. PETTEN:

Is that right?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

Again,

we evaluate those on a case-by-case basis too, because if we have a landlord

that's willing to continue on in a month-to-month and it's favourable to us,

obviously – if you're in a month-to-month, most of the time that's favourable to

the tenant.

MR. PETTEN:

Could we get an itemized list of those leases and terms?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, it's all available on the website, but if you want us to –

OFFICIAL:

We'll send that along.

MR. PETTEN:

It's available on the website?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Do you have any leases at 20 years or more? Are they available on the website,

too?

MR. CROCKER:

They would be. I'm not aware of any –

MR. PETTEN:

Twenty?

OFFICIAL:

The only (inaudible) new FLR.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, the new FLR building would be in that. I think you would find, too, there

were some long-term leases entered. Eastern Health went into some long …

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

We have a smattering of them.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

There

is a smattering of them around. There were some long-term leases entered into.

When Justice took enforcement from FLR, they went into some big leases.

MR. PETTEN:

It's not the norm, though. Twenty years is not the norm for your leases.

MR. CROCKER:

Not unless if you look at when Justice took the enforcement from FLR, it makes

sense if you're looking at getting a new build over a long period of time. If

you know you're going to be there in that place for a long period of time, it

makes sense to get new builds.

Eastern

Health does it. If you think about the building that was repurposed in Holyrood

– it's Eastern Health there now – that's obviously a long-term lease.

MR. PETTEN:

Right, based on the investment that's required.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Fair enough.

The

acronyms, right? Welcome to government – 2.3.04 – it takes a while to get used

to it.

MR. CROCKER:

2.3.04?

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

How come I don't have that?

OFFICIAL:

2.3.04?

MR. CROCKER:

I'm already there. No, I'm

not.

MR. PETTEN:

Purchased Services.

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. CROCKER:

The tab is wrong.

MR. PETTEN:

Under Purchased Services,

what's the discrepancy? You go from $11 million, almost $12 million, down to $8

million, back up to $12 million.

MR. CROCKER:

I'm sorry, Barry, bear with me for a second, 2.3.04?

OFFICIAL:

2.3.04.

OFFICIAL:

2.3.04.

MR. PETTEN:

We'll be here until 9:30.

OFFICIAL:

Oh, it's there; it's a just numbered wrong, I think.

MR. CROCKER:

Oh, it's numbered wrong.

OFFICIAL:

Sorry.

MR. PETTEN:

Oh.

OFFICIAL:

That's my bad.

MR. PETTEN:

Very good.

OFFICIAL:

Here we go.

MR. CROCKER:

Go ahead.

MR. PETTEN:

Under Purchased Services you have that it went from $12 million, basically, down

to $8.8 million, back up to $11.6 million. What's the fluctuation there?

MR. CROCKER:

Purchased Services; that's schools A and I, basically, due to project delays.

One of the challenges that we have year after year in schools A and I is

actually getting the projects complete. If you think about it, doing repairs to

a school, especially if it's a structural repair, you have a small window.

Really, you have summer, so schools A and I is a challenge.

OFFICIAL:

We had a project planned in

Exploits Valley that we didn't get done last year.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah. Last year, for

example, we had a big project at Exploits Valley that we weren't able to get

done. Obviously, in this case, primarily, we're working with the Newfoundland

with their priorities.

MR. PETTEN:

So somewhat of a carry-over.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes and the budget stays the same.

MR. PETTEN:

2.4.02 now.

MR. CROCKER:

2.4.02, Airstrips?

MR. PETTEN:

I thought I was waiting for you.

MR. CROCKER:

No, Airstrips?

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Oh you thought you were waiting for me?

MR. PETTEN:

I was waiting for you. It's a long day.

MR. CROCKER:

I can't read your mind yet, Barry.

MR. PETTEN:

Getting close.

How

many airstrips does the provincial government operate or are responsible for?

MR. CROCKER:

Joe, 13?

MR. DUNFORD:

(Inaudible.)

OFFICIAL:

Twenty.

MR. CROCKER:

We're responsible for 20, 12 of which are in Labrador. The 12 in Labrador would

be sked, right, they're certified. Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, the 12 in Labrador would be certified strips because they're scheduled

flights.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay. Could we get a list of them or are they online?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, we can.

MR. PETTEN:

What changed for Airstrips in 2019-'20 there?

MR. CROCKER:

On what line?

MR. PETTEN:

We're down here in 2.4.03.

There's

no –

OFFICIAL:

That's just capital split in

the projects.

MR. PETTEN:

Under capital, I guess.

MR. CROCKER:

That's the current capital split in the projects.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah. The current –

MR. CROCKER:

And the capital split.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

Most of the work that we

would do on airstrips would be current, right?

OFFICIAL:

Next year would be capital.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, so the change would be the work we did this previous year would've been

current and the work that we're planning for this year would be capital.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay (inaudible)

section now.

For

that

section that's all I got left, yeah.

CHAIR:

Any other questions on 2.1.01 to 2.4.03?

Ms.

Coffin.

MS. COFFIN:

Airstrips: “Appropriations provide for the purchase of tangible capital ….”

There's $999,900 for –

MR. CROCKER:

That's the LCARP agreement, right?

OFFICIAL:

That's right (inaudible) like snow blowers or it might be a new septic system.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, because you see that in, I guess, revenue as well. That could be snow

blowers, septic fuel upgrades …

MS. COFFIN:

I'm sorry.

MR. CROCKER:

Oh, yeah, no problem. That could be equipment; for example, snow blowers. Last

year we did – I think it was in Makkovik – a substantial upgrade to the septic

system and –

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

– that type of work.

MS. COFFIN:

All right then.

And

that's fully recoverable? Yeah, it comes out to a net zero, right?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Right.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, do you want me to do highways or wait until the next one?

Okay,

let's have a chat about highways, Trans-Labrador Highway in particular. A

timeline to completion?

MR. CROCKER:

Do we need a vote first?

CHAIR:

Yeah we'll just stick with these item numbers first.

MR. CROCKER:

Does Paul want to –?

MR. LANE:

Okay.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay. All right, good enough. I got excited.

CHAIR:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

That happens.

CHAIR:

Right, do you guys have any other questions?

MR. PETTEN:

Not in that section.

CHAIR:

With the grace of the

committee, I'll offer Mr. Lane some time to speak, if you guys are all good with

it.

Mr.

Lane.

MR. LANE:

Yeah, thank you.

Just

wondering, my colleague for the District of Ferryland asked a question about

Team Gushue Highway –

MR. CROCKER:

He's qualified for that (inaudible), yeah.

MR. LANE:

– which I was going to ask.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE:

He asked would it be finished this year and you said, no, it won't be finished

this year.

MR. CROCKER:

No.

MR. LANE:

You didn't say when it would be finished, so I'm kind of expanding on it. If not

this year, when can people expect to have that full connection in place? A

guesstimate, I understand it can vary.

MR. CROCKER:

Personally, the comments that I've made on it have been aiming at next year.

MR. LANE:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

Obviously, there's a lot of work to do and there's a lot of work to do around

the engineering. You're more than welcome – actually, I invited the member for

Mount Pearl North today to come over and just look at what it is we ended up

having to look at from the design that was there.

Yeah,

you're more than welcome to come over, actually, when we do that with the Member

for Mount Pearl North, to have a look at different reasons why we may want to

reconfigure what's there.

MR. LANE:

Okay.

AN HON. MEMBER:

Can I get in on this?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, no problem,

MR. LANE:

There you go, b'y.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, no problem. And you, too, Barry or Alison, anybody who wants to look at

what we're looking at there. We're trying to see if there's other options to be

MR. LANE:

Okay, fair enough.

Next

question has to do with roads. This is kind of a difficult one, I suppose, but

I'll ask it, and I know it can be somewhat controversial, but we continue to

of roads throughout the province that are, like, riddled with pot holes.

Markland is one that comes to mind that really got a lot of attention in social

media, for sure. Maybe even –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE:

– the mainstream media, and, I got to say, it looked like a minefield. You got

to agree, when you're looking at it, it's like, oh my God, I can't believe it's

that bad.

What is

the plan? I mean, I know you have a Roads Plan, I understand that, but I think

we also have a reality in this province that, generally, politicians, of all

sides, don't necessarily want to talk about it or address because it can be a

challenge.

The

reality of it is that we have so many roads, and it's fine to say we'll

prioritize, put it on the list, but you know and I know that there are probably

roads that will never be paved, right? Nobody might want to say it or admit it

but it will never happen – just not going to happen because of the reality of

where it is and that there's nobody living there and it's such a cost and so on.

So is

there any thought gone into alternatives from the perspective of saying, do you

know what? Let's be honest with people and say, you're never going to get

asphalt, but, let's put in a decent gravel road and grade it or something so

that you can manage for now, but be honest with people because it's got to

happen.

MR. CROCKER:

I'm honest with people. There's a community –

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– in my district that there's a 3½ kilometre road, it was paved in the '70s. It

leads to three households and what we've offered that community is to pulverize

what's left of the pavement and offer a gravel road that will be graded twice

year.

You're

absolutely right. There's no way on this creation that we are going to be able

to maintain 10,000 kilometres of paved roads in this province. If you think

about it, don't blame it on any political government.

MR. LANE:

No, no.

MR. CROCKER:

The reality is these roads were paved when public service pensions were going

into general revenue –

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– and that is a fact of life in this province. So we're not going to be able to

maintain 10,000 kilometres of paved road.

MR. LANE:

Yeah, okay.

Well, I'm glad to know that you're talking about that and thinking about that

because it's reality. Right?

MR. CROCKER:

We're looking for

alternatives. Through engineering, we're looking for alternatives.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Different products. There are products – we were going to do a pilot last year,

but we couldn't find a suitable (inaudible). It's called grave lock, different –

MR. LANE:

Yeah. Okay.

All

right. Thank you for that. I'm glad you're at least thinking about those things.

I'm

wondering about the pilot project on the asphalt mix. What's the status on that

or an update on that?

MR. CROCKER:

So, we're about 18 months in. We've seen some variations. Certainly, not enough

to bring any conclusions. I guess one of the engineers behind me could speak

probably better to it than I could but if I miss something they can, certainly,

chime in.

To see

a real difference here you're going to be into a number of years, whether it's

four or five or six, because the reality is something may wear out, may lose

quickly in the first 24 months –

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– but by year five, it actually holds up something that wears more in year

three.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

So, it's really a long-term view. I don't think – Cory, I'm not sure if we've

seen anything yet that would make us change anything at the moment.

MR. GRANDY:

That's correct. It's still (inaudible) time.

MR. LANE:

So, a couple of more years?

MR. GRANDY:

But I'm looking forward, actually, our equipment is out now getting some test

results after the winter season. We measure it twice a year. Once after the

winter season; once after the summer season.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. GRANDY:

One thing that we do see – and, Minister, maybe you want to speak to it. I'll

leave it to you.

MR. CROCKER:

(Inaudible.)

MR. GRANDY:

No, I was going to speak to winter versus summer.

MR. CROCKER:

Right. We're seeing the wear is actually happening over the winter months.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Two factors.

MR. LANE:

Studs?

MR. CROCKER:

Studs and, obviously, plowing it.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

We're seeing the wear.

One of

the things we are seeing, though, is back in 2013 – when did the department add

polymer '13 or '14?

MR. GRANDY:

'14, at least; maybe even '15.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, back in 2014 – you can probably remember it because we were sitting over

there.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

The department –

MR. LANE:

Still sitting over there.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

The

department added polymer.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

We first started using polymer that construction season.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

We are seeing – so, that's five or six years now.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

We're seeing success with polymer.

MR. LANE:

Okay. All right. Well, thanks for that.

MR. CROCKER:

You can thank Brazil for that.

MR. LANE:

I guess we'll see how it all sort of rolls out.

MR. CROCKER:

Petten never heard that.

MR. LANE:

But I think it's a good idea to do that because –

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely.

MR. LANE:

– obviously, what we're doing now is really not getting us where we need to be.

On the

Leased Accommodations –

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. LANE:

disabilities. I know that – well, we're challenged even in our own

government-owned facilities, in a lot of them.

schools – although I know there was a pilot project that happened about a year

or two ago and a lot of schools on the Avalon are now fully accessible with blue

zones and everything, I guess, the way it should be, but I know there are a lot

of leased facilities around and they are not accessible, they don't have proper

signage, blue zones, proper entrances, curb cut-downs, whatever.

there now at least something in place that would say any new leases must be

accessible for people with disabilities?

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely. Not only for leases, if you look at, for example, the new Corner

If you

look at the new visitors' centre actually as an example of job that government

recently completed here at Confederation Building, I think that's – I don't know

MR. LANE:

Okay. Perfect. Thank you.

terms of the Low Carbon Economy and stuff like that, and it kind of ties into

new builds as well, I suppose, I don't know if this word is old now, but back in

my day on city council the buzz was lead facilities. I know that the Summit

Centre is a, or at least is a partial lead facility capturing rain water to

actually use in the toilets and in the urinals and different things like that.

Is that

being incorporated into government builds now, that idea?

MR. CROCKER:

We always look to achieve lead silver.

MR. LANE:

Yeah. Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

Don't ask me what that

means.

MR. LANE:

Okay, that's good.

MR. CROCKER:

We look to achieve it.

MR. LANE:

On the issue of snow clearing, of course there was an issue – well, actually, my

first quick question is, you said we're not getting another tow plow, we have

two.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. LANE:

Is the reason why we're not getting another one because the tow plows are not

working or not doing what you thought it would do? Why are we not getting more?

MR. CROCKER:

It's just something we didn't budget for, and some of it comes back to a

consideration to Alison's comment earlier.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

We can't fill the highways – obviously, tow plows can primarily only be used on

a divided highway.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Effectively.

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

If we fill the highways up with tow plows, we're going to cause traffic

challenges.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

So there's a balance on what we can do with a tow plows.

MR. LANE:

It makes sense. I understand. Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

It's not that we wouldn't get any in the future –

MR. LANE:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

– but we don't want to –

MR. LANE:

I know.

MR. CROCKER:

– clog up the highway system with tow plows.

MR. LANE:

I can see that.

I guess

the – because I'm running out of time here, so another quick one is snow

clearing for ambulances.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. LANE:

We had an issue last year, of course, with ambulances getting stuck between here

and Whitbourne and so on. I know that the response – I believe the response –

I'm not going to put words in your mouth, but it was something to the effect of:

They shouldn't be on the highway. They should check and so on, particularly, if

they don't have an emergency, but the issue, of course, is that if you already

had an emergency in Whitbourne and you brought someone to St. John's, even

though you don't have an emergency now that ambulance needs to get back to

Whitbourne in case you have another emergency.

I'm

just wondering: Has your department worked out any kind of communication beyond

what was in place prior to that to ensure that when we're talking emergency

services, ambulances, fire departments and so on, that there is a system to make

sure that they can get through the highway in the case of emergencies?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, I won't take full

credit to what you attribute my comments because I don't think it was that cut

and dry.

MR. LANE:

No, I'm just trying to –

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, absolutely –

MR. LANE:

From memory, right?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, 100 per cent. What

we've done, if you reflect on that night as an example, Eastern Health actually

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– well, there's a dispatch

centre at the Health Sciences Centre that shows dispatch down there for where

every single ambulance is in the province at any given time. We have our Plow

Tracker so we know where every single one of our plows are at any given time.

There was a communications breakdown that day, I think, would be clearly what

happened, or the fact that we were operating in silos.

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Right now, if you were to go

into our provincial dispatch for TW which is in Deer Lake, if you were to go

into our dispatch centre right now, since that incident we have a monitor that

consistently shows us Plow Tracker and we have a monitor that consistently shows

where every single ambulance is in the province.

we're going to close a highway now, before the decision to put out an advisory

that Route 460 is closing, our dispatcher looks up to make sure that there's

been no ambulance activity on 460.

MR. LANE:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

And we've really just broken

down the silo with Eastern Health and with the ambulance operators because

ambulance operators themselves all have AVLs, so in –

MR. LANE:

Yeah.

No, I'm

glad to hear that. I mean that could be life and death, right?

MR. CROCKER:

No, no, absolutely.

MR. LANE:

You don't actually know. I

know that.

MR. CROCKER:

There was a communications

challenge to say the least, but I think we've overcome a lot of that. We'll

never be perfect but it's a lot better than it was.

MR. LANE:

Perfect. Thank you.

CHAIR:

Okay your time has expired.

Any

further questions?

MR. CROCKER:

Mr. Chair –

CHAIR:

Everything done?

CLERK:

2.1.01 through 2.4.03 inclusive.

CHAIR:

Shall 2.1.01 to 2.4.03 inclusive carry?

All

those in favour, 'aye.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

Opposed?

Carried.

motion, subheads 2.1.01 through 2.4.03 carried.

CHAIR:

We're going to take a

five-minute break now before we move into the next section.

Get out

and stretch your legs or your bladder.

MR. LANE:

It's already stretched.

Recess

CHAIR:

Okay, we're going to ask

everybody to take their seats, please.

CLERK:

3.1.01 through 3.5.02.

CHAIR:

Okay, Mr. Petten or Mr.

O'Driscoll, would you like to start off?

MR. PETTEN:

Thank you very much.

Minister, I just asked you a question, I got to go back, even though we voted on

it, but I wanted to know if you'd give me a list of – in 2.3.02, I'm just

looking for a list, it's not a question. I missed it actually.

MR. CROCKER:

(Inaudible.)

MR. PETTEN:

I figured that.

CHAIR:

Order, please!

Thank

you.

MR. PETTEN:

So there are a couple lists

I wanted: 2.3.01.

AN HON. MEMBER:

(Inaudible.)

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

I want

you to provide us an itemized list of each government-owned building with the

following information: the square footage, appropriations for utility,

appropriations for maintenance, appropriation for operating costs and the total

number of employees that operate out of each building.

MR. CROCKER:

(Inaudible.)

MR. PETTEN:

Can you provide an itemized

list of each government-owned building with the following information: square

footage, the appropriation for utilities. So, basically the costs, right, of

appropriations, utilities, maintenance, operating costs of each building and the

number of staff that operate out of each building.

MR. CROCKER:

Right. So, can we – we'll give you the best of the information we have towards

that. Joe is saying maintenance, for example, there are buildings that don't

have dedicated maintenance.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

Right?

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

We can get you the buildings, square footage, utility costs, but the maintenance

is regional.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, I know what you mean, I understand.

MR. CROCKER:

Right? It's not like Confederation Building where we have 10 people that work

maintenance.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, I hear you.

MR. CROCKER:

But we'll get you the best attempt at –

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

I need

the same thing for leased space, basically.

MR. CROCKER:

Well, obviously, we wouldn't have maintenance on leased, right?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. PETTEN:

We already asked for a copy of the list of leased spaces.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

The list?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Most of those leases would be all inclusive, right?

MR. PETTEN:

How many employees, that's the only question, how many employees operate out of

your leased space?

OFFICIAL:

How many employees are in each – work from each building, is that what you're

asking?

MR. PETTEN:

You lease space for office space, would you know or departments or any

approximation?

OFFICIAL:

We have some but not all; we would do tally –

MR. CROCKER:

So we're the landlord, I guess in that –

OFFICIAL:

Yeah

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, I know what you mean.

MR. CROCKER:

So, AES, we wouldn't know how many –

CHAIR:

Excuse me. Your mic is

there.

MR. CROCKER:

I'm sorry. We wouldn't know how many employees AES would have in a building that

AES –

MR. PETTEN:

Okay, yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Right?

MR. PETTEN:

No, you're right.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

So,

we'll just get a copy of the leased space and the departments –

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. PETTEN:

– or whatever and we'll figure it out from there.

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay, thank you for that.

Under

3.1.01, there's a decrease of Salaries of $291,000 compared to the revised

Estimates. What's the reason for the decrease in Salaries?

MR. CROCKER:

That was the variance from severance cost in '18-'19. We had severance costs in

'18-'19.

MR. PETTEN:

Severance?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay. You had retirees, did you?

MR. CROCKER:

Or was that through Flatter, Leaner?

OFFICIAL:

It wouldn't have been through Flatter, Leaner.

MR. CROCKER:

No, so normal retirements or …?

OFFICIAL:

Normal retirements or people leaving?

MR. CROCKER:

Either retirements or people leaving – normal.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay. So on that note now, there's no more severance?

MR. CROCKER:

Right.

MR. PETTEN:

Right, going forward.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

So were your budgets adjusted for that? There was nothing in budgets for

severance, was there?

MR. CROCKER:

Never budgeted, right?

OFFICIAL:

It was never budgeted.

MR. PETTEN:

It's not a budget line, severance, anyway, was it, ever?

OFFICIAL:

No.

MR. PETTEN:

So there's no change anyway.

You can just do more paving with the extra money now?

MR. CROCKER:

That's a good point. No, there's $25 million a year in savings.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

Yeah,

that's what I'm asking. Where do that money go?

MR. CROCKER:

I'm sure we already got it absorbed.

MR. PETTEN:

Where does that go? Does that go back to general revenues? That's my question:

Does it stay in the department? Does that stay in your budget? There's $25

million less, roughly, you're estimating what you would need now.

MR. CROCKER:

Overall in government, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Right? So where does that money go now? That just went into savings, did it?

MR. CROCKER:

Finance budgets for severance. Are you on the Committee that has to take Finance

to task? Ask Tom Osborne.

MR. PETTEN:

In your department, though, you had – I'm asking it more and zeroing in on your

department. Right?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

So you had an approximation every year for severance?

MR. CROCKER:

We'd have to find it, right? Obviously, you haven't got to find it anymore.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, but I remember being there, you always ballparked. You knew that this one

or that one was leaving, right?

OFFICIAL:

Right.

MR. PETTEN:

What budget line would that come of? Just in that division, was it? It was

always earmarked at that –

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible) just manage it

based on our needs.

MR. CROCKER:

The deputy is saying to me, Barry, it was managed through the vacancy rate or

whatever means was necessary.

OFFICIAL:

There was not cut to our

(inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, there was no cut to ours.

MR. PETTEN:

It shouldn't be a cut; it should be more money.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

OFFICIAL:

Gives us some flexibility,

maybe, but you never know where and when.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, you don't know where and when.

MR. PETTEN:

Some of that money could be substantial, right, in the department now that

severance is not –

OFFICIAL:

Some of that would go to

Finance for a transfer because we (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Right, the nature of our business, too – Tracy just mentioned to me – is lots of

times we would have to go to Finance for a transfer, right?

MR. PETTEN:

Right, so you wouldn't necessarily have it there, you'd have to get extra money.

MR. CROCKER:

No, we have to go to Finance for a transfer.

MR. PETTEN:

That's my question.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

That's a relevant question

because some of the severance is big money. I've been around, I know. We're not

talking $500 or $1,000; this is like six-figure dollars. Depending on the year

of retirement, it's a lot of money, including (inaudible) the department.

MR. CROCKER:

I guess it is 10 years, right, or it's a year's salary for anybody who serves 12

years or greater.

MR. PETTEN:

Right, exactly.

The

number of government employees up for retirement and –

MR. CROCKER:

Oh, it stopped at 20 weeks,

didn't it?

OFFICIAL:

Twenty weeks.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, 20 weeks. Anyway,

yeah, it's big money.

MR. PETTEN:

It is.

The

3.2.01, Improvements - Provincial Roads, 2018-'19 Estimate saw a decrease of

$897,000 compared to what was budgeted. This year's Estimates have it, this line

item, at $1.12 million less than what was spent in 2018-'19. What's the

discrepancy?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, so your $897,000, as

the individual allocations reach type of expenditure item, i.e. Salaries,

travel, Supplies, Professional Services are completed based on the standard

percentages of total project cost, so obviously there's variances year over

year. Your $1.1-million variance primarily reflects the reduction in 2019-2020

allocation based on the province's Roads Plan.

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. CROCKER:

Right, so as you can see on

the top line there, we have $32.9 million in current and this year we have $12.6

million in current.

MR. PETTEN:

This is where a lot of

engineers in the department, their salaries are charged off to different jobs.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, so –

MR. PETTEN:

If they're assigned to a

job, the salary goes into that job.

MR. CROCKER:

Right, so in this case,

these are current jobs.

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

If it was a capital, you'll

see over when we get into capital, that's gone up because we have more work in

capital this year versus current.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, so their salaries are

never as much a line item, they're always tied to the Provincial Roads program.

MR. CROCKER:

They're tied to what we bill

back to the project.

MR. PETTEN:

Cory is nodding his head.

Just remember, Cory, just (inaudible).

Under

Transportation and Communications as well – I guess I'm going to answer my own

question – that ties into the roads program as well.

MR. CROCKER:

The same thing as well,

we're charging off our engineers' time and travel to –

MR. PETTEN:

That fluctuates anyway.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

Under

Purchased Services, why such a drop of $21 million if the roads program budget

remained the same?

OFFICIAL:

It's the same section.

MR. PETTEN:

It's the same section.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, the same.

It's a decrease in current capital. It's a split again.

OFFICIAL:

Sort of standard.

MR. PETTEN:

Why would it go from $30

million to $9 million? What happened to the $21 million? It was $26 million last

year. What's involved and what's included in that, I should say. What is that?

What does it make up?

MR. CROCKER:

That's our contractors.

That's paying for roadwork, but it's being billed over the capital now versus

current.

MR. PETTEN:

That's the money we're

paying out to contractors for the roads.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

There's

a standard –

MR. PETTEN:

Is the $9 million a

carry-over from last year?

MR. CROCKER:

I don't think it was $9 million.

MR. PETTEN:

It says $70 million or $74

million isn't it?

MR. CROCKER:

The Provincial Roads Plan

was $77.2 million.

MR. PETTEN:

Seventy-seven million

dollars, okay.

MR. CROCKER:

If it's any use to you, I

can give you the percentages. For example, Salaries are billed at 6.4 per cent;

travel and supplies is billed at 1.5 per cent; Professional Services, 7.9 to 12

per cent and Purchased Services, 80.1 to 84.4 per cent.

OFFICIAL:

That will be in the (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, that's going to be in

your copy of the Estimates book when we give it to you anyway.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

My time

is up now, so I'll pass it over to my colleague.

CHAIR:

Okay, Ms. Coffin.

MS. COFFIN:

Thank you.

Let's

go to cost-shared federal and provincial agreements. Are we getting more

position under Salaries, 3.2.03.01? There seems to be increases across the board

in all categories there.

CHAIR:

What was the line number

again, sorry?

MS. COFFIN:

3.2.03.01, Salaries.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah so, again, this is the

same thing. It's the percentages that we billed off to our projects. This is the

activities for agreements like New Building Canada and rural and northern

communities projects.

MS. COFFIN:

These are cost-shared, so

that's 30-30-40?

MR. CROCKER:

When we have a cost-shared,

it's 50-50.

MS. COFFIN:

There are no municipalities

involved in this one (inaudible).

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, it's done through that

department.

MS. COFFIN:

Right.

Okay,

the federal revenue variance, I guess that's also related to that, yes?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

Improvement and Construction - Provincial Roads, let's see, more positions lost

as well. We're seeing attrition in the Salaries, yes?

MR. CROCKER:

No.

MS. COFFIN:

Oh no, more extra positions.

You have money.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, again, that's the

compensation that's tied to what we bill to our projects.

MS. COFFIN:

Right. Okay.

There

seems to be $300,000 less in Supplies.

MR. CROCKER:

Again, it's the same. It is

formula based; it's based on the project. Supplies are billed at 1.5 per cent of

project costs.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

Professional Services and Purchased Services; the Professional Services dropped

significantly and Purchased Services went up significantly.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, so Professional

Services are billed at 7.9 to 12 per cent.

MS. COFFIN:

Right.

MR. CROCKER:

Purchased Services are

billed at – and this is our contractors, obviously. They make up approximately

80.1 to 84.2 per cent of any given project.

MS. COFFIN:

Right. Okay.

Speaking of roads, what's the QA/QC on roads – quality assurance and quality

control?

MR. CROCKER:

Two years, right?

OFFICIAL:

Our warranty for that is two years.

MR. CROCKER:

Our warranty?

MS. COFFIN:

No, how do you monitor your

contractors? Just to couch that in an example for you: I'm coming out over the

Brigus highway out over Roaches Line and I was very excited to see that someone

went over it with a little bit of asphalt. They mostly just whispered asphalt at

it and walked away, but I'm pretty sure they didn't tamp it down, because I'm

coming across –

MR. CROCKER:

Yes,

I know exactly what she's talking about.

MS. COFFIN:

I'm not sure how they added

asphalt and made it worse.

MR. CROCKER:

I know exactly where you're

talking about.

MS. COFFIN:

You do, don't you, right?

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely.

MS. COFFIN:

I'm so glad I have an

all-wheel drive. I was going to buy a WRX so I could rally drive it, right?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

I can tell you another story.

MR. CROCKER:

Remember the good stuff Paul

Lane said about Joe Dunford? I know the exact area, what you're talking about.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, (inaudible) farms.

MR. CROCKER:

I can even tell you how it

was laid. It was dumped and spread without (inaudible).

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, like the b'ys walked

away. They just kind of flung like they were scattering birdseed and walked

away.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, so that was an attempt

at summer maintenance.

MS. COFFIN:

Nice try – no, not even a

nice try.

MR. CROCKER:

That wouldn't have been a

capital project. That would have been summer maintenance.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

Not

much on the QA/QC, though, hey?

MR. CROCKER:

Obviously, that's done by

our internal staff.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

When you come to capital

projects, if you were to look at – for example, if you went down Veterans

Memorial instead of using Roaches Line, you would have seen right now there's

construction there.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

That's capital construction.

That's a contractor that we're purchasing.

MS. COFFIN:

Oh yeah, and that's serious.

We're bringing our real equipment in.

MR. CROCKER:

Right.

MS. COFFIN:

We're actually going to do

this with a purpose, yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

For quality assurance there,

we would – I guess, on a job that size we would have an engineer there full

time?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, we would have staff on

that site full time –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– with an engineer

overseeing that project. That engineer may have a number of projects happening

in that area –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– but that would be overseen

by one of our engineers.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay.

I say

this because when I was coming down over that highway another time – and I take

that road because I don't go down over Veterans because I'm not going to Bay

Roberts, I'm going off the Roaches Line to Brigus there. I was coming down over

the highway one day and there was – I assume it was a family with a Subaru

Outback and a pop-up camper, one of those little fold-down ones. They had

out-of-province plates on them. They were coming there before they whispered

asphalt at the road. The car was slowing. It was stopping. The camper on the

back was moving around so much I thought it was going to let go like one of

those Jiffy Pop things on the campfire, it looked like that was going to happen.

thought this is not particularly good for tourism because they are going to go

home and go: B'y, I totally ripped off the axle and my camper's no good and it

just popped open in the middle of the highway.

So, is

there any kind of effort to go: How are we going to target the roads? That's a

key highway for tourism; there are a number of other ones like that. Is there

accommodation for that type of thing?

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely.

AN HON. MEMBER:

Adventure tourism.

MR. CROCKER:

It's called adventure

tourism. No.

Upon

until, I guess, last year, we signed the new bilateral with Ottawa, and northern

and rural is a new pot of roads funding that we have. So we have our traditional

Roads Plan, our $77.2 million.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

But we also have an

additional $104 million over the next nine years; this year being one of those

nine. So what we've set out in criteria for that funding, tourism is actually

one of the criteria we look at in that funding because one of the things with

the Roads Plan, as pleased as we are with the Roads Plan, it wasn't addressing

some of these realities because of traffic counts. Traffic counts become a

factor in our Roads Plan –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

whereas some of these

roads, Bonavista is a prime example, and others – so, yeah, one of the things

that we're going to try and do with our northern and rural projects is address

tourism and economics in one. If you got a road, in some cases, there's not a

lot of traffic but it leads to a fish plant –

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

– for example, where there's

a lot of heavy traffic – so, yeah, that's one of things that we're trying to

focus our limited – because it comes back to Paul's comments earlier about

trying to maintain 10,000 kilometres of road.

MS. COFFIN:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

But we are trying to take

that new pot of funding, federal-provincial funding, to address some of the

tourism issues.

MS. COFFIN:

Okay, leads me to another road.

You

know the Dominion in Bay Roberts?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

Have you tried turning left off the highway onto that?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, so you should see

where my in-laws live in Bay Roberts and try and back out of their driveway, but

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah, and the reason I bring this up is, one, I like to shop there, but also the

other thing is that's a main highway, I understand that it falls under

provincial jurisdiction –

MR. CROCKER:

It does.

MS. COFFIN:

– because it is the old highway.

MR. CROCKER:

It is.

MS. COFFIN:

That's a serious safety

issue.

MR. CROCKER:

Highway access – he's not

paying attention now, thankfully – highway access is a challenge, all the time.

If you look at a strip there in Bay Roberts, and we just had an issue there

where there was another business that wanted to be built, and we actually,

pretty much, had to say no, because every time you create an entry point on that

road – and Barry would be quite familiar with this, Route 60 – there are so many

challenges with access points on roads that are still provincially owned roads

but they're in bustling municipalities.

MS. COFFIN:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

And that's a challenge. We

would love for the Town of Bay Roberts to take over that road.

MS. COFFIN:

I'm sure you would. I doubt

very much the Town of Bay Roberts is excited about it, though.

MR. CROCKER:

But the challenge, I guess,

that we face with that road is the primary route for us in that region would be

Veterans.

MS. COFFIN:

Yeah.

MR. CROCKER:

Right? So …

MS. COFFIN:

With that we have a

compounded problem, right? So, if we start moving to the highway system, what

we're doing is we're not paying attention to Route 60, the maintenance is not

going on Route 60.

MR. CROCKER:

That's right.

MS. COFFIN:

What we are doing then is

we're forcing traffic onto the Veterans, which compromises the small businesses

in that particular area.

MR. CROCKER:

Absolutely.

MS. COFFIN:

It compromises the housing

in that area and it reduces services to individuals there, as well. So, the

residents in the area are suffering.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

So there needs to be, perhaps, a more prudent approach to when each of these

things are occurring and how we want to direct traffic. Because the other thing

that happens is we can rig our counts a little bit by making Route 60 sketchy

and making Veterans –

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, that is –

MS. COFFIN:

– a little bit less sketchy but still somewhat dangerous.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MS. COFFIN:

What we're doing then is

we're forcing more traffic to Veterans, so you are changing your counts, which

means that Route 60, which really, really, really needs work, the counts are not

there, so it is not being justified.

So, we

have this, kind of, competing issue that's happening because we're not doing the

maintenance, which drives down the counts, which means that then we also don't

do the maintenance on it, so it becomes a self-perpetuating problem.

there such a thing as a solution to that?

MR. CROCKER:

We're attempting to work

closer with municipalities, because I think that's where the solution does lie.

MS. COFFIN:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

It's finding a funding

arrangement to actually leverage …

Obviously, a municipality can apply for 50-50 for roads. I get why

municipalities don't really want to take these roads; they're big liabilities.

MS. COFFIN:

Yes.

MR. CROCKER:

But I think we're trying to

forge a better or a new relationship with municipalities to incorporate, for

example, ways where they're doing some of the maintenance on our road, shared

arrangements with municipalities to do some, for example, whether it be summer

maintenance or ways of actually – because in some cases there's a duplication of

service. The town plow, as an example, is driving over our road to get to a town

street, right?

MS. COFFIN:

Are they plowing it?

MR. CROCKER:

We're in Bay Roberts now, sorry. We're not even in CBS, Barry.

MS. COFFIN:

If they're not plowing it, then (inaudible).

CHAIR:

Okay, time requirements – do you want to finish up?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, but you're dead on the money because that plow is driving over Route 60 in

CBS – supposed to be. The plow is driving over that to get to a town road, and

then we're coming out and plowing that road. So, I think co-operation with

municipalities is something we –

MS. COFFIN:

Perhaps. Yes, we can talk about municipalities after.

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

CHAIR:

Mr. Parsons, do you have any more questions from 3.1.01 to 3.5.02?

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, I'm good.

CHAIR:

Sorry, Mr. Petten.

MR. CROCKER:

He's going to ask about the Burgeo Highway if he gets a chance.

CHAIR:

(Inaudible) paying attention back there.

MR. PETTEN:

Andrew and myself, we want a whisper of pavement in CBS and Port aux Basques.

AN HON. MEMBER:

And all points in between.

MR. PETTEN:

And all points in between,

yeah. Yeah, that's a good line. I'll remember that one.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, I can see that coming back in Question Period.

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah, that's a good one. When I get in the mood one day, yeah.

3.2.02,

under the Canada/Newfoundland and Labrador Infrastructure Framework Agreement.

MR. CROCKER:

3.2.02. Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

So this $295,000 that was budgeted, where did that disappear or where did that

go? Revenue side, where was that?

MR. CROCKER:

The department had anticipated to receive this federal revenue in '18-'19;

however, we received it before the end of '17-'18 fiscal year.

MR. PETTEN:

What was that revenue for?

MR. CROCKER:

It was the end of a cost-shared program.

MR. PETTEN:

So it's the federal share for –

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, yeah, this was a rehabilitation for the Gambo River Bridge and Benton Road

intersection project.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

So it's just a specific project, right?

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

3.2.03,

the Federal - Provincial Cost-Shared Agreements. The Salaries there went to

$200,000 to $150,000 and then back up to $570,000.

MR. CROCKER:

Again, that's the standard percentage being applied to the projects.

MR. PETTEN:

That's again tied to the –

MR. CROCKER:

Tied to the percentages of the contract.

MR. PETTEN:

And what about Purchased Services?

MR. CROCKER:

Same thing. Purchased Services is billed at a fixed rate of – sorry, yeah, over

80 per cent, 80.1 to 80.4 – sorry, 80 per cent to 84 per cent is billed as

Purchased Services. It's payments –

MR. PETTEN:

So what's in the Purchased Services in this area? What would you be –?

MR. CROCKER:

Contractors.

MR. PETTEN:

Just the contractors.

MR. CROCKER:

The tender, the contract.

MR. PETTEN:

That's it, is it, just the contractors?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah because we're billing off our supplies in that. Yeah, so it's just the

contractors.

MR. PETTEN:

Just the contractors.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay, 3.2.04, Salaries, under Improvement and Construction - Provincial Roads.

MR. CROCKER:

That will be the same.

OFFICIAL:

I think that's the same.

MR. CROCKER:

That's the building of the formula for Salaries.

MR. PETTEN:

It's tied to the jobs as well.

MR. CROCKER:

(Inaudible) to the program to the job that's being done, because we're over in

capital now, right?

MR. PETTEN:

Right.

The

first service, that's for the contractor.

MR. CROCKER:

The same thing, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

3.2.05;

there's nothing allocated for Salaries this year?

MR. CROCKER:

End of the project, isn't it?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. PETTEN:

Or really any of that.

MR. CROCKER:

That's the end of Team Gushue.

OFFICIAL:

Oh, this is the end of Team Gushue, yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

A full line.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, that's the end of the last Team Gushue project.

MR. PETTEN:

That's end of Team Gushue. That $1.6 million, that's there for this year's work?

That's Team Gushue?

MR. CROCKER:

No.

MR. PETTEN:

That's for other projects?

MR. CROCKER:

That's the outstanding cost for the Placentia lift bridge. We're being sued.

MR. PETTEN:

(Inaudible.)

Okay,

good.

MR. CROCKER:

Listen –

MR. PETTEN:

I'll stop there.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, you should stop there.

MR. PETTEN:

I don't need to ask.

MR. CROCKER:

Loyola, he wouldn't have asked that question. He knew what it was.

MR. PETTEN:

I'll stop.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

He was trying to get me to ask that.

MR. PETTEN:

I'll try – do you want to ask about Team Gushue?

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. CROCKER:

What?

MR. PETTEN:

What's he like.

MR. CROCKER:

A $50-million bridge.

CHAIR:

The mic for Mr. O'Driscoll? Yeah.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

The Team Gushue is going to be added back in there?

MR. CROCKER:

Team Gushue, right now, will be all provincial moving forward.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Okay.

MR. CROCKER:

We've expended the federal contribution to Team Gushue. It dates back well

before –

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Well before us.

Okay,

all good.

MR. CROCKER:

Any of us in – well, yeah.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Yeah, it's a long project. I know that.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. O'DRISCOLL:

Okay, all good.

CHAIR:

You're good?

MR. PETTEN:

Under the revenue there's $2.3 million. It didn't look like we received any but

it's still there in this year. What happened to that federal revenue?

MR. CROCKER:

What

section are you on, Barry?

MR. PETTEN:

Oh, we're back, I'm sorry, 3.2.05. Still in that one I was just into.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, revenue?

MR. PETTEN:

Yeah.

doesn't look like any money come in under that revised.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, that was the final payment, the final federal contribution from Team

Gushue. We'll receive it this year.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay, so it was expected last year but now you're going to get it this year?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

Under

3.2.06, I guess we're talking Salaries and Purchased Services. That will go to –

MR. CROCKER:

Trans-Labrador.

MR. PETTEN:

– to the projects as we already discussed, right?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, that's right.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

What

about the revenue piece? Is that the cost-shared factor as well? We had $30

million come in, $23 million we're expecting this year?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes, that's Trans-Labrador.

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

Okay.

3.2.07,

Federal - Provincial Cost-Shared projects, on Salaries there, that is a result

of the percentage?

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, it's the billing split

for the projects.

MR. PETTEN:

It's getting easy.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah.

MR. PETTEN:

The revenue piece, are we expecting $31 million this year from the federal

government?

MR. CROCKER:

Yes.

MR. PETTEN:

What agreements are in this? What projects are included in this one?

MR. CROCKER:

This is New Building Canada

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible) rural and

northern and Investing in Canada.

MR. CROCKER:

Okay, yeah, so this is the

New Building Canada, rural and northern communities and Investing in Canada. New

Building Canada is concluding, right?

OFFICIAL:

No, we still have –

MR. CROCKER:

We have a few years left on

it, yeah.

OFFICIAL:

Yeah, there are a few more years left on that.

MR. CROCKER:

Yeah, so New Building Canada

I think concludes in '22-'23?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah, I think so.

MR. CROCKER:

Rural and northern is new;

we still have 8½ years on rural and northern. Investing in Canada is the same

thing; we would have about eight years left on it.

MR. PETTEN:

There's still a lot of projects not in for that. There's not been a lot done

with that, has it?

MR. CROCKER:

The only thing that I think

we would pretty much have our project listing done for is New Building Canada,

right?

OFFICIAL:

New Building Canada and rural and northern –

MR. CROCKER:

We're not complete though,

no.

OFFICIAL:

Oh, no, no.

MR. CROCKER:

No, no.

Yeah,

so the only one I think that we've done our final submission of projects for is

New Building Canada, but we're only in year one of rural and northern. We only

actually just got approvals in the l