March 22 2026
Fellow Petitioners,
It’s been 5 weeks since we began the Petition on February 14, 2026. As of today 118 signatures.
A sincere thank you to all for your support since mid January.
Recap of Events To Date:
May 8, 2025 in the lead to the Referendum and the AGM. The cost of the Maxwell Lake Water Treatment Plant was advertised as $14.6Mil but the Referendum was worded - “To Borrow $11.7 Million”, with no mention of the overall cost of the projected $14.6Mil in the wording. Hence the reason a number of Ratepayers believe the overall cost was going to be $11.7 Mil. Were Ratepayers misled by the NSSWD for not specifically stating the Overall Cost of The Project in the Referendum?
* January 16. 2026 - Special Meeting - Staff brought forward a Budget of $16.6 Mil and 2 Motions;
1. A Construction Engineering Contract for $925,000 with KWL. It has always been implied that the post design, construction services would be approximately $500,000. Only after the Tendering process had concluded did the Design Engineering Firm, conveyed at the December 18, 2025 General Meeting by Staff that their fees would be $975,000 and subsequently reduced to $925,000.
Trustees’ Vote passed 3 In Favour, 1 No, 1 Abstention.
2. General Contractor - Contract for $12.3Mil with Hazelwood Construction.
Trustees’ Vote passed 4 In Favour, 1 OpposeThe Total Cost of the project purported to be $16.6 Mil on January, 16, 2026, however this does not include the Best Practices of including the Soft Cost of Design Engineering Fees $639,000, making the overall cost of the Project $17,239Mil currently.
* January 29, 2026 - General Meeting - “Motion To Rescind” the KWL Contract at $925,000.
Trustees’ Vote - No Seconder, so the Motion fell to the cutting floor.
* February 26, 2026 - General Meeting - Brought forward a Motion to basically Pause the Project and have the $2Mil Cost Overrun to be approved by Referendum in the lead up to the AGM on May 6, 2026 or put to an RFP (Request for Proposal) out for a Design/Build/FixCost Budget of $14.6Mil, which was the projected overall cost in the lead up to the May 6, 2025 Referendum.
Motion seconded by one of my fellow Trustee’s. Discussion followed.
Trustees’ Vote - 1 - In Favour, 3 Opposed, 1 Trustee Absent. 4 of my fellow Trustee’s are effectively ok with a $2Mil cost overrun before the project even begins.
Driftwood Newspaper - March 6, 2024: Quote - “The referendum is an authorization for us, from our ratepayers, to take out a loan, said CAO Boysen”. “There’s other ways of paying off that loan; there’s reserve funds, it could be other one-time funding sources or possibly a continual [payoff] through our surpluses.”
“The worst-case scenario, we’d have to pull the entire loan out, and the ratepayers would have to pay that over 25 years,” - said financial officer Tammy Lannan.” “But our hope is that we can pay for it with other funds.”
Moray agreed, saying while ratepayers are a “big portion of that story” right now, staff would be looking at opportunities to keep direct costs to water users at a minimum.” Trustees said they looked forward to hearing regular updates.”
“It will be a bit of a moving target,” said Moray.”
Moving target indeed, on how the $2 Mil cost overrun will be addressed. At the General Meeting of January 29, 2026 the CAO announced that sadly the Federal Grant of $6Mil requested, that our application for the Grant had been rejected, which had been received earlier that morning.
As a Trustee I requested the Contract between KWL and NSSWD and received it on March 4, 2026. It was provided in confidence to all Trustees. Ratepayers/Petitioners can request it by going through the FOI - Freedom of Information process at the NSSWD, it’s public domain. It’s a straight forward process, which has recently been put in place but hasn’t been tested at the NSSWD.
There’s a number of revelations. The Contract is dated January 1, 2026 only had one signature of the CAO of NSSWD, a follow up request produced both signatures from NSSWD and KWL but neither were dated, only the January 1, 2026 date at the top of the Contract. A follow up Agreement was added as an appendix and presented by the Engineering Firm on February 2, 2026 on the scope and costs for the Project. Another revelation is that its a “Budget Estimate” $647,544, not signed.
At the Special Meeting of January 16, 2026 the 1st Motion stated the Contract with KWL was for $925,000 for Engineering Construction Services. There’s never been a public cost breakdown of the $925,000, specifically the cost for Project Management and Engineering Services by KWL.
However, what appeared Out of the Blue at the February 26, 2026 General Meeting Agenda Package, was a one page document stating that approximately $300,000 of the $925,000 had already expensed with KWL but not disclosed at the Vote on January 16, 2026 and neither to the “Motion to Rescind” the KWL Contract at the General Meeting of January 29, 2026.
Is anyone else of the opinion that this needed to be disclosed to the Ratepayers as a salient point to the costliest Capital Project ever considered on Salt Spring Island, at an approximate overall cost of $17.3Mil.
What is disclosed in the Contract, we are basically paying for engineering services on an hourly basis. Could costs go beyond the $16.6Mil Vote, at the January 16, 2026 Special Meeting? In my opinion - absolutely!
Transparency is talked about a lot, it’s almost a buzz word but seldom executed. With the events since the December 18, 2025 General Meeting of the NSSWD, is it fair to say we’ve seen a fair bit of the numbers moving around?
Please considering writing the Chair and asking the following Question.
Cut and paste into an email:
"Dear Chair of the NSSWD,
In lieu of the suggestion in the lead up to the Referendum of May 8, 2025, requesting permission to borrow $11.7 Mil, it was disclosed the cost of the Project would be $14.6 Mil and basically that was the position of the NSSWD up until December 18, 2025. Now that you have Voted to support a $16.6Mil Budget on January 16, 2026 and have reaffirmed that by not supporting the “Motion to Rescind” the KWL Contract for $925,000 on January 29, 2026.
Can you you please accurately disclose the Overall Cost of the New Water Treatment Plant at Maxwell Lake, using Best Practices in costing, which includes the soft costs of $639,000 for Design Engineering and is it possible due to unforeseen circumstances, that costs could increase within the current Contract?
Thank you, --- -----
Ratepayer NSSWD"
Email address - bpyper@nsswaterworks.ca cc: dcourtney@nsswaterworks.ca
Using the current numbers available and they are a moving target - 1.Design Engineering Costs $639, 000. 2. Disclosed on February 26 ~$300,000 has been expensed already with KWL. 3. As of February 2, 2026 - Contract with KWL states $647,544. Cost Projection in the Driftwood was ~ $15.7Mil, missing was the Design Engineering cost the $639,000, pushing the Overall Cost of the Project to $16.339 Million. If you use the current Budget established on January 16, 2026 of $16.6Mil, with the soft costs included, the overall Budget is $17.239Mil. This is a tad off the Projected Cost of $14.6Mil, understated last April in the lead up to the Referendum on May 8, 2025.
Can Engineering costs go higher under the current Contract? Absolutely.
Thank you, Trustee David Courtney, NSSWD