G035 - Mon 24 Mar 2014 / Lun 24 mar 2014

STANDING COMMITTEE ON GENERAL GOVERNMENT

COMITÉ PERMANENT DES AFFAIRES GOUVERNEMENTALES

Monday 24 March 2014 Lundi 24 mars 2014

PAN/PARAPAN AMERICAN
GAMES REVIEW

PAN/PARAPAN AMERICAN
GAMES SECRETARIAT

TORONTO 2015
PAN AM/PARAPAN AM GAMES
ORGANIZING COMMITTEE

COMMITTEE BUSINESS

The committee met at 1404 in committee room 2.

PAN/PARAPAN AMERICAN
GAMES REVIEW

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): I’d like to call the meeting to order.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Chair?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Ms. Damerla?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Chair, I have a motion that I’d like to move.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Could I continue my remarks? Then I’ll—

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Okay.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Okay. I’m sorry.

I’d like to welcome everyone to the Standing Committee on General Government. We’re here to discuss the 2015 Pan/Parapan American Games and the Pan/Parapan American Games Secretariat. We do have two delegations before us this afternoon. The round of rotation will be 25 minutes, started by the opposition, followed by the NDP and the government—a rotation of questions and statements to each delegation—followed again by another 10-minute round. Having said that, again, welcome to everyone. I look forward to hearing the discussion.

Ms. Damerla?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you, Chair. I move that the Standing Committee on General Government continue report writing on the auto insurance study pursuant to standing order 111(a), for the dates of March 26, April 9 and April 23, and one additional day for public hearings on Bill 11 to take place on April 2, followed by clause-by-clause consideration of Bill 11 on Wednesday, April 16 and on April 30.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Any further discussion? Should we—

Mrs. Donna H. Cansfield: Take the vote now?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: I’d like a recess before we do a vote—

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Pardon me?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: —and I’d like to see a copy of the motion.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Okay. Would it be in the best interest if we continued with the delegations? I’m just looking to see how we want to proceed forward. We do have two here; do you want to deal with this at the end of the delegations or does the committee wish to deal with it now?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: If we can have a quick vote now, we can do that. If people want to discuss it, then I guess we’ll wait until the end, once we’re done with the official delegations.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): You’re requesting copies of the motion? Is that what I understand?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: I’d like a copy of the motion and then I’d like to take a recess before we do the vote.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Based on the fact that we do have a structured agenda here, maybe the Clerk’s office could get copies of the motion to distribute, and in the meantime we’ll continue with the presentations. Would that be fair enough? We can deal with the issue at our earliest convenience, perhaps between delegations and/or at the end of the delegations. Is that clear? Very good.

PAN/PARAPAN AMERICAN
GAMES SECRETARIAT

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Having said that, we have before us Nancy Mudrinic, I believe, assistant deputy minister, risk management and financial oversight division. Welcome. You have a five-minute presentation, and then I think I explained how things will unfold.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Thank you very much. Good afternoon. My name is Nancy Mudrinic. My role is the assistant deputy minister for the risk management and financial oversight division of Ontario’s Pan/Parapan American Games Secretariat. This is one of the three divisions in the secretariat. I’ve held this role since February 2012. Prior to this role, I was the executive lead for the secretariat from June 2010 to January 2012.

My division at the secretariat is focused on two key aspects of oversight for the games: using risk management principles to inform operational planning and decision-making, and providing oversight of Ontario’s financial commitments to the organizing committee, Toronto 2015; and financial coordination of provincial deliverables, including working with provincial partners that are focused on games delivery responsibilities.

The Pan and Parapan American Games are a significant undertaking. As such, risk and financial oversight are important to ensure that the province’s interests are protected and the provincial deliverables and the $500-million provincial transfer payment to Toronto 2015 are well managed.

There is a significant amount of activity required to stage the games, which requires the participation of partners, the province being one of many. In this light, risk management is an essential function. Successful project management requires that risks to implementation be identified and assessed so that appropriate strategies can be developed to facilitate success. We are actively applying this perspective to Ontario’s games’ deliverables. As well, my group is monitoring risks related to partner activities that have an impact on Ontario’s objectives for the games.

Another essential component of risk management is the audit function. My division is responsible for working with the government’s internal audit teams to develop and implement a multi-year plan for provincial audits related to the games. The focus of the provincial audit activity is based on Toronto 2015 as a transfer payment recipient. Specifically, the audit plan has been and will continue to be focused on Toronto 2015’s compliance with the broader public sector directives on expenses, perquisites and procurement, as well as the requirements identified in the games’ governing agreements, mainly the multi-party agreement, the Ontario transfer payment agreement and the Ontario support agreement.

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I provided the Clerk with copies of the MPA for your convenience. The other agreements, including the MPA, are available on Toronto 2015’s website.

Financial oversight is the division’s other main activity. This function stems from the provisions of governing agreements that the province is party to. The multi-party agreement sets out all partners’ commitments, obligations and funding contributions; the Ontario support agreement defines the province’s role in supporting Pan American Games’ commitments; and the transfer payment agreement sets out Ontario’s commitment to providing funding to Toronto 2015 and the terms and conditions of this funding.

In order to fulfill the roles specified in these agreements, my division provides oversight of Toronto 2015’s budget, financial reporting and the administration of Ontario’s transfer payment. This is accomplished by reviewing the contents of Toronto 2015’s business plans, quarterly reports and the annual audited financial statements.

The risk management and financial oversight division in the secretariat works closely with our funding partner, the federal government, in coordinating financial activities and information-sharing related to the reviews of Toronto 2015’s business planning and financial reporting. The secretariat and Toronto 2015 maintain a collaborative working relationship which keeps Ontario abreast of major developments in planning and staging the games. It also allows our organizations to co-operatively meet our operational objectives and create synergies in deliverables for the successful delivery of the games.

Those are major files and activities that I am responsible for in the risk management and financial oversight division at the secretariat.

I welcome any questions you may have.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Thank you very much, Ms. Mudrinic. We’ll pass it over to the opposition: Mr. Jackson.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Thanks very much, Nancy, for being here today. I know you’ve been here once before at least, and I appreciate you taking the time out to come and be with us again.

My first question for you will probably require some sort of lengthy response, I would guess. I am curious what you foresee will be the biggest risks in the future with planning and implementing the games. There is going to be a second part to that question, just to give you a heads-up, on what your biggest problems have been so far, in your estimation.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I’ll start the question by talking a little bit about risk management. From our perspective, risk management and risk planning are an important component of project management and planning for these games. Understanding the risks associated with the games is instrumental in helping to facilitate the deliverables that we all strive for.

Looking at risk means looking at the province’s objectives for the games. The objectives for the games are focused on providing games that are portable and fiscally responsible, that engage the public and Ontarians in participation of the games, and looking at operational efficiency for the delivery of the games and ensuring that all of the components and requirements of the games are met. That forms the basis of our look at risk and our review of risk management and also financial oversight.

When we look at the games in terms of affordability and being a fiscally responsible games, we do that in a number of manners. We look at the various financial reports that Toronto 2015 produces. They’re required to produce a number of financial reports, activity reports, project management reports and risk reports and to share them with their funding partners—the province and the federal government—and to allow us to look at the financial stability of the organization and identify any risks that may be there from a financial perspective.

The province has a series of controls, as well, associated with the financial oversight of Toronto 2015 that helps mitigate these risks and helps manage them as they’re going forward.

The organizing committee has a budget of $1.4 billion, and that’s the main focus of our review on the financial oversight side as to how they’re managing towards that $1.4-billion budget. So as a risk, financial oversight and having a fiscally responsible plan in terms of continuing to maintain within that $1.4-billion envelope is something that we look quite closely at.

Another aspect of risk is operational efficiency and delivery. Certainly the games are a unique undertaking that has a set date. The games are going to be delivered in 2015. They’re happening over a defined period of time for the Pan American Games, and the Parapan American Games as well, so it’s an established date. So things do need to be ready and done when it comes to the delivery of the games. They can’t be delayed by weeks, months or even years. The games will happen at that time, so ensuring that all the partners, in their various aspects of delivery, are ready is a very important part of risk management. So we look at that closely. We look at all of our partners’ risk management plans, and project management plans in particular, to look at what they’re delivering when, will deliveries be ready, and how are partners working together to ensure, when things are required and dependent upon each other, that the plan is well coordinated, that partners are talking and working together on deliverables that have an impact up against each other.

A good example of risk management in this regard is the delivery of the major capital projects. One of the features of delivering the projects is the involvement of Infrastructure Ontario. So from a perspective of risk, the use of Infrastructure Ontario is contemplated in a number of the governing agreements that are between the province, the federal government and the organizing committee, depending on the agreement. The use of Infrastructure Ontario as a major project manager for procurement and project management is contemplated in those agreements. As a result—Infrastructure Ontario has a long history of project management and delivering complex infrastructure projects not dissimilar to the ones that are being implemented for these games, so that expertise is a risk-mitigating factor. Having a well-established organization that has experience working with governments and municipalities implementing large projects on a time-sensitive schedule was instrumental in helping to manage the risk, because having these projects delivered on time is an important feature of being able to deliver the games in 2015.

To that end, most, if not all, of the projects, and in particular all of the major capital projects, are expected to be delivered well in advance of the games, in 2014. That will allow the organizing committee to run test events at the games. Having test events being run at these facilities helps mitigate against risk because you know that the facilities work; you know that it works in a competitive environment where a sporting event is being held. So that’s an important feature of risk management from that perspective. It also allows the community to access the facility and use it for community purposes well in advance of the games as well.

That leads into a little bit of another risk, of community engagement and involvement in the games. Having the major facilities opened, operating and part of the community certainly brings the community into the involvement of the games and builds excitement. The geographic footprint of the games is quite large in southern and central Ontario, and building the excitement across that area is an important feature that is required for the games to engage the public, so, from a risk perspective, employing a number of strategies and techniques to make sure that happens, monitoring them and trying to develop the programs that are suitable to build the excitement for the games so that when they are here, it’s a project and an event that’s well appreciated by Ontario and provides a lot of benefit.

Those are the major risks that we look at and some of the mitigating factors and approaches that we’re taking via risk management to help manage those risks.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Recently, the contingency spending in the budget was down from $82 million to $54 million. What was the main reason for that?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Sorry, can you repeat the last bit?

Mr. Rod Jackson: Yes. The contingency spending in the budget was down from $82 million to $54 million. Can you explain what precipitated that drop?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Well, the aspect of having a contingency reserve is actually an important feature of risk management, if I could say. Toronto 2015 has a $1.4-billion budget in which to manage these games, and it has an operating budget of $767 million. Within that budget, an $82-million contingency reserve was established. Having that reserve there allows the organizing committee to make operational decisions against the budget that they have, and still live within their budget amounts.

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From when the games were won—as a part of the bid—to now, a lot of operational planning needed to happen. Schedules needed to be developed with sport organizations. Different operational plans needed to be implemented. Having a reserve there allows the organizing committee the flexibility to deal with costs as they change, because they do change from time to time. It gives them a tool in which to address changing costs, yet still live within the operating envelope that they have.

The contingency reserve was established in the fall of 2012, if I recall correctly, and has remained at $82 million until most recently. Toronto 2015, as it planned and finalized certain components of its operating plan, found that they needed a little bit of additional financial flexibility to meet a couple of the deliverables as they finalized that aspect of the operating plan. The contingency reserve allowed them to do that, to meet those needs and still be in their $1.4-billion envelope.

Mr. Rod Jackson: The extra day that has been added to the Pan Am Games: Where in the budget is the extra money coming from, to have that extra day? Was it from the contingency or—

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: No. The contingency reserve hasn’t been accessed for that. They were able to find flexibility within their budget. Extending the Parapan Am Games an extra day, to accommodate the sports schedule, provided relief in other areas of the budget, and that provided them with flexibility to manage the extra costs of an extra day of operations.

Within the budget, they looked at all the different categories they have. Things change, and with a little bit of give and take here and there, it’s all being managed within the budget. For that instance, there wasn’t any access to the contingency reserve to meet that need.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Just recently, two people from the TO2015 executive were dismissed, or however we want to put it. How much is their severance going to be?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I’m not aware of the exact details of their severance package. I’m sure that the issue of severance is contemplated in their contracts and will be dealt with by the organizing committee. I read, and maybe you have as well, that that’s something that more information will be provided on in the future. But I’m not aware of the exact details of the severance package.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you have oversight over the contracts?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The contracts are personal employment contracts between Toronto 2015 and the individuals.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Wouldn’t it be prudent for someone who has financial oversight to have access to that information? It’s a considerable amount of money when we’re talking about people getting paid, from the CEO in the multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars, down to their executives getting paid $180,000, $200,000, $300,000.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s a standard part of their contract. Really, the decisions around the terms of employment are designed by Toronto 2015 as an organization, best understanding their needs for that organization. It really is within there.

I know there is a severance provision, but the exact details are dependent upon the terms that are negotiated with the individual as they leave. At this point, I don’t have any information about that.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Would those said severances have a place built into TO2015’s budget already?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The terms of salary and wages, and employment terms, are within their $1.4-billion budget, so it would be managed from within the costs that they have, the funding that they do have.

Mr. Rod Jackson: How endless is that pit, to keep being able to afford to let go senior executives? We’re talking about a lot of money. The severances are going to be a fair amount. At what point does it start to affect that budget and start to impact other things within that budget that have to maybe get cut or moved around? Can you give us some sense of that?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: My understanding of the decisions that were made over the last few days in terms of this employment is that it was done respecting the go-forward delivery of the games and what would be most efficient and best for Toronto 2015 in meeting their operational deliverables and with the type of executive team and organization that they need to have for delivery. So I assume, as a part of that, that the decision was made with that context in mind, in terms of what they needed to do and how they needed to do it in the most efficient way between now and games time.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Wouldn’t it seem more efficient to just hire the right people first and not have to pay them a severance?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: My understanding, in terms of games delivery, is that where you start in terms of planning and where you end in terms of implementing the final, last strokes of games delivery are different skill sets. I think that’s a decision made by the executive at Toronto 2015, looking at the skill sets that they have and what they need going forward.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Who has oversight over TO2015 overall?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: In terms of Toronto 2015, the various agreements outline the type of oversight that Ontario—and I’m speaking for Ontario—has in terms of providing financial oversight and overall oversight of the games. Certainly, Ontario has financial oversight of the games based on the terms and conditions set out in the various agreements. There is oversight of the games in terms of Toronto 2015 as a transfer payment recipient that requires them to follow Ontario broader public sector directives when it comes to expenses/perquisite procurement. So oversight is provided in that way, and it’s certainly based on terms and conditions of funding from ourselves, and the federal government as well, for the $500 million that they are providing as well for the staging of the games, and as it’s laid out in all of the various agreements.

Mr. Rod Jackson: The $500 million from the federal government: Did that money that came from the federal government go—mostly for capital expenses, I believe, right?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The focus on the federal funding is on the capital projects, as well as the legacy fund. Toronto 2015 has a $70-million legacy fund that’s intended to be exactly as it’s called: a funding legacy for the major projects that are eligible for a high-performance sport facility. So that’s not capital funding; that’s operating funding. The federal government participates in the funding of that program as well.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Did the federal government, if I just move to the capital portion—because probably the largest portion of the $500 million is going towards capital, I would think. Does that $500 million go directly to Infrastructure Ontario to put RFPs out and to then arrange the building of the infrastructure for the games, the capital infrastructure?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It depends on the project, on how the finances are organized for that. Some of the funding goes to Toronto 2015 for smaller projects as they engage perhaps directly with municipalities outside of Infrastructure Ontario. Infrastructure Ontario is involved in every single capital project that’s there. They certainly can be available for advice and support and project management if Toronto 2015 chooses, but not necessarily involved in every single project. So in those conditions, the funding could flow to Toronto 2015, and then a partnership is arranged with the municipalities. For the bigger projects, it could flow to Toronto 2015 and then the consortium is entered into. So there’s a variety of different ways that funding flows.

Mr. Rod Jackson: In your opinion, do you have the appropriate amount of oversight over TO2015 in your role?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The oversight for Toronto 2015 is rigorous. As I said, it’s based on the compliance of a variety of agreements, so it’s fairly comprehensive when it comes to oversight of financial reporting.

I mentioned in my opening remarks that there is an audit function as well for Toronto 2015 as a recipient of funding from Ontario, so that’s a robust program that’s applied as well.

Mr. Rod Jackson: There are a few programs that were mentioned in different deputations by different deputants at different times. I’m hoping that you’ll be able to tell me where they come from, which budgets they come from, whether they are coming from TO2015 or whether they are included in other ministries’ budgets, or wherever they’re coming from.

There are a few of them here, and I’ll just go one by one. There is the Pan Am kids’ program, for example. Can you tell me how much, and where that money is coming from, exactly?

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Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I don’t have handy the exact amount of money for that. In the summer of 2013, the province announced the promotion, celebration and legacy program, and that was a $42-million program.

In front of you, there is the chart. It has a few different colours on it. That shows the different aspects of funding. If you look on the bottom half of the chart, and you look at, let’s say, the fifth line down, there’s the legacy strategy, at $22 million. That’s part of the $42-million program that was announced this summer. The Pan Am kids’ program is funded from within that amount of money.

That aspect of the chart is identified as an additional host jurisdiction responsibility, so that is funding provided by Ontario, and that’s outside of the $1.4-billion spending envelope that Toronto 2015 has.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. So $22 million of that $42 million is coming from the legacy strategy fund, and the rest of it is coming from the province of Ontario?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The Pan Am kids is within the legacy strategy, and that $22 million, plus the line below that, the $20 million, makes up the $42-million promotion, celebration and legacy program that was announced this summer.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Oh, I get it. They’re put together. All right, sorry.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes, if we put them together, that’s $42 million, because it was announced as one program this summer. That’s funding that Ontario is providing for those initiatives.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay, thank you. What about the volunteer initiative that’s offering OSAP relief structure?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Same thing. That’s also out of the legacy strategy of $22 million.

Mr. Rod Jackson: That’s part of that $42 million?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It is part of that $42 million. The $42-million program is the additional amount of funding, sort of like net new funds, available to implement that. But there are certain aspects of it which I think include the training that’s done in partnership with the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities and may already be part of their existing funding envelope, so perhaps it’s not net new money to Ontario. But working with them and collaborating with that ministry, we were able to access a program that they have, and focus the priorities in terms of delivering for the games.

Mr. Rod Jackson: What about the apprenticeship program, that has been widely advertised?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Same thing.

Mr. Rod Jackson: So that’s part of that $42 million?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s part of that strategy, overall. When you think of the legacy strategy, it’s a deliverable under that strategy. But I can’t tell you off the top of my head if all or just a portion of any additional funding is in that $22 million or is part of the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities’ ongoing deliverables for apprenticeship training. We just created some synergies between us, in terms of focusing some funding on this priority.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. I only have two more, in case you’re wondering. You look a little concerned.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s all right. Keep going.

Mr. Rod Jackson: How about the Pan Am trails?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Same thing. The Pan Am trails are part of that $22 million.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. The new Canadian Sport Institute in Scarborough?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The CSIO?

Mr. Rod Jackson: Yes.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The CSIO will be eligible for—it’s probably a little more complicated. The facility itself is being funded out of Toronto 2015’s capital project. The actual building itself, the new community centre pool in the U of T campus in Scarborough, is being built as part of that. Some aspects of the sport facilities, outside of the needs for the games but, rather, directly for the longevity of the CSIO, are funded out of the legacy strategy.

We talked a little bit before about the overall $70-million legacy strategy. You see that in the upper part of the chart, if you look at the third line down, which talks about post-games venue support. If you go across, that’s $70 million.

That facility, as it houses the CSIO and it is a high-performance centre, will receive funding to help the long-term operating component of that. That one in particular has a few different aspects of funding.

I hope that was clear.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Yes, I understand it better.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Okay.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Would you undertake to get me the breakdown of the costs of those programs that I asked you about?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes, absolutely.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I’d just be curious to know what they are on their own, the total cost of each of those programs. If you could undertake to do that for the committee—

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes, I can do that.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Thank you. Sorry. How much time do I have, Chair?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): You have one minute and 15 seconds.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Time flies when you’re having fun.

So I do have one quick question maybe you can answer. You’re responsible to coordinate provincial service delivery for health management, and I see health is down here, on the chart you’re referring to, as zero.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The Ministry of Health is responsible for delivering the health services within the jurisdiction, and that’s part of the overall host jurisdictional services.

The Ministry of Health has been working with all of its partners in terms of health delivery across all of the communities that will have events and venues, but the cost of delivering those services is expected to be managed from within the Ministry of Health’s overall funding envelope. So, at this point, why it’s showing here as zero is that, while they are delivering services and they are working with their partners in coordinating and planning for the games, they are going to manage all of those services from within the health envelope.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is that the Ministry of Health?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. I assume that’s it.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Very good. Thank you very much, and we shall move to the third party. That would be, I believe, Ms. Sattler.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Right. Thank you very much for being here today, and also for having come to the committee previously. I wanted to ask questions both about your presentation today and also about some things that were presented to the committee at your earlier appearance here back in November.

At that time, there was a comment made about due diligence on the business plan including, when necessary, securing the advice of an outside consultant for third party validation. Can you give us some examples of the kinds of issues that—when you were reviewing the business plan and doing the due diligence, what kinds of examples or what kinds of things would lead you to secure third party advice? What would flag something as needing third party validation?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The review of the business plan is an important feature of oversight, as you point out, and it’s a function that both Ontario and the federal government participate in. It is one of our key tools of accountability with the organizing committee, and also helps in our review of oversight and applying that.

The delivery of the games is a project unlike typical projects that happen here in this jurisdiction. A games of this scope and scale and size hasn’t happened since, I don’t know, the 1930s, I guess, when Hamilton had a large games there. So the assistance of third party support in reviewing a business plan that is designed to be very specific around the deliveries of an event like this is helpful to the government in some of the key features of it; in particular, in looking at operational readiness and operational planning.

An important feature from the financial side, in looking at the overall budget of the games and looking at the spending and the commitments that Toronto 2015 has made from an overall financial perspective, is very much dependent on operational delivery: from a risk perspective, trying to understand where they are in the continuum of games planning as it moves from general planning to specific operational planning to implementation. At this stage of the games, are they in the right place at the right time with the work that they’ve done and the work that’s left to do?

Having the support of a third party consultant that has expertise in games delivery from that financial side of delivery and an understanding from an operational perspective—“Have they spent the right amount of money? Are they within plan?”—is very, very helpful.

The type of support that we received from the consultants we engaged—they have had and have participated in this type of work with other games around the world, so that expertise does exist, and we were able to access that to help us provide some advice and potentially some advice back to Toronto 2015 as well, if we feel that there are things that need to be addressed.

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Ms. Peggy Sattler: How often did you engage the third party expertise?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: We brought on the consultant as a part of an engagement for all of the business plans that Toronto 2015 will be submitting, so it’s a long-term engagement. That’s beneficial to us because it allows that support, too—as we work on the games and go through the different aspects of post-jurisdictional delivery as well, that we have the consultant there over the long term so that we’re not starting again. If we have financial questions on something or if we need some help in analyzing a very specific feature of the business plan that’s very unique to games delivery, having a source there for the long term is instrumental in providing that continuity.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. Another thing that was mentioned in the November appearance before the committee was around a data tracking system. I wondered if you could tell us more about that. What kind of data is tracked and what would raise a red flag as you’re monitoring this data tracking system?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: With the secretariat and Toronto 2015, we share project management information with one another, and also our risk management framework. Receiving operational risk detail from the organizing committee—through a variety of sources, through their project management reports, their risk reports, and also through quarterly reports and other financial reports that they give us—we compile the information, and allows us to look at all of the features of the organization: the amount of spending that the organizing committee has done to date, and the commitment levels that they have also managed to achieve. There’s a difference between cash spending and making a commitment on a certain aspect of operational planning. Having all of that information forms the basis of our knowledge in terms of understanding the data.

There are lots of different points and sources of data that we assemble in Toronto 2015’s activity reports, their quarterly reporting and their financial activity reporting—both to the province and the federal government.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Have there been red flags, so to speak, raised that have caused you to go back and highlight certain concerns that you’ve had?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: We work closely on a day-to-day basis with the organizing committee when it comes to looking at certain points. We always have questions in terms of understanding the level of operation—and that’s a main feature, as well, of risk management: looking at that information and sharing and asking questions and understanding all of the details associated that are relevant to us when it comes to operational planning.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: The issues around the compensation for the executives on 2015: You said that many of the details around severance are contractual, but as part of the project management tracking that you were doing, you would only have access to the total amounts for salaries and not the details of the contracts. Is that correct?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The contracts themselves are contractual agreements between the individuals and the organizing committee, but we do receive information on overall salary and wages when it comes to the delivery of the budget overall. It’s a component of the overall $1.4-billion budget, so we do have and receive information on that, certainly on a commitment basis, that we know and understand how many staff are in Toronto 2015’s organization at any given point in time. They report that type of information to their board and we receive that information as well. So we do have various data points around that.

I don’t receive a fine level of detail of “employee X makes Y dollars a year.” That’s not the type of information that we assess in terms of understanding risk, but rather: Are they living within the $1.4-billion budget, and how does that component of their budget—how are they doing with that? Are they managing to what their expectations are? And are they within that budget category, in particular, given their level of delivery?

There are different decisions that an organizing committee can make. They can choose to contract out a service to deliver a certain feature, or they can choose to do that through staff within the organization. Those are decisions as any organization would make in determining what’s the most cost-effective way of delivering that service and what skill they are looking for. In some instances, it makes sense to hire an individual to do that type of work. In other cases, it makes sense to procure it through a contract, a third party consultant, a different operating methodology, or to partner with somebody.

All of those decisions are part of the project management work that we receive, so we do understand when they do make those decisions. All of that’s to say is that those decisions are made from the funding envelope that they have.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: From a risk management perspective, would there be any concerns about all of this turnover at the top, first with Mr. Troop being let go and then the two new executives being let go. Would there be any concerns about the impact of all of this turnover on the success of the games and the ability of the organization to continue to deliver?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: My understanding, in terms of making the decisions most recently made in terms of staffing, is to deliver the games. As the CEO said, it was a function of streamlining and bringing forward the team in terms of meeting its operational needs and demands over the next—I think there are about 16 months left till the games. That was a decision that they made in terms of understanding their deliverables and the best way in which to deliver them.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: From your perspective, then, it didn’t raise the level of risk that you saw? Okay.

One of the issues that we’ve talked a lot about at this committee is around the growth of the security budget. It’s now at $239 million. Given the initial budget of $113 million, from where you sit in providing the financial oversight and the risk management, does this raise a red flag? At what point does the increase in the budget cause you to start asking questions about management?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The increase in the budget was required as the security planning moved along in coordination with all of the operational planning for the games itself. There were a few certain features of the planning for security that became more certain over time, as the planning continued on from 2010, where we had the budget of $113 million notionally allocated, to now. We’re aware of the security decisions in terms of the level of security activation that’s happening around the games to best match the footprint of the games, the venues and the sports schedule as all of that is organized.

We do have a window into and a review of the operational activities that are occurring at the organizing committee and also how that is coordinated with the host jurisdictional services. As a part of risk management and project management, we do look at that. We look at the changing conditions, the changing and better clarity on the requirements in terms of delivering security services. That was understood in conjunction with changes in the budget.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: You just talked about the requirements for choosing the security services. Can you speak to the decision-making process in terms of the procurement of those private security services?

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Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: No. No, I can’t, not in terms of the specific procurement of private security. That was done by the MCSCS, the ministry responsible for that. In terms of that, that’s a question that they’re best able to answer.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: From a risk management perspective, I wondered—our understanding is that Contemporary Security Canada has won the contract to provide the services for the Pan Am Games—$81 million—but there have been problems with this company following the G20/G8 protests in 2011, with charges laid about failing to ensure proper uniforms, hiring unlicensed guards, offering security services while not licensed. Wouldn’t this entail risk, engaging a company that has such a poor record in past experiences?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: My colleagues at that ministry are responsible for implementing that aspect of the games and the details around the provision of private security and the controls that they would have in place to address those issues, from a risk perspective. Their responsibility in meeting the games’ requirements is really focused on them and in a very specific operational delivery in terms of meeting those requirements. So I think that that aspect of the operations is best addressed by the security experts.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So risk assessment that’s related to the provision of security services is the responsibility of MCSCS; it has nothing to do with the function of your department?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The specific operational details, when it comes to understanding and controlling, perhaps, some of the items that you raised, are really an operational expertise. That’s something that they would control in terms of their environment.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: But isn’t there an element of financial risk if it’s an $81-million contract and the kinds of services that you would expect aren’t delivered appropriately for that $81 million?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: From the financial perspective, the assessment of risk is looking at the delivery of services and the different options and alternatives that exist in providing those services from a financial perspective. Who can provide them best and what controls and features—how that’s put on the table from an operating perspective is MCSCS. Certainly, we look at the alternatives when it comes to providing services from a public perspective, from an OPP perspective and from a private security perspective. Those are, perhaps, on the financial side, more of the alternatives and options that we work with them on, and understanding what the risks are and relying on their advice as security experts—because they are the security experts—on the best way to deliver those services.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: When Saäd Rafi was here last week, committee members asked some of these questions around the security of the games, and he also was not able to—that wasn’t within his area of responsibility. These are questions, as you said, that should be posed directly to MCSCS. Is that correct?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Some of the components that you asked about are very detailed operational security questions that, from a financial perspective, I’m not in the best position to answer.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: But isn’t it even a value-for-money kind of question? For $81 million, are you getting the appropriate level of security service? This is an operational question, not financial.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: From the value for that perspective and the delivery of services in that way, there’s a few different ways in which I—to deliver security services, that ministry is in the best position to provide the advice and make the decisions on ensuring safety and ensuring that security services are delivered in the appropriate manner. There are trade-offs in how you deliver those security services from a financial perspective, in terms of—is it the OPP, as an example, that delivers those services, or is it private security? It’s a combination thereof.

In terms of making those decisions, my understanding is that MCSCS certainly relied on some of the experiences of other organizations as they delivered similar games and looking at the right mix between using and utilizing private security services where it’s appropriate and bringing it back to the table.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Can you confirm: Has that contract been signed?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I believe it has.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. I wanted to go back to some of the personnel issues. Who, in the ministry, is responsible for signing off on these contractual arrangements with the specific individuals about the kinds of severance payouts that they get? Who is responsible for that?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: That’s the responsibility of Toronto 2015, and it’s a contract that’s entered into between the individual employee and the organizing committee.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So Toronto 2015 has full authority to make up those contracts, and there’s no sort of ministry involvement in whatever kinds of—I understand that Ian Troop got a cash payment of $478,200, $27,300 in retirement benefits, $10,000 in out-placement payments, $3,500 in legal fees and medical benefits of $15,800. All of those aspects of his employment contract—TO2015 had full authority to negotiate that and there was no ministry oversight or involvement?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Our oversight in terms of salary and wages is looking at Toronto 2015 and managing to the $1.4-billion envelope that they have. The specific details of an individual employment contract are really the responsibility of the organizing committee, and they make those determinations.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Do you think that this was an appropriate settlement in terms of an employment contract?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It was their decision in terms of the terms and conditions of the contract.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. The money that would come for this payout, as well as whatever comes from the contracts from the two new executives who were let go—that money has already been budgeted for? That’s included already in the—

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s in their budget.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: It’s in the operational budget of 2015? Okay.

My other question: Going back to a comment that you made in response to a question from Mr. Jackson around mitigation strategies, you talked about the use of Infrastructure Ontario because of its past experience as a strategy to mitigate levels of risk. Can you give me some examples of other mitigation strategies that you would use to reduce levels of risk?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: We talked a little bit about this already. In terms of our review of various financial reports from Toronto 2015, understanding the details associated with that and a review of the annual business plan is a strategy that provides us potential early warning signals in terms of any financial components of the games. So the rigorous review of those financial reports also helps assist in risk mitigation.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: How much time do I have?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Just under three minutes.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Just under three minutes. Okay. What are some other specific examples of early warning signals that you would look for?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: We would look at various benchmarks, certainly understanding the level of operational planning that Toronto 2015 has accomplished at any given point in time. That would provide us a benchmark to understand how well they’ve planned in terms of their operations and some of the goals that they’ve achieved; that’s a useful tool for us to look at as well. We talked about the various reports that we receive. They share project management information with us as well that helps us understand where they’ve accomplished their operational level of planning. That’s important to us from delivering our host jurisdictional services; as well, understanding and working with them on their achieving a certain level of operational completeness, which helps in terms of the operation of transportation and other host jurisdictional services—so working with them, co-operating and coordinating with them. Part of that work also feeds into that information as well and understanding operational readiness.

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Ms. Peggy Sattler: I wonder, through the Chair, in light of the comments that were made about the role of the MCSCS in terms of the security provisions, if I could request some information to be provided to the committee. Do I do that now or should I—sorry. I’m new at this, so I don’t know the procedures.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): I respect what you’re saying.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay.

Interjection.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): I think how this would work—I think you could request information through the witness—

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): —what’s relative. But if you’re looking for other information from another ministry, for example—

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Yes, it would be.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): —we’d want to discuss that at the committee level to see what information you’re actually looking for and get unanimous consent to request.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: At this point? Because it sort of follows directly from the comments about the role of MCSCS in the oversight of the security budget. Would this be the right point to do that?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): I think what we’ll have to do—the time is up. Just let me take a few seconds to consult with the Clerk so that we can figure out how to proceed with this one.

It appears that there are a couple of possible avenues forward here.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Chair, can we just clarify what the request was? We missed that.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Ms. Sattler, could you clarify the request one more time?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Yes. I’m interested in the committee having access to the RFP for the security service provision records respecting the RFPs, the responses to the RFPs, the final checklists and the records that led to the decision to select the Contemporary Security Canada as the games security provider.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): I think that is a fair request. I think what we should do is continue with our line of questioning and perhaps we could debate that after, but there’s a couple of options we could move forward. You could request someone from MCSS to come—did I say that right?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: MCSCS.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): MCSCS—thank you—and/or you could request the Chair to write a letter to the ministry to request the information that you’re looking for. Those are options that we could look at.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Chair?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Ms. Damerla.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: If you wanted clarification as to whether that would fall within the original parameters and mandate of this committee in terms of what we are doing, what’s the best way to do that, because I’m not sure—it may or may not, but I just want some clarification as to whether that request of another ministry is part of the mandate of the committee as it was constructed to undertake.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Okay. So once again, I think there’s a question being asked here. I think what we should do is continue with the rotation and get through the delegations today, and then we can have some discussion at the end of the meeting on how you want to move forward with the particular request. Is that fair enough?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Thank you very much. We’ll move to the government side. Ms. Damerla.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you, Ms. Mudrinic, for being here. Actually, welcome back. I think you were here once before.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I was.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: I recall that, yes.

Thank you for all of your time here. I know you have a busy day outside of committee work as well. Any sport of this scale—and certainly this is probably the largest games Ontario is going to be hosting. It’s also the largest ever Pan/Parapan Am Games to be hosted. I know, given the scale of the games, it is a multi-party endeavour, and given the geographic scale—it’s many municipalities, obviously the province of Ontario, the federal government, TO2015, all of these various players. I know that this committee has spent most of its time focusing on the role of the province, but to understand the role of the province, I think it’s important to get the context of who the other players are and how they constrain what the province can and cannot do in the joint responsibilities where many of the decisions are taken.

In light of that, could you just outline for us what the multi-party agreement looks like generally, a general outline?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The multi-party agreement is really a governing agreement that each of the parties responsible for delivering the games is a party to, so that includes the federal government, the province of Ontario, the Canadian Olympic Committee, the Canadian Paralympic Committee, the city of Toronto and, through joinder agreements, other municipalities and universities are also parties to this agreement. So the agreement covers a fairly large scope of responsibilities and requirements and, of course, this is an agreement with Toronto 2015, the organizing committee.

The agreement itself—you have a copy of it there—certainly talks quite a bit about incorporation, the board and its responsibilities as well. It talks about governance in terms of how the board is formed and certain aspects of the senior membership of the delivery responsibility for Toronto 2015, and how those partners participate and how they’re formed as well. There’s a description on board governance issues and certainly a lot of the requirements in terms of delivering the games. There’s a lengthy section on business planning and what Toronto 2015’s business plan is expected to cover, ranging from financial reporting to a plan for French-language services, a cultural plan and other details.

The agreement also talks about the funding contributions, and there are many parties that contribute funding for the delivery of the games, the federal government being one, the province of Ontario as well, and it talks about the terms and conditions of funding; and municipalities as well, in terms of the delivery of services, the funding, the participation in the capital program. Those are same sorts of features that apply to the city of Toronto and other municipalities that have venues and are having events in the games.

The multi-party agreement has typical features when it looks at how to manage disputes between the various parties. I talked a little bit about incorporation documents. It talks about the requirements of a cultural plan, French-language services, as I said, and various other features.

So it’s a fairly comprehensive plan in terms of understanding the different roles and responsibilities, delivery responsibilities of all of the partners that are a part of these games. It certainly is heavy on Toronto 2015’s requirements, but, at the same time, it does contemplate the other partners, their roles, their governance roles and their commitments in terms of providing services and facilities for the games.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Now, one of the things I have heard, along with being probably the most ambitious and largest Pan/Parapan Am Games ever held, the other thing I’m hearing is that it’s also one of the most open and transparent games, and I just wanted to hear your thoughts on that.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: One feature of openness and transparency is the application of FIPPA to Toronto 2015, and that was a decision that was made, that FIPPA would be applied to that organization, so that has a very distinct and quite a rigorous feature of being open and transparent. Information provided to the federal government and the provincial government in terms of activity reporting is also an important feature. Toronto 2015, through these agreements, does post a quarterly report on their website. In terms of transparency, the agreements—the multi-party agreement, the transfer payment agreement, the Ontario support agreement, the host city agreement and PASO statutes—are all posted on Toronto 2015’s website, as is a regular, updated quarterly report. Toronto 2015 also posts on its website various policies associated with procurement as well.

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Toronto 2015 has been posting senior expenses. They’ve done two postings so far, I understand, in November and at the end of February as well—on their website, which is the website everyone should go to in terms of understanding the requirements of the games and the features of the games. It’s certainly there. There’s a fairly robust description of the projects and a good detailing, also, of the progress of the various capital projects as well. All of the venues are clearly articulated there, and a good understanding of the sports program, the types of sports that are going to be delivered, all of the partners that are involved.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Would you know which jurisdiction—I mean, there’s the province, there’s the federal government. Who’s idea was it to bring the games under FIPPA? Do you happen to know?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The province’s.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Did the province have to do it, or was it just something that the province chose to do?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: They chose to designate Toronto 2015.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Would you say, in your opinion, that this choice reflects a desire on the part of this government to be open?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Certainly all of the requirements for transparency—and I outlined quite a few of the features that are available for the public to read and see to have a better understanding of the games and all of its obligations—add, overall, to the transparency of the games.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Comparing it to, for example, the Winter Olympics that were held in British Columbia, did the province, at that time, do something similar to what we’ve done in terms of bringing the games under FIPPA?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I don’t believe that the BC government did that. An Olympic Games and a Pan American Games are somewhat different in a variety of features, but certainly respecting that the funding for staging these games is, in large part, composed of funding from Ontario, from Canada, and certainly, for the major capital projects in municipalities, from municipalities or universities as well—as it is public funding from that source, that transparency is an important feature as part of that.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: In terms of transparency, my understanding is that one can find fairly detailed information. Could you give me some idea of the level of detailed information that is available to anybody who chooses to go online?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Again, the place where a lot of this information is found is Toronto 2015’s website. I think that the various agreements that are posted there—and I spent a little bit of time talking about the multi-party agreement, but the transfer payment agreement is there as well, as are a series of other agreements. Reading through those agreements provides a very description of funding commitments. They provide a good description of various responsibilities from the funding partners and articulate the provision of services and the provision of host jurisdictional services as well.

In addition, with the bid book being available as well online, the bid book describes in great detail the aspirations around the different components of delivering the games, including the sports, the type of commitment that was made by all partners that are party to developing the bid, and the type of games that will be here in Ontario at that time. There is a lengthy section on the athletes’ village, the sports, the cultural programs, the celebration programs. The bid book gives a very good description of the expectations of what the games are going to look like.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Would the transparency go as far as showing figures for salaries of senior executives and their expenses and that sort of thing?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I’m recalling—as part of the quarterly reporting, Toronto 2015, in a broad sense, provides a good description of spending to date, funding for various projects, operating funding, how much has been spent, how much has been committed. So that information is available, but the granular detail of an individual salary is not part of that aspect of Toronto 2015’s reporting. However, as Toronto 2015 is the recipient of funding from Ontario, they are subject to public sector salary disclosure. So as a part of the annual disclosure of salaries, there’s a significant amount of detail provided there for all Toronto 2015 employees who meet the terms of the Public Sector Salary Disclosure Act.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Based on what you’re saying, this is probably one of the most transparent games ever. Would you agree?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: There is a significant amount of transparency that’s applied to the games.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Just going further on that idea of governance and transparency, auditing is always a big part of the checks and balances to make sure that money is being spent the way it ought to have been, and if it isn’t, to flag that. As the ADM for risk management and financial oversight, could you perhaps tell us what audits have been performed on the organizing committee, TO2015?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Sure. As a recipient of transfer payment funding from Ontario, the public sector directives on expenses, perquisites and procurement apply to Toronto 2015. As well, the governing agreements—in particular, the MPA also contemplates in terms of procurement the fair, open, transparent process for that. As a part of this feature, Toronto 2015 was required to be compliant to these directives as soon as they received $10 million in funding from the province. As of April 1, 2012, those aspects of the directives were applicable to Toronto 2015.

As a part of that, through the internal audit teams of government, a decision was made to perform a series of audits on Toronto 2015. From a time perspective, compliance started April 1, 2012, and an audit was performed starting three months later. The reason that was done was to allow a little bit of time for Toronto 2015 to be under the frame of the directive and then perform an audit in fairly early days. The benefit of this was to be able to provide advice to the organizing committee, if required, in terms of their practices, in terms of expenses, perquisites and procurement. So a series of audits was done. Expenses and perquisites were done together, and procurements was a second audit of the organizing committee. That was done over the summer of 2012. The internal audit team, working with ourselves and with Toronto 2015, developed a series of reports on the results of their audit and provided advice. The intention is that in this upcoming fiscal year, a follow-up audit would be done on those items, on expenses, perquisites and procurement as well.

In addition, another audit that is currently ongoing is Toronto 2015’s compliance to the various governing agreements. We’ve talked a little bit about what those are. The audit is composed of looking at the various requirements. The requirements include aspects of reporting, submission of business plans, general governance within the organizing committee, and it’s laid out in fairly great detail in the multi-party agreement. That audit is now ongoing. We’re expecting the results of that audit later, next fiscal year. The intention is that, later on, a follow-up audit would be performed on that topic as well.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Coming to the federal government, does the federal government have any involvement in these audits, or do they perform their own audits for their stake of the games with TO2015?

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Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The federal government also has a contribution agreement with Toronto 2015 for their funding, so the scope and scale of the federal audit is based on their contribution agreement with Toronto 2015. They perform audit functions associated with compliance and the terms and conditions of their contribution agreement.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: They do an independent, separate audit? Is that what you’re saying?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s a separate audit, yes.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Are you aware of what agency the federal government uses for their audits?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I can’t tell you off the top of my head if it’s done through their internal teams or if it’s an external provision.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Speaking of the federal government, do you have any interaction with a counterpart from their ministry or any representatives?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I do. The federal government, as well, has an organization within their sport division that manages activities such as the delivery of games. On a regular basis, I do speak with the federal government, as do my staff when it comes to—

Ms. Dipika Damerla: But more specifically, just as the province has somebody like yourself for financial oversight, does the federal government have somebody for financial oversight for their portion of the contribution?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes, they do. They have a staff that manages that for them as well.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: How often do you communicate with that counterpart who’s responsible for financial oversight?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I do frequently. My staff, as well, do on a daily basis, so—

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Daily. Okay. That’s good to know.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: —there’s quite a bit of interaction.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Do you receive any documents or financial updates from their investments in the games?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Many of the documents that Toronto 2015 produces, they do so for the purposes of the provincial and federal governments. So we have a lot of shared financial documentation. As a part of the federal government’s contribution agreement, they ask for some specific project funding and spending information for the capital projects. That information, as Toronto 2015 sends it to the federal government, is also provided to us as well. It’s a federal government requirement, but we do see that information.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Chair, how much time do we have?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Seven minutes.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Okay. Good.

I just wanted to talk a little bit about the athletes’ village. It’s one of the major projects that have been scrutinized, and it’s a long-term investment for this province. Could you tell this committee about the partners that we’ve been working with to build the athletes’ village?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Sure. I’d be happy to do so. The athletes’ village is a project that is being developed within the greater West Don Lands. The planning for the West Don Lands has been a long-term initiative of Waterfront Toronto, in conjunction with the province, the federal government and the city of Toronto as a part of the overall commitment to the redevelopment of Toronto’s waterfront. In the West Don Lands, an initial phase is well under way that includes housing developments, affordable housing and a new park that was opened last year. The athletes’ village is the continuation of the development of the West Don Lands and the next phase of development.

The planning work around the implementation of the village has many partners to it. It’s spearheaded in combination by Waterfront Toronto and Infrastructure Ontario, but certainly the development of a new residential community involves the participation of many partners, including the city of Toronto, as you can imagine, for various planning approvals. Various other partners are part of the development of that community when it comes to the provision of a new streetcar line, a new community centre, new affordable housing that will be happening there. So there’s quite a few different partners that are interested in its development and part of the overall process.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Back in 2009, it looked like the estimate for the athletes’ village was $1 billion, but now it’s down to $709 million. Is that correct? Can you comment on that?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: In 2009, as a part of the bid, the overall consideration of the athletes’ village was around a billion-dollar development. In terms of implementing the village, it was a procurement that was run by Infrastructure Ontario and Waterfront Toronto in terms of acquiring the services for the construction, the development of not only the village but the supporting infrastructure that goes along with it. As a part of that competitive process, the village was procured, and the next phase of development could begin. The number associated with that is, as I said, $709 million.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: The fact that it’s about $300 million cheaper than anticipated: How does that reflect on the province’s ability to negotiate a deal with all of the stakeholders?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The provision of the village for $709 million was done as part of an open and competitive process, managing the requirements of what was required to deliver the games. From 2009 to the close of this procurement process, which was January 2012, a lot of work happened between the province, Infrastructure Ontario, and Waterfront Toronto in terms of understanding the requirements of the deliveries of an athletes’ village, and what was required to be able to stage the games.

The village was developed with a footprint keeping in mind all the work that happened to understand what was required to be able to accommodate 10,000 athletes and officials over the games’ time, over the Pan American Games and the Parapan American Games that occur over two different periods of time. Having that information from Toronto 2015, the organizing committee, understanding better the requirements for a village—what was required in terms of athlete number of days, athlete hours, athlete beds and things like that in terms of figuring out how to build the village—had an impact on what the village would cost, and it was put out, as I said, in an open, competitive process.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Do you think it’s a good-news story, that it’s coming in at $300 million less than what we hoped?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s an open number in terms of the $709 million. It will be ready in plenty of time for the games, so it’s certainly positive.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Could you tell us exactly when the cost of the athletes’ village was outside of the operating budget? The operating budget is $1.4 billion. At what point was the athletes’ village put outside of the operating budget? Was it from the get-go? What’s your understanding?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Looking at the bid documentation in the bid book, the athletes’ village is described as being an item of delivery outside of the organizing committee’s budget. When the procurement of the athletes’ village was complete and announced in January 2012, it was certainly part of a provincial deliverable at the time. It was the province, through Infrastructure Ontario, Waterfront Toronto and our partners there, but it was a provincial delivery, as the West Don Lands is a parcel of land owned by the province.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: So what you’re saying is, right from the get-go, it was always outside the operating budget?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you. Would you be able to tell us a little bit about why the West Don Lands was chosen as a site for the athletes’ village? My understanding is that it was a brownfield before?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes. The West Don Lands is a brownfield site, and it’s part of the ongoing development as part of the regeneration and revitalization of Toronto’s waterfront. Work had already commenced in the first phase of the West Don Lands, and having the athletes’ village in the West Don Lands provided a boost to that community in terms of accelerating development. A lot of the planning, development and infrastructure planning work had been organized and contemplated. It was a great fit in terms of having a centralized village in Toronto, where a majority of the activities will be happening for the games, and a continuation and acceleration of the ongoing development of the West Don Lands.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you very much. I have no more questions.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Thank you very much. You had only 14 seconds left.

We’ll go to the second round. We have a 10-minute round. We’ll go to Mr. Jackson.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Thank you, Chair. Can you tell me what you—do you know much about the municipal partnership agreements, as far as—well, just about anything between venues and security? These are agreements that I don’t think have been signed yet. Is that correct?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: They have not. They have not been signed yet.

Mr. Rod Jackson: What do these partnerships mean? Can you explain to us exactly what municipal partnership agreements are?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The exact details of what will be in the agreements and the level of operational detail in the services, specifically—I can’t really comment on that right now, because it’s more of an operational requirement. But I can tell you that as a part of a host jurisdiction, there are services that need to be provided for the games that are outside of the responsibility of Toronto 2015.

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These agreements that are under contemplation now will outline the provision of these services in terms of, using one example, certainly garbage pickup and that type of municipal operation, ensuring that the games are a success and that when an event happens in a particular municipality, it’s well run and efficient for that community.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is there a chance that this could have an effect on any budget, whether it’s TO2015’s or the secretariat budget or the provincial side of it? I guess what I’m getting at is that if the municipality and the province can’t come to an agreement that is favourable for the province or the organizing committee, the organizing committee or the province would pick that up.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The provision of those services is contemplated as part of—again, I draw your attention to the chart that you have in front of you. If you look at that bottom half again, the host jurisdictional games costs, you see, on the third line from the bottom, that there is a municipal services provision in terms of what the estimates could be. This is part of the number that was put out there in the various technical briefings. As you said, these are early days for these details with the agreement. As that work goes on over the coming months, it’s contemplated as a part of this budget over here.

Mr. Rod Jackson: That 15 to 35 is a pretty broad range; one number is double the other. What are the chances this—I guess there’s a good chance it falls within that 15 to 35; that is a pretty broad range. But what is the risk that it comes outside of that on the high end? Surely, there’s a risk for everything, I know, but in your opinion—

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: There’s still work to do on this, as you said. It’s early days. I think that providing the numbers here of 15 to 35 indicate exactly that, that work is ongoing. In future technical briefings, if this number needs to be refined—eventually, it will be refined once all of the agreements are signed and we know what it is, but that will be subject to future meetings that we’ll have and technical briefings. Right now, this is the range that we understand it could be in.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I think there are eight other municipal police forces that are involved in the security partnership. Is that included in the municipal services portion of that?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: No. The provision of security is part of the overall security budget. Again, I don’t have the operational responsibility for security, but security is delivered by the local forces in the community in which events are, so it will involve the local police force. That $239 million is what encompasses what you just noted.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. How much time do we have, Chair?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Just under six minutes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. I still have a fair bit of questions I want to get through, so forgive me if it seems a little curt.

Let’s talk about the athletes’ village for a minute: $709 million. I’ve heard different numbers about the recoup number on that. What do you think is the amount the province will recoup in cash on that project?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The number that was provided to the committee a few weeks ago was $71 million in terms of the revenue that the province would receive from the athletes’ village.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Seventy-one million dollars?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: So $71 million out of the $709 million—how is that money being recouped? Where is that money coming from, that $71 million?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I believe that my colleague who was here previous to me from the secretariat provided you with a chart, I think, that may have outlined that. I don’t have it here in front of me, but it’s revenue associated with the affordable housing projects, the YMCA and the George Brown facility.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Who are the units being sold to, exactly, when we’re talking about the housing units?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The affordable housing components—agreements were made with various affordable housing providers. They will own that building and provide affordable housing to the community in a way that affordable housing providers do—typically in Ontario. So they’ll own the units, they’ll own the building and provide rental housing. As a part of the other major development, I believe there’s affordable ownership units as well that will be a part of that, and they’ll be owned by individuals.

Mr. Rod Jackson: How many providers are there?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: There are two.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Two? Okay. And how many units in those two providers would be the total?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: There are about, give or take, 250 units.

Mr. Rod Jackson: What is the retail amount of each of those units?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I can’t answer that question.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you know what they’re getting each unit for?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: No, I don’t.

Mr. Rod Jackson: No? So of the total units, including the ones that are being sold to those groups, how many units are being sold in total? You said that there are some that are going to be owned by individuals.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Of affordable housing, there are two buildings, and I believe the total number of units within those buildings is 250.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. So outside of that, there’s no other types of housing?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Well, there’s the rest of the residential construction that’s happening, but that’s outside of the affordable housing units. I think there’s around—again, give or take—800 units of market housing, and around 100 of the 800 is affordable ownership.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Am I correct to say that the majority of the recouped cost of that $71 million is coming from those two providers that are paying for those 250 units, plus people who are buying the other units, that that equals roughly—and George Brown and the Y—the $71 million?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Yes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: What is the remainder of that money that’s not being recouped? Where is that going, that investment? What I’m trying to get to here is, this is such a wonderful project to provide low-income housing, but the only way we’re recouping the cost is by charging these low-income housing providers for it. It kind of is backwards logic that this is a great thing that the province is paying for. I think in one case, one of those providers is actually paying $8 million. These low-income housing providers are paying $8 million to buy those units to be able to provide that low-income housing. So if that’s the case and the money’s being recouped from them, then what’s the giveaway part for the remainder of that $709 million? Who benefits from that?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: My understanding for the affordable housing component is that it’s structured in a similar way as all affordable housing projects are in terms of government funding and the arrangements for that. The remainder of the funding is going to the development of that next phase of the West Don Lands, which includes a significant amount of public infrastructure works, the development of roads, sewers and general public infrastructure, including a new—I think the Cherry Street streetcar LRT will be through there as well. As someone mentioned earlier, it was a brownfield land, so cleanup is required of that land as well.

Certainly there’s a cost associated with the provision of those units to be suitable for the athletes to be used during the games, and the acceleration of this part of the community in the West Don Lands is being accelerated five to 10 years earlier than what was originally contemplated.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Fifteen seconds.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. So that $638 million is for the infrastructure that’s attached to that development?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Again, I know a chart was provided previously that provided perhaps a few more details of the components of the village that was under construction.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I’m not sure it broke it down quite that specifically, but—

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Thank you very much. We shall move on. The 10 minutes are up. I apologize.

Ms. Campbell? No, Ms. Sattler.

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Ms. Peggy Sattler: Thank you very much. I have some more questions based on your introductory remarks, the text of your comments here. The top paragraph on page 2, the final sentence, says that your group is monitoring risks related to games partner activities that may have an impact on Ontario’s objectives for the games. Can you give us some examples of what kinds of risks related to games partner activities could have an impact on Ontario’s objectives for the games, and what are you looking for as you are engaged in this monitoring?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: I think a great way to describe that is looking at the operational readiness in games delivery and efficiency of the games. There are various partners that are responsible for games delivery. There is the organizing committee that is staging and implementing the specific details of the games, sports schedules, movements of athletes and officials, but there are also other partners that are providing host jurisdictional services, ensuring that the transportation network is available and can accommodate the movements of athletes and officials and, from that light as well, looking at the transportation network as it needs to continue to serve the travelling public and also for day-to-day operations, businesses, day-to-day movements for people going back and forth from work, from school, going about their daily business, but also the ability of Ontarians and visitors to be able to participate in the games, to be spectators and to join in with the various community celebrations and events that are happening.

So from a risk perspective, it’s important to look at the deliveries associated with all—there are many, many partners associated with delivering all of those services—looking at the various plans in terms of implementation plans, and ensuring that cost-effective and efficient solutions are put on the table in terms of the delivery of those services. That’s an important part of risk delivery and looking at the objectives and ensuring that the games are well run, efficient and that objectives are met in terms of people expecting a good, seamless games operation.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So you make assessments as to what the partners are proposing to do, as to whether that’s reasonable to expect that they will be able to deliver what they’re committing to deliver in their overall plan?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s understanding the scope and scale of delivery, looking at efficient delivery of those services, things that make sense, and that they’re well coordinated between all of the different delivery partners.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: You mentioned the transportation network and the ability of Ontarians to travel back and forth to work at the same time that the games are going on. Is your department involved in decisions around transportation logistics, as to how you’re going to be able to manage that transportation network and balance the needs of commuters as well as the athletes and the spectators?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The secretariat works with all of the partners on the transportation team, which includes the Ministry of Transportation and certainly, as you can imagine, with the large scope and scale of transportation providers across the entire footprint—which includes Metrolinx, the city of Toronto, TTC, transit services, road services, road operation and traffic services—there are many, many partners that work on a coordinated transportation plan, and the secretariat is also one of those partners. Toronto 2015 is part of that partnership as well. They are also relying on the services of transportation and transit providers to ensure that games operations can run smoothly. So it is a partnership when it comes to the delivery of those services.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Do each of those agencies—Metrolinx, TTC, municipal transit—put in their own plan to you? Or is there one plan that comes to your department that you review?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: The strategic framework for transportation was most recently released a couple of weeks ago, and that was developed as a partnership of all the partners that I talked about. The Ministry of Transportation released a plan a few weeks ago that looks at various options and delivery of transportation services to look at efficient delivery of the games.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. So you would review that strategic framework in its entirety, not necessarily the individual contributions made by each of the participating partners?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: It’s a plan that’s developed by all the partners, so it’s hard to distinguish, really, the individual components of it. The partners all work together in terms of making decisions on options and developing alternatives for the delivery of transportation. It’s a comprehensive plan that takes into consideration various options, alternatives and opportunities by all the partners that are participating.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So when you’re assessing risks related to games partner activities, does that include the role of the municipality? The municipalities provide you with plans as to how they’re proposing to deliver on their commitments, and then you also review all of that documentation?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Well, we just most recently spoke about the municipal service agreement, so as a part of that, it’s understanding the scope and scale of what a host jurisdiction—and a host jurisdiction is certainly the province. Municipalities are hosts to facilities and events as well. It’s important to understand and bring together the operational requirements for the games and the requirements for municipalities that are hosts to these areas. As a part of that work we work with municipalities as well.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Is this the kind of thing that you would ask your third party validator to be involved with, because they would have—would you make judgment calls as to whether this is realistic or practical and achievable? Or would you bring in—is it Deloitte that you use?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: No, not for the risk management framework. The risk management framework, from a broad perspective, is a project management tool that we work with with those partners in terms of understanding the risk. It’s not a report-in necessarily to us, where we review or grade or look at it that way, but rather a tool where we all talk about risk. We look at alternatives, strategies, options in terms of mitigating and managing risks and looking for solutions. It’s a very iterative approach in overall looking at risk.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: And is emergency preparedness part of that as well, the kind of risk that you look at?

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: There is a robust emergency preparedness plan as well, and a number of emergency preparedness exercises are being planned for the games, where all of the partners come together and look at different aspects of what could happen and aspects of emergency preparedness. I guess that’s a very live risk management plan in practice, where all of these partners come together and look at the services that they deliver, options, alternatives, contemplate various scenarios, how it would play out and who would do what as a part of that and develop plans. At the end of it, protocols will be developed and understanding of roles and responsibilities will be developed. Part of that is really digging into looking at alternative solutions and understanding roles and responsibilities.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: How much time do I have?

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Twenty-one seconds.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. That’s good. Thank you very much.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Thank you.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): We’ll move to the government side.

Interjection.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): No further questions. Well, thank you very much for coming this afternoon. You did a great job.

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic: Thank you for the time.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): We appreciate it.

There’s going to be a vote, I would think, in a number of minutes. Do we want to get started on the next delegation or—

Interjection.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Take a five-minute break? Okay. A five-minute break is reasonable. Thank you.

The committee recessed from 1550 to 1616.

TORONTO 2015
PAN AM/PARAPAN AM GAMES
ORGANIZING COMMITTEE

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): I’d like to call the meeting back to order, following that exciting event in the House. Prior to starting, I’d just like to advise the committee that I will be having to depart at 4:30, at which time there will be an election for a Chair. Unfortunately, I’m going to have to interrupt the presenter—well, he’ll get to present, but it’ll be the NDP, during the questioning and statements, that I’ll have to just stop and excuse myself.

Having said that, it’s a great honour to have Toronto 2015 Pan Am/Parapan Am Games Organizing Committee senior vice-president, sports and venues, Mr. Bob O’Doherty. Great to have you here, sir. There’s going to be a 25-minute round from each side, all three, followed by a 10-minute round of questioning and comments and statements, that type of thing. You will be able to begin with a five-minute presentation.

The floor is yours, sir. Welcome.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome to the other committee members. My name is Bob O’Doherty, and I joined Toronto 2015 in September 2010 as the senior vice-president of sport and venues. I actually moved from Ottawa to be part of this extraordinary undertaking in sport that will have a transformational impact and leave a lasting legacy in my home region and my home province for generations to come.

I’ve been involved heavily in sport for over 40 years as an athlete, coach, educator and administrator. I’ve competed nationally in a number of sports and played professional football for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the Canadian Football League.

Over the past 30 years, I’ve held a wide variety of senior management positions within the Canadian sports system, including serving as the chief operating officer for three national sport organizations. I’ve also been involved in bidding for and bringing over 20 major sporting events to the Ottawa area in the province of Ontario, including the Ontario Games, the Canada Games, the Canadian Special Olympics winter games, the Commonwealth Games and various other national and international single sport events. Prior to Toronto 2015, I was the general manager of the 2009 IIHF world junior hockey championship in Ottawa, which, to this day, is still the biggest and most successful single sporting event ever come to the province of Ontario.

At Toronto 2015, I oversee our sport programming, venue management at games time, medical services and anti-doping, Parapan planning and integration, international relations, and national Olympic committee and national Paralympic committee services. One of my biggest responsibilities is building relationships and strategic partnerships with a wide variety of client groups, many of whom are located throughout the Americas, in the Caribbean as well as in Europe. They include the International Olympic Committee, the International Paralympic Committee, the Pan American Sports Organization out of Mexico City and its 41-member groups, and the Americas Paralympic Committee, which is headquartered in Argentina, and its 30-member groups. In addition, our sport clients include continental, international, national and provincial sport organizations. In total, my team and I work with hundreds of client groups in these areas.

Working collaboratively with these groups is essential to the successful delivery of the games. These strong relationships have enabled Toronto 2015 to accomplish a number of firsts and best-evers that will significantly raise the profile of our games. I’ve highlighted some of them: biggest international multi-sport games ever hosted in our country, and the most comprehensive investment in sport infrastructure in our country’s history. We’re hosting the full Olympic program for the first time ever, including the canoe/kayak slalom and the new Olympic sports of golf and rugby sevens.

We have the most Olympic qualifiers in Pan Am Games history. They’ll be here in Toronto. We have the most Paralympic sports in the history of the Parapan Am Games, including the addition of wheelchair rugby, which has its origins in Canada. We also have the most Paralympic qualifiers in Parapan Am history, with all 15 sports being Parapan Am qualifiers. We have the most female athletes in the history of the games: 45% of our participants will be female. Our biggest and best Canadian teams in the history of the games will participate here. Canada will be looking for great podium performances.

These accomplishments are positioning the Toronto 2015 games to be a key part of the athletes’ high-performance pathway to the Rio 2016 games. This strengthens our ability to attract the best athletes in the Americas and the Caribbean and to raise the sport competitions within the games to unprecedented levels.

For example, we were able to work out an agreement with FINA, which is the governing body for aquatics, which saw them move the dates of their 2015 world championships to ensure the best aquatics athletes in the Americas could come to Toronto 2015. They’ve never done this before, and it clearly shows that the behind-the-scenes work that we are doing is paying off.

There are additional advantages that we have put into place to deliver our best-ever games, which I am happy to discuss with you today as well.

In closing, the Toronto 2015 games will deliver an outstanding athlete and spectator experience and provide strong, sustainable economic, social and sport legacies for Ontarians. That’s why I got involved in 2010, and it’s what continues to motivate me today.

I welcome your questions. Thank you.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Thank you very much. Any Grey Cup rings, Mr. O’Doherty?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: No. My last year in Winnipeg was 1983, and the Bombers won in 1984. Timing is everything.

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Sorry to hear that, sir. We will start with the New Democratic Party: Ms. Sattler.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Thank you very much, Mr. O’Doherty, for being here today and for your introductory comments. You gave us an overview of the kinds of experiences you’ve had in the past, and also your responsibilities at TO2015 in terms of the things you oversee.

Would you say that your responsibilities at TO2015 are similar to the kinds of activities that you were involved in, in your previous experience with major sporting events?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Very similar. In my previous positions as a chief operating officer, I had even more responsibilities than the ones that I currently have at Toronto 2015. My depth and breadth of experience previously was a lot greater than the focal area that I currently have. So, very, very similar.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: On page 3 of your presentation, the last point lists the different areas that you’re responsible for: international relations, and national Olympic committee and national Paralympic committee services.

Then you go on to talk about building relationships and strategic partnerships throughout the Americas and the Caribbean, as well as Europe.

Building partnerships and strategic relationships: Is that covered by that bullet on international relations?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes, it is. Our primary client groups, for my area of responsibility, are the national Olympic committees and the national Paralympic committees. We have 41 national Olympic committees in the Americas, and we have 30 national Paralympic committees. Those are the organizations that select and provide the athletes to come to Toronto 2015.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Sorry, how many committees did you say?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Forty-one national Olympic committees and 30 national Paralympic committees.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. As you will recall, there were many concerns expressed through the media and elsewhere about the expenses of TO2015 executives. Is there anything you would like to share with this committee about the expenses of the executives and, particularly, yourself, as you were carrying out this work?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: From my perspective, because it’s a primary responsibility that I have, to look after this client group, it does require international travel. So I would expect that, on an ongoing basis, I would have probably between four and six international trips each year to service this client group, where I’m either required to make presentations to the rights holders, for example, which are the Pan American Sports Organization and the Americas Paralympic Committee, or to meet with groups of NOCs, NPCs or, in the case of the sports side, with groups of international federations and continental federations. I’ll only attend a meeting if we believe that the benefits for attending the meeting are commensurate with the expenses to attend it. A good example is some of the international meetings we’ve had with FINA, who is the rights-holder governing body for aquatics. We had a couple of meetings with them that paid off in the end with them moving the dates of the world championships for the first time ever to accommodate the best athletes in the Americas to come first to Toronto and then go to the world championships in Kazan, Russia, several weeks later.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: You mentioned that your responsibilities for TO2015 are very similar or comparable to the work that you did in other major sporting events.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Did the other major sporting events that you’ve been involved in also have this same degree of international travel and the same kinds of expenses incurred?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes, absolutely. It usually is variable, depending upon the size of the client group that you’re servicing internationally.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Would this be an example of the biggest client group that you’ve been serving internationally?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Absolutely. These are the biggest games ever to come to Canada, so this would absolutely be the biggest client group that I’ve had to service, as far as numbers go.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Do you think the expenses that you’ve incurred in fulfilling your role have been reasonable based on your work in the past and the expectations of the job?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Have you changed any of your expense practices or travel habits since there was so much negative media attention focused on this?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: From my perspective, right from the get-go, when I joined the organization back in 2010, we only undertook travel if we felt that the benefits were commensurate with the investment of what the travel expenses would be. That philosophy hasn’t changed since I first joined the organization.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: You mentioned FINA’s decision to change the date of its aquatics event as one of the benefits of the travel. Can you tell us other examples of some of the benefits that you’ve gotten out of the travel?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Sure. The other big benefit is negotiating with the international sport federations to increase the number of Olympic and Paralympic qualifiers. We are at historic levels. In Guadalajara in the 2011 games, we had 11 Olympic qualifiers and 13 Paralympic qualifiers; in Toronto, we’re going to end up at between 16 and 18 Olympic qualifiers and 15 Paralympic qualifiers. The investment of our time in negotiating and working these agreements with international federations has proved to be very beneficial.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: To get that increase in the number of qualifiers, that required you to go in person to these member groups, international organizations and—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Absolutely. But we look for synergy. I’ll give the example in sport: Once a year there’s a convention called the SportAccord Convention, where every international federation on the Olympics side comes. So instead of me going to visit 36 different international federations individually, I go to that one convention and meet with all 36 over six days. We look for opportunities like that to ensure that we’re spending money wisely when we travel.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: How many opportunities were there like that, that you were able to meet within Ontario or Canada with a group—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: SportAccord is an annual convention, so that’s what we target to address the international federations. Then, if we have the opportunity or need to meet with a smaller group, we’ll do so outside of the SportAccord Convention.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: That was the need for some of the travel to Miami, Rio, Mexico, Phoenix, Jamaica, Cayman Islands, St. Kitts—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Well, a lot of those are required trips to report to the stakeholders. The Pan American Sports Organization, for example, has a general assembly once a year, and two to three executive committees throughout Central and South America. We also have regional organizations. For example, CACSO is the Central American and Caribbean Sports Organization, which represents all the countries in the Caribbean. We have ODESUR, which is the sport organization that represents all the federations in South America. They have their own general assemblies, which we’re required to attend, and we do so as required.

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With regard to groups of meetings, for example, a lot of the international federations are located in Lausanne, Switzerland, so often, if we have the opportunity to go to Lausanne, we meet with eight or 10 of them on a targeted basis, again looking for opportunities to group these meetings together as opposed to having one-offs.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: And when you say that these were required trips, does that mean that whichever jurisdiction is hosting the games is required to make these trips?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We are required. They are the rights holder of the games. We—TO2015—are required to report and give updates, and answer to their executive committee and board of directors on a regular basis.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So for previous games, the organizers would have all engaged in the same level of international travel?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: That’s correct.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Were you involved in the decisions to change the original venues to the cluster system?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I was involved in that process, yes.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: And how has that decision helped or hindered the municipalities that were then left out?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: From a games operational point of view, it streamlined our operations. I think we’ve created some great operational and financial efficiencies by doing so.

I believe the total number of competition venues when I joined the organization was in the neighbourhood of 50. We’re now down to 32 competition venues, so we’re a much more streamlined organization.

Out of that, I believe we now have 11 clusters and nine stand-alone venues. The nine stand-alone venues are based upon technical reasons where the sport requires water or elevation, so our choices are limited, or where previous commitments were in place to ensure that the host municipality would be hosting a specific sport.

So I think we’ve made great inroads into being a more efficient operation as far as our venue plan, while still maintaining a fairly wide regional footprint for the benefit of the 16 host municipalities that we have as part of our plan.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So, was the cluster—

The Chair (Mr. Grant Crack): Sorry, Ms. Sattler. Sorry to interrupt. It’s 4:30, so we’re going to have to just go through a little procedural thing. Sorry, Mr. O’Doherty.

I’ll pass it over to the Clerk. I will have to leave. Again, my apologies, and good luck with the rest of the day.

The Clerk of the Committee (Ms. Sylwia Przezdziecki): Honourable members, owing to the absence of both the Chair and the Vice-Chair, it is my duty to call upon you to elect an Acting Chair. Are there any nominations?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you, Clerk. I’d like to nominate Bob Delaney as Chair.

The Clerk of the Committee (Ms. Sylwia Przezdziecki): Okay, Mr. Delaney. Any further nominations? Mr. Delaney, do you accept the nomination?

Mr. Bob Delaney: Yes.

The Clerk of the Committee (Ms. Sylwia Przezdziecki): In that case, there being no further nominations, I declare those closed and Mr. Delaney duly elected Acting Chair of the committee.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Let that be a lesson to the committee on the smooth transfer of authority.

Ms. Sattler, the floor continues to be yours.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: How much time do I have?

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): You have 13 minutes and 40 seconds.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. Thank you.

The decision to change to the cluster model for the venues—that was based on efficiency purposes? That was a financial decision?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Well, I think there were a number of reasons. In some cases, we had to change some venues because they didn’t meet the international federation’s technical requirements to host the event, so we had to make the change to get a venue that would be approved by the international federation. That was step one.

Step two was to take the clustering principle—which had already had its founding in the bid document; there were four clusters already established in the bid document—and expand upon it to see if we could drive operational and financial efficiencies.

Number three is that when we make these decisions, we don’t make them lightly. We want to ensure that it enhances the athlete experience, because at the core of these games are the athletes. We have to make sure that, if we’re changing a venue, it is going to enhance the athlete experience. A good example might be that it’s closer to our main athletes’ village or closer to a satellite village that we have in play. For athletes, we try to minimize the time they are on buses and maximize the time that they’re in training and competition venues.

I think the last reason with regard to our capital programs, whether it was a major or a minor capital program, is to look at the sustaining legacy value that that venue is going to provide back to Toronto 2015 well after the games are over.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: You mentioned the efficiencies that were achieved by increasing, enhancing the cluster model. What’s the dollar amount of the efficiencies that were achieved?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I think the efficiencies that we created allowed us to stay within our budget of $1.4 billion. I came in September 2010, and it was $1.4 billion; today, three and a half years later, it’s still $1.4 billion. So these were changes that we made to ensure that we would stay within our current operating budgets.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So if you hadn’t made those changes, you would have been over budget?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We potentially might have had to face the realization that additional resources might have been necessary.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: What about transportation plans? Is that part of your role in terms of venue management, looking at transportation between the venues?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It isn’t. What I mean by “venue management” at games time, our venue team runs the venue during the games, so they’re on-site actually being the venue general manager, if you will. Just like one of our venues would have a general manager running it today, we assume that role during games time. It’s a very multidisciplinary role, in that we have to integrate all the games services underneath our venue general managers to deliver the games, transportation being one of the services provided to the venue. So that would be another operational area that’s outside my area, but if you have any general questions pertaining to transportation, I can certainly try to address them.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Well, you had mentioned earlier that one of the principles is to reduce the time that athletes, I think, spend travelling between venues.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Right. So usually, international federations set the time limit of somewhere between 45 minutes to 60 minutes as the upper cap of how long their athletes should be in buses. If we can’t deliver on those times, then we move to see what alternative arrangements might be, and typically that’s when we start moving to providing satellite villages for those athletes so they’re much closer to their training and competition venues.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. When you were looking at reorganizing the venues in order to stay within budget, was travelling one of the main considerations that would have been factored in?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It would be one of the considerations, not necessarily the main consideration.

Let’s use the example of soccer. When I joined the organization, we had three competition venues for soccer, of varying degrees from the athletes’ village, all with their own unique operating costs. We consolidated all that to one venue in Hamilton, which is a capital project for us, so it’s a rent-free venue for us because of the capital program that we have in place. As a result, the financial and operational efficiencies that we put into place for that one sport would be a good example of what we were looking to do right across the board. That happened in several sports, where we decreased the number of competition venues that were required and tried to get them into one venue.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Now, you said that you weren’t directly responsible or involved with overall transportation logistics, but you said you could provide some insights or comments about—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: From the athletes’ perspective, one example I just gave you, the time limits that usually international federations set, so we would work with our transportation team at Toronto 2015 to try and meet those objectives with regard to athletes’ expectations.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Are you able to shed any light on how the 20% reduction in traffic will be realized?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’m sorry, that’s outside of my sphere.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Can you walk us through what the next few weeks and months look like for you in your role at TO2015?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Sure. The biggest change for our organization is that we’re starting to really focus on the delivery of the games. On our particular sport side of things, we’re getting very, very deep into our sport operations, planning and finalizing things such as our sport schedule. Our sport schedule has gone through five major revisions. We have two more to go. We are at about 85% confidence right now. We have to have our final sport schedule at about 98% confidence in July, because that corresponds with when we start going to the general public to sell tickets, so obviously we need our competition schedule nailed down as much as possible.

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We’re just starting now in the procurement of our sports equipment. We have about a $6-million budget in sport equipment. With 51 different sports and 68 different disciplines, you can imagine the grocery list that goes into that $6 million. We’ll be starting the procurement process as we get into that.

In the month of May, we start our test event program, which is a 12-month program, where we’re going to have 45 test events: three that Toronto 2015 is going to run and 42 where we’re partnering with national sport federations, to test out the various venues and sport operations sides of things. That will lead us into the springtime, in preparation for the games a year later.

We’re also getting our final qualification system and technical manuals to all the sport organizations, national Olympic committees and national Paralympic committees so they can start the process of putting into place how they’re going to select their best athletes to come to Toronto.

That’s sort of a quick example of some of the things that we’re working on in sport in the next couple of months.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: The $6 million for the procurement of sport equipment: Is that something that you oversee directly? Or who oversees that?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: My team oversees it. That’s right.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: So your team is—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: One of my teams is my sport team. I have 35 people who work for me just in sport alone. One of those positions is our sport equipment manager. Our sport equipment manager, working together with my VP of sport and myself, will oversee the procurement of those items, working with our procurement office at Toronto 2015.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: And how is that process done? How does that process work for the procurement of the sports equipment?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s done in an open and transparent manner. We have this process in place where it gets posted. There are opportunities for all organizations that are registered with Toronto 2015, or that are interested in having those opportunities to bid on our business, to do so.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: How much time do I have?

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): You have a little under five minutes.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Oh, under five minutes. Okay. Are new staff going to be hired, or do you have the staff complement in place as you’re transitioning from planning to actual games delivery?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We have over 330 staff now at Toronto 2015. I would say about 70 of those staff are in sport and venues. Of that 70 sport and venues staff, 35 of them would be in the sport side of things, probably 24 or 25 in venue management, and the rest distributed through the other key operational roles.

We’re in the hiring process right now for probably another six to eight positions. After those are in place in the next couple of months, we’ll probably have put into place most of our full-time staff complement. Our target was to do so about a year in advance of the games, so we’ll be a little ahead of that schedule.

The balance of our hires will be much closer to the games, in the last three months prior to the games, where there will be specific roles filled in the areas of sport management and venue management. Those are temporary workers to us, because they come after January 1, 2015.

So I would expect our complement to grow, say, from 80, probably with another 30 to 40 people in place, to 110 or 120 by games time.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. But you’re hiring six to eight positions in the short term, but then the balance—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We have some positions in medical services, for example. We also have some positions in international relations that we’re hiring, and also in Parapan planning and integration.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. But you said the balance of the hires will be two to three months before the games. How many is that?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Thirty to 40.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Oh, so about 30 to 40 more hires just shortly before the games start.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: That’s right.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: What will those people be doing?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Those will be people who will probably be specifically involved on the sport competition side, on the field of play, and probably on the venue management side, assisting our venue manager on-site, probably as an assistant venue general manager.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Do you have a role in the hand-off of the venues following the completion of the games?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Well, we do have a role, but it’s actually overlaying the infrastructure that hands the capital of project venues back to the venue owners.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: What kind of infrastructure is in place to make sure that the legacy projects are able to move forward, are functional and are ready to be handed off?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Each project would have its own timelines in place with regard to the time frame that Toronto 2015 has to return the building in the condition in which it received it. Then there would be some process of signoff between Toronto 2015 and the venue owner that we have returned it in the shape in which we received it, and then they would continue on with regard to their ongoing operations afterwards.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Where would—

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): And this is to warn you that you have just a little more than a minute and a half of time remaining.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Where would all that be documented in terms of the handoff following the completion of the games? Is that part of the—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: In the facility agreements between Toronto 2015 and the venue owners.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. And each facility agreement would have—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It would have the time frames involved, and we would have to turn back the facilities in their proper condition back to the venue owner.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Okay. And there may be differences based on the nature of the facility?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. Every venue is different, depending upon the complexity of what has to be done to return it to its original operational mode.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Right. Okay. Thank you very much.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Thank you very much. To the government side: Ms. Damerla.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Mr. O’Doherty, for coming here. I heard your opening remarks. Your resumé is very impressive and you appear very well suited to this role, so congratulations.

Given your wide experience in the world of sports, can you tell me a little bit about your experience with event bids and how your experience with other event bids, if any, may compare with the bid for the Pan Am Games?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: That’s a great question. As you know, I’m a big supporter of sport tourism and really believe Ontario can play a leading role in this area. When I was in Ottawa, I probably bid on 40 to 50 major different events on behalf of Ottawa and Canada’s capital region. We had great success in bringing events there, and believe it or not, our biggest problem in Ottawa was getting the rest of Canada to believe that there was a pretty good community that lived in Ottawa; it wasn’t just about the headlines that came from the politics of it. Ottawa started carving out a real niche as being one of the leading host communities in Canada.

The one thing that I was not involved with—kept an eye on—was the bid for the Pan Am/Parapan Am Games. Really, for me, it was a godsend that the bid was submitted, because a lot of times it’s the timing that is crucial. If we look at when Canada has bid for the Olympic Games, we lost 1996 to Atlanta and we lost 2008 to Beijing, and we had superior technical bids. I believe that Toronto would be a great Olympic and Paralympic host, but the timing was wrong. The politics of the day—you have to ensure that the timing is right.

For Toronto, even though they were forced to submit the bid on tight time frames and did so probably with not completed, full information, their timing was impeccable. As far as the rotation went and the way bids are submitted for the Pan Am Games, PASO viewed a bid coming back to Canada in 2015 as something that could really help grow the brand and the awareness of not only their organization but of the games.

The last time Canada hosted was 1999 in Winnipeg, so it was sort of North America’s turn, and I think Toronto did a great job closing the deal in their final presentations, which were done down in Guadalajara. I still remember November 6, 2009, when the announcement was made that Toronto had won the bid. I think it was a great day not only for Canada but it was a great day for this province.

Personally, I had felt defeat on the international stage with our inability to bring the Commonwealth Games here to Canada and, in particular, to the province of Ontario. That really upset me. It still upsets me to this day, because one of the key legacies that any of these major games leaves behind is the infrastructure, not only for high-performance sport, which is badly needed in this country, but also for recreational and community programming, which lends itself to the sustainability of the project. We just weren’t able to crack that nut.

I think when Saäd was here, he indicated that the last time Ontario had hosted a major games was back in 1930, well before our time. I say this is our time now, and our time is to host a best-ever Pan Am and Parapan Am Games. I’m really excited that the bid went in when it did and was successful, and now it’s our job to deliver against those commitments that were made to ensure the legacy of the games but also to position Toronto and the province of Ontario long-term as a leader in the hosting of major sporting events, not only in this country but internationally. I think that’s a very viable goal.

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Ms. Dipika Damerla: Your answer touched on, actually, three different things that I want to follow up on.

I’ll begin with the piece around tourism, because you hinted that you were quite disappointed we didn’t win the Commonwealth Games, and I heard you talk about the importance of sports tourism. Perhaps you could speak to why you think it’s so important that we host a games like the Pan/Parapan Am Games.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Well, first of all, the size and scope of this project alone—you know, the impact is in the billions of dollars and the incremental tax revenues that will be shared federally and provincially will be significant. I would venture to say that there will be a return on investment, a significant one, on the $500 million that have been invested by the federal government and the province of Ontario. So I don’t see it as an expenditure; I see it as an investment in sport that will pay dividends in the short term and long term.

On the sport tourism side of things, I’ve been involved in sport tourism since—I hate to say it—the early 1990s, before “sport tourism” was even coined in Canada. The first annual general meeting of the Canadian Sport Tourism Alliance, which is a membership of partners and stakeholders in the industry, was back in 2000. I think we had maybe 10 people there. We go to a general assembly now and they’ve got 400 people there. They all represent municipalities and rights holders of sporting events throughout the country. So this is a $3.6-billion industry in Canada, and Ontario has an opportunity to take a much larger piece of the pie as a result of hosting these games.

In addition to that, that represents over 200,000 events at the provincial, national and international level that are bid on in this country every year. That’s a significant economic driver, and I think if we get a bigger piece of the pie, the success stories start building momentum and gather on each other.

I use the example of two things that we’re doing for the sport tourism industry here in Toronto that I certainly hope have legs. One is that we’re bringing 45 test events to the greater Golden Horseshoe area in preparation for our games. When I ask the province how many major events they are usually supporting each year or are aware of their coming, their answer might be four to six. Well, you know, we’re bringing 45. Of those 45 events, a year later I’m staging 68 Pan Am championships in the period of 30 days—68 continental championships. So there’s 100 significant sporting events in a period of less than a year that we’re bringing to this area.

We’re opening up the door to new partnerships between sport, private and public sector, venue owners and community groups. I think, if taken advantage of, this is a huge opportunity that will sustain itself long-term, and then Ontario will get a bigger piece of that sport tourism pie, which, by the way, will continue to grow. It was $1.8 million when CSTA started back in 2000; it has now doubled. It’s going to double again very, very soon. Because of this little niche industry, I think it’s an area that we can do a better job on here in the province of Ontario. I exploited it quite favorably in the Ottawa area, and I’d certainly like to see the province now exploit it on a provincial basis and become a leader nationally and a leader internationally in hosting major events.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: The other topic that you touched upon was the legacy of the sports, and you mentioned high-performance sports events as well as just generally more sports events. Can you tell me a little bit about some of the value of some of these legacy pieces that we’re building? For example, I know we’re building something pretty special in Innisfil. Did you want to speak to that one?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Absolutely. I know previously, when Saäd was here, some questions were asked about the sport legacy fund. Back in the early days, the NPA partners identified three target sports that really needed to build capacity as far as venue infrastructure. The reason for that was a dearth of these facilities in our country, the importance at the Olympic and Paralympic level of these sports, and for Canada to be successful long-term on the international stage, something had to be done. Of course, those three sports were athletics, aquatics and cycling. If you go and look at the Olympic program, they’re three of the top six sports with regards to medal count. So for Canada to progress in the medal count, especially in summer sports, these are critical sports for us to deliver new, world-class infrastructure. And we’ve done so here.

Another sport that flies underneath the radar screen a little bit is shooting. Shooting, I think, has the fifth-highest number of medals at the Olympic Games. When we started out, I think we had three different venues for shooting in the bid book. We created a vision where we thought that we could have all three disciplines in one location, and that ended up being CFB Borden. At the end of the day, we weren’t able to accomplish our objective from a legacy point of view.

We continued to look and came across the Toronto International Trap and Skeet Club, which we had had some discussions with. But at the same time, we never envisioned a solution that saw all three disciplines go there. Lo and behold, once we got all the parties around the table, we delivered on that vision. The Toronto International Trap and Skeet Club is now getting new 10-metre, 25-metre and 50-metre indoor facilities, and we’re expanding their outdoor ranges. So for the first time ever in the history of the Pan Am Games, all three shooting disciplines in pistol, rifle and shotgun will be held at one venue.

In addition to that, the legacy value for our top athletes in this sport will now be centralized in one location. The Shooting Federation of Canada is turning the location into its high-performance centre, so you’ll see the top athletes in all disciplines training there throughout the year. They have also committed to bringing international and national events there on an ongoing basis—I come back to sport tourism—so you can see the kickoff benefits.

I would expect to see, in the next quad or two, Canada starting to show up on the Olympic podium in the sport of shooting because of this. That’s what excites me. I was very excited by the announcement, and I can tell you that the shooting community in Canada was absolutely thrilled, in particular because in 1999, in Winnipeg, it was a temporary venue with no legacy, and in 1994, at the Commonwealth Games in Victoria, it was a temporary facility with no legacy. So you can imagine the impact that this is going to have on the sport.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Where would our athletes have practised their shooting before we built the shooting facility in Innisfil?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: In some cases, in their garage, I’m sorry to say. But typically, in most sports, what happens is that Canadians have to leave the country and go to train elsewhere around the world where the facilities are. The two sports that have commonly done this are cycling—because we have no four-season, permanent velodrome—and shooting, because we just didn’t have the facility.

Now we’re going to have a facility in both those sports, so our high-performance athletes and the up-and-coming Canadian athletes will now be able to live, train and compete in Canada. I think that’s something we should all take great pride in, because it will be in the province of Ontario.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: What would you say the new facilities—the shooting facility in Innisfil and the velodrome in Barrie—are going to mean to the local communities there?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I would be very excited, because it provides them with a venue. You have to remember that the sustainability of these venues is not only built on the high-performance side of things. It is also built on the community and recreational programming. It will provide opportunities for the general public to come out, participate, exercise and take part in a world-class facility right next door to where they live, which they couldn’t say before.

They can also get involved as volunteers in supporting any of the activities that are going on there, working on the events, and coming out as spectators, supporting these world-class events that will now be coming to these facilities.

I think it’s a win-win situation. I know that the people who we have spoken to in the communities have talked about this at length, about how excited they are to have these facilities open so that they can participate, as individuals, and cheer on our top athletes, as spectators.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: I guess one thing that’s different is that we could have easily built, I’m assuming, the shooting facility or the velodrome closer to Toronto, in a bigger city, but we chose to go to smaller communities. I’m curious: What do you think of that and what impact it might have in that sense, that we have geographically dispersed the various venues?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I don’t know if we would be allowed to shoot in Toronto, because there’s a bylaw against it.

I’m really pleased about where we ended up. We originally had three venues that were scattered, each having a different shooting discipline. I think we’re in a much better place now that we’ve consolidated. Again, I use another example of why we have consolidated from three venues to one: to drive operational and financial efficiency and to have sustainable legacy value. That’s a great news story in the case of Innisfil and shooting.

I think that same example can be used in many cases where we’ve taken a similar approach. I always say that the biggest asset we have is that this is a regional bid and that we’re sharing the wealth around the greater Golden Horseshoe with a number of our capital programs, which all have similar stories to the one I just told about Innisfil. Our greatest challenge from an operational point of view is that we have a large games footprint and we certainly realize that.

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We could never do this at an Olympic Games level. The Olympic Games has become very concentrated. If you look at the Toronto Olympic bids, even the last one that we did in 2008, it was a much more different model than, say, these Pan Am Games. Because there’s more flexibility in the Pan Am Games, we’re allowed to explore avenues where we can have a regional approach, and since legacy is so important in our country and in this province, we’ve been able to share the wealth.

We’ve actually been complimented on our approach of sharing the legacy by both PASO and the Americas Paralympic Committee, which is the rights holder, and even by Rio 2016, which has been up here looking at some of the things we’ve been doing on the legacy side of things to see if they can borrow some best practices for what they’re doing.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Would you say that Ontario is sort of leading edge when it comes to this idea of sharing the wealth, as you call it, and having venues in a wider geographic footprint?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: That’s a great question. I would think that the position that we’re in today has certainly benefited the province of Ontario. Of course, I wasn’t there in the early days to know strategically if that’s what the plan was originally because we’ve revised the venue plan, but certainly with the assistance of the province and working collaboratively with them, we’ve put into place a venue plan today that meets our operational and financial needs, while at the same time still delivering significant legacy values. So yes, I really like where we are today.

If we can now take what we are today—and I keep coming back to this message, that these games are much more than just 2015. They’re about the next generation of Ontarians. I think it’s important that we keep that in mind.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: One of the criticisms of the games at this scale in general has been the fact that you build for a games and then, once the games are gone, what do you do with the legacy pieces? How is Ontario different from other jurisdictions when it comes to the forethought that has been put into what to do once the games are done?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We’ve put into place a process with regard to legacy and all of our capital programs, depending upon the complexity and the scope of the capital program. We have certain requirements in place with regard to legacy, and one of the key principles was: How do we ensure priority to affordable access for our high-performance athletes? The federal government, which is providing the money for our capital program—that’s their number one priority: high-performance sports. Obviously, if we’re going to spend dollars somewhere, we want to see what the return is for our high-performance athletes.

Our second big check is the sustainability. We want to know what the business plan is for that venue to ensure that it’s going to be sustainable over lots of decades to come—the old no-white-elephants mantra. We’re very, very aware of what has happened at major games, and we certainly don’t want to have any white elephants here.

We’ve been creating a lot of due diligence around reviewing business plans. In some cases, we reviewed sets of business plans because of the complexity of the project before we move forward. We certainly want to put into place a legacy program that has the approval and input of the national sport governing body or bodies that are going to be using the facility, so it has been a very collaborative approach between the venue owner, the governing body of the specific sport that’s going in there, Toronto 2015 and the applicable levels of government. I think it has worked pretty well to date.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Given your experience with multiple bids as well as attending or working with different sporting events, would you say that the government of Ontario’s approach of actually planning the post-games scenario in such level of detail—would you say we are leading in this; we’re doing something different than other jurisdictions?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. I think the province did its due diligence with regard to looking for best practices of other games to ensure that the legacy value is there. Of all the games that I’ve been to, the ones that are the most successful are the ones that have spent the time looking at the details of what the legacy should be. It has to start back in the bid stage. You have to set the platform of what the expectations are from a legacy point of view. You have to set out clear deliverables and be held accountable to them so that it’s not a happenstance, that it’s something that has been strategically decided upon, and the organizing committee and all the partners around the table have to be accountable to delivering on the legacy, because that’s probably the biggest component of the games.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: So would you say, based on your knowledge, that when we made our bid, it already planned for the legacy?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes, absolutely. There was a legacy piece that was part of that, and I would like to think that we’ve taken that and enhanced it. From a sport perspective, and in the area that I work in, legacy is critical. It’s absolutely critical. So we certainly spend a lot of time addressing that issue within the sport environment on an ongoing basis.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you so much. I’m just curious, in your role, what partners outside of TO2015 do you work with?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I think in my opening statement I talked about—we have hundreds of client bases—

Ms. Dipika Damerla: But the main ones. The key—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: The main ones—I mean, this event is all about sports, so our international federations, which are the governing body for the sport internationally, are the ones that approve our plans, whether they’re operational plans or venue plans. They sign off on the field of play. They appoint the technical delegate as our liaison that we work through to the international federation. So we have 36 of those international federations on the Pan Am side and 15 on the Parapan Am side, so those 51 international federations represent a very critical client group to us.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Are they excited about the games?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: They’re absolutely excited about it. I must admit that Toronto created a lot of, I would say, good feelings from the two Olympic bids. Even though they were unsuccessful, they were well-received, particularly by the international sport community. The sense I get from the international sport community is that they’d love to see Toronto bid again somewhere down the road. That’s not the focus of our games, but that’s what we keep being told by international—they view Toronto as a great world-class city, and one that should have the opportunity to host.

They’re very, very excited about Toronto being given the opportunity to host these games, because they’re a huge games and they want to see the job that Toronto does. So we’re going to be held accountable to delivering a best-ever games, because that’s what the international sport community expects from us.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: I’m sure that you follow the media coverage of the games very closely—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I try not to.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: You try not to. Tell me why you try not to.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I try not to follow it.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Just generally, how do you feel about the coverage? Does that have any impact on your day-to-day work, morale, anything? I’m just very curious.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Well, as I said, I really don’t follow the media. I’m very much focused on what we have to deliver on the sport side of things. I think it would be unnatural to say that it doesn’t impact the 330 staff that we have working at Toronto 2015. They’re very aware of what’s being written in the papers and what’s being said on radio and television. They follow it closely, and it does impact morale, certainly.

It’s something that we have to deal with every day. What I tend to tell my team is—I really try and put a positive spin on things—that we have to keep in mind that our vision is creating a great legacy. Not only a legacy for our staff and the people that are in the games, but they have to look at the bigger picture of what this is going to mean for Ontarians and Canadians, and what our responsibility is. We’re doing so many great things, so we have to focus on those positive things and feel good about what we’re going to be able to deliver in 2015.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Yes, and there’s a lot of good news—when I talk to people like you, when you come here to the committee—around the games: the fact that it’s on budget and on time, that we’ve planned this so well, that we’re doing things that no other jurisdiction has done to ensure the legacy piece and to ensure that the benefits are spread widely. We hope that those stories will also make the news at some point.

I’m just curious about—

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): You have about two minutes to go.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Thank you. I’m just curious about, in your opinion—again, given that you’ve been involved with so many sporting events. One of the things that this government is very proud of is that we feel it’s one of the most transparent and open games ever. In your position, would you be able to comment on that?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I think one of our objectives is to make these games very authentic, where the people of Ontario can enjoy the games and get to meet these great athletes who are coming up from the Americas. Our whole philosophy with regard to our ticketing approach and the pricing of our tickets will be to make it affordable for a family of four anywhere in Ontario to come and be part of the games and see first-hand what these great athletes are.

We don’t have the same high level of security requirements as an Olympic Games, so the athletes tend to be in a more informal stage a lot of the time, and they like to interact with the spectators and have some fun. I think it helps their level of engagement and performance at these games. That’s one of the unique things about a Pan Am and Parapan Am Games.

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We want to create those special moments where young and old alike—but particularly the young, you know? If we all look back to when we were younger, we were all motivated by certain figureheads and leaders, and we’re going to have these tremendous athletes here. So I really hope they serve as motivators to the youth of Ontario, that they have an opportunity to buy a ticket to come down and see these great athletes, but also to, outside of the competition, have an opportunity to interact with them, chat with them, get their autograph or whatever it might be.

I think we’re well on our way to creating those opportunities, and I think that will be what creates the special moments from these games, those unique touchpoints between our great athletes and the youth of Ontario.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Chair, how much time do I have?

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): You have 13 seconds.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: All right. We’ll leave the rest for the next round. Thank you so much.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): All right. Thank you very much. To the PC side: Mr. Jackson, you have the ball.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Thanks very much for coming, Mr. O’Doherty. I appreciate your time. I know you’re a busy guy and you’ve got lots of things to do, so I really do appreciate you taking the time to come in and talk to us today. I just want to start off following up on a couple of things I heard today—just some follow-up questions to a couple of the other questioners.

I want to go back to transportation issues for a quick moment. One of the things that PASO said that they had concerns about in the early days were the transportation issues in Toronto. As we know, the distance between the athletes’ village and some of the main venues is right along the most congested roads in Toronto, and some of the travel is going to have to happen during peak times.

As we know, the transportation plan that was released a week or two ago really hinges on a 20% reduction in traffic, and really doesn’t actually take into account a good chunk of the officials’ and athletes’ transportation needs. Is that something that you help to oversee, the athletes’ and officials’ transportation?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I don’t personally, no.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is that something that is—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s handled by our transportation team at Toronto 2015.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I’m sorry?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s handled by our transportation team at Toronto 2015, which is on the operational side, not our sport and venues side.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. So the $6 million that you talked about with the equipment that you’re budgeted for, can you tell me—just give me a quick example of the types of things that would be. I know you can’t name them all—there’s a lot of stuff. But—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’ll go to the sport of gymnastics. Everything that you would see on the competition floor for the sport of gymnastics would be considered sport equipment that we would have to either purchase or rent.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. So, like, balls, nets and—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Well, in gymnastics—

Mr. Rod Jackson: —gymnastics rings—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. You’ve got trampolines—

Mr. Rod Jackson: —and horses—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: You’ve got the rings, you’ve got the pommel horse, you’ve got the mats—everything that you see on the field of play. We have to replicate that in the training venue, and also in a warm-up venue, so we need three sets of everything.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Right. Is there a legacy plan for the equipment to go to, I don’t know, inner cities, or spread out across Ontario?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. We’re just starting to get into the details of how we’re going to distribute it, but in principle, we’ll be working with the national federation of the sport to see how best the equipment gets distributed within the province of Ontario—to hopefully not only high-performance but community needs.

Mr. Rod Jackson: So it’ll be distributed throughout the whole province?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes, working with the national sport federations. As I said, they’re early discussions, so I can’t give you any details, but that’s certainly our intent.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. That’s good.

You mentioned earlier, too, that medical services falls under—is that under your auspices?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It is.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I think I heard the number 35. I think that was attached to some other hirings that were going to happen as well. Is that—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. We’re hiring in our medical area right now.

Mr. Rod Jackson: And what is the medical—is that physiotherapists? Is that paramedics?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s all of the medical services to accredited games participants within our footprint.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. So would that include physiotherapists, doctors and paramedics?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes, doctors, nurses, physios, massage therapists. We’ll have medical services units at each of our competition venues and training venues. Our main polyclinic will be a temporary facility located in the athletes’ village.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I was asking Ms. Mudrinic about this earlier, and maybe you can shed some light on it: In the games funding partner contributions, it has health down as zero. Is medical services not a part of the health budget?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Medical services is underneath my budget. It’s about $8 million to $9 million.

Mr. Rod Jackson: It’s $8 million to $9 million, in that range?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. That includes the staffing as well as all the medical programs and services that we have to provide.

Mr. Rod Jackson: So that’s all-in.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s all-in, and it includes our anti-doping program as well.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. And that’s already within your budget?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: All right. Thank you for that. I want to talk a little bit about the Ivor Wynne Stadium rebuild. I know that because of the weather and whatnot, there have been some issues with it and some questions certainly raised.

In the winter quarterly report, it says the province gave $22.3 million, but in the March report, it says $22.5 million. What’s the discrepancy there?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’m sorry, I don’t have the answer for you. It’s not my area of responsibility specifically, so I’d have to get the answer for you and give it to you.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Could you undertake to supply that answer to the committee?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Sure.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Because I’d be curious, how that came to be.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’m hoping it’s not a typo.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Yes, me too. Sometimes those things happen, right? I mean, that’s a couple of million dollars’ worth of typo—or a couple of hundred thousand dollars, anyway.

The part that concerns me is that we keep hearing the “on time and on budget” thing. We know now—and correct me if I’m wrong—that the Ivor Wynne Stadium build is a little bit behind schedule at this time. Is that correct? The last time I heard, a couple of weeks ago, is four weeks—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I think it’s public information now that Ontario Sports Solutions, who is the contractor, has notified Infrastructure Ontario, IO, that they’re projecting up to a six-week maximum delay on the delivery of Hamilton stadium. They’re now working through with the venue owner to best mitigate against that timeline.

As you know, it has been a very severe winter here. The frost is still very, very deep in the ground. The last thing that’s usually done on these major capital builds is the field of play, and when the field is still frozen, you certainly can’t complete that.

As far as the timing of the projected up-to-six-week delay, it doesn’t impact us at all. We get the stadium 10 months in advance of the games instead of 12. The issues between the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, the venue owner, the constructor and IO will have to be worked out between them.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you know what the delay will cost, if anything?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Sorry, I don’t have that information.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you know precisely what has caused the delay? You mentioned a couple of things. I know it has been a harsh winter, but what exactly has caused the delay?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It has been the harsh weather: high winds, cold weather—

Mr. Rod Jackson: Just inability for the—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: The permafrost has been very, very deep. I think we can all vouch for that. I’ve been here for four winters. This, by far, is the worst winter I’ve ever seen. It has impacted the construction industry significantly.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is the developer or the construction—whoever is in charge of building it—are they on the hook for any cost overruns?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. It’s not the taxpayer of Ontario; it’s the constructor. They would have an indemnity clause with regard to their agreement with IO for their responsibility in that area.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is that similar with all the venues? Do they have the same sort of clause so that the builders are on the hook for any cost overruns?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Absolutely.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. I want to talk a little bit about the velodrome. Let me preface this by saying that although I know it gets presented that I might be anti-games or something, that’s not the truth at all. In fact, I’m quite a big supporter of the games. I actually have friends who are going to be in the Pan Am Games. One of them is a cyclist, and he has been an Olympian. He might be in his last Olympics, coming up, and certainly in this upcoming Pan Am Games, and is a medal winner too, in the last Pan Am Games.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: What discipline is he in?

Mr. Rod Jackson: Cycling.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Cycling. Track cycling or road cycling?

Mr. Rod Jackson: Track.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Track cycling.

Mr. Rod Jackson: He does a bit of both, but because there’s not a velodrome here, he doesn’t have anywhere to train. So we talk lots about this, and there is a need, certainly.

But I’ll tell you my concerns flat out. Firstly, I have tried to wrap my head around the difference between the projected and estimated costs. The projected cost, I think, was $50 million, and the estimated cost then rose to $56 million, so a difference of $6 million.

I guess the $50-million number came from the bid book, and then when reality set in, the number rose to $56 million. It’s also within the budget, but still, can you explain to me how the difference between the projected and estimated cost and—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’m sorry. I wasn’t involved on the infrastructure side of that build, so I can’t give you the answer to that.

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Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Is it still on time, the velodrome?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: In the same letter, it’s the same company that’s involved in building Hamilton is building the velodrome. In the letter that’s been provided to Infrastructure Ontario, they indicated that there could be up to an eight-week delay in the velodrome.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is the velodrome in the same situation, where it’s planned to be ready anyway a lot of time in advance of—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: That’s right. The substantial completion date was August 31. It’s now going to be pushed till probably mid-October.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Can you confirm if there are any cost overruns on the velodrome?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Again, it’s not the area that I deal in, so I can’t confirm anything for you.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Isn’t it something that—I mean, you’re in charge of venues, right?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’m in charge of venue management at games time. I run the venues at games time.

Mr. Rod Jackson: So you’re not involved at all in making sure the venues are being done on time or on budget?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: As far as infrastructure and overlay goes, it’s a different area of our operations and they run the actual building and overlaying of the venues.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you have regular contact with that group about the status of these projects?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Absolutely.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Who’s responsible for any of the issues that, say, the velodrome may—is it the developer still and the same with the costs overruns, the same thing we talked about before?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. It’s the same formula.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. So let’s talk about the legacy of that, and that’s something else that concerns me a little bit. One of the only velodromes that hasn’t become a white elephant in North America is in Atlanta, in a high-performance village, if you will.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: There is no velodrome in Atlanta.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Then is there a velodrome that—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s in California.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. I stand corrected. So is it the only one? Is it part of a high-performance—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It is. It’s a UCI-approved track.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Is that one of the only ones in North America?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: How many other velodromes have been built that didn’t make it, that became white elephants? I know there’s one in Montreal that’s now an arboretum, I think. Do you know of any others that—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: There are quite a few around the world, but our focus is really on making the one in Milton sustainable. Our focus all along was to ensure that their business plan is sustainable. I have full confidence in the plan that they presented to us as part of their funding application from the sport legacy fund, that it’ll be a sustainable business for a long period of time.

Mr. Rod Jackson: How much of that legacy fund—was the number a $20-million legacy fund for the venues after? Am I right about that?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: No. It’s $70 million.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Seventy million dollars. So that $70 million is for several different venues, correct, including—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Three venues.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Pardon me?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Three venues.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Three venues. So the velodrome and which other two?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: The York athletics stadium and the Pan American aquatics centre and field house.

Mr. Rod Jackson: And that’s going to be supporting those venues for 20 years, am I correct?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We’re projecting a minimum of 20 years. Our goal is obviously a lot longer than that. In our partnership with the Toronto Community Foundation, we have an opportunity, potentially, to even make it in perpetuity if things go well.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is there a breakdown of the amount of money each of these venues is going to get of that $70-million legacy fund?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. I mean, I believe this committee asked for our sport legacy fund plan, and I think we agreed to provide it to you and those details are provided therein.

Mr. Rod Jackson: So they’re incoming?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Absolutely.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. One other venue I want to talk a little bit about is the Pan Am rowing centre in St. Catharines. Right now, I guess the winter report said that a contractor has yet to be signed for that. Has a contractor been signed yet?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I don’t know the answer to that, but I can find out for you.

Mr. Rod Jackson: If you would undertake to get that information, I’d appreciate it.

Do you know if there’s an estimated cost for that or if the cost has changed, or what the cause of the hold-up is?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I know the cost hasn’t changed. We can find out what the dollar figure is. It’s very nominal work at Henley. It’s the replacement of a bridge and some work on the race course itself.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you have any idea what the cost of that’s going to be?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I can get the number for you, but I can tell you that it’s certainly not over budget; it’s on budget.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay, great. And on time?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’ve heard nothing otherwise, so I’m assuming it’s on time. I can find out for you from our infrastructure team.

Mr. Rod Jackson: All right. The Pan Am shooting centre—that’s a significant investment. I think we went through close to $3.5 million for the shooting centre in Innisfil.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: That’s correct.

Mr. Rod Jackson: It also doesn’t have a contractor as of yet. Is that correct?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: You have to remember that we just announced recently, so we’re going through the process of the design/development phase, where we’re actually going to design, and then award the contract.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you have a timeline for that?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We believe the project will be done in the spring of 2015, which is fine for us.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Out of curiosity, what’s going to happen for that $3.6 million? What improvements need to be made to that to make it a world-class shooting centre?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: A new 10-metre shooting range is going in, an indoor facility; a new 25- and 50-metre shooting range, which is an indoor/outdoor combination. We have one Olympic-size bunker there. We’re creating a second Olympic-size bunker. We need two as a minimum technical standard to stage the competition, so it’s a significant build, both for indoor facilities and expanding of outdoor.

Mr. Rod Jackson: The extra day that’s been added to the games, I guess for the Parapan—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: The Parapan Am Games, yes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: What venues will be used in that added day?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s the same venues. We just couldn’t complete the competition schedule and get our athletes to the closing ceremony within the current number of days that we had. So to ensure that we didn’t have to bring on an incremental number of venues and pay additional dollars, we extended the number of days by one.

It also allows us to hold our closing ceremony of the games, which is not only for those games but the 60 days of our journey, to be held in a public location where the entire community can come out and celebrate.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Are the closing ceremonies going to be a combined Pan/Parapan Am ceremonies?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: No. Each will have its own closing ceremony, but the closing ceremonies of the Parapan represents the end of both games.

Mr. Rod Jackson: You may not have anything to do with this, and you might not be able to answer the question, but I’m going to ask anyway. Wouldn’t it be cheaper to have a concurrent Pan/Parapan Am Games? What’s the benefit in not having it concurrently? I would think—I’m just asking the question. In my mind it might be cheaper—I don’t know—and it might actually serve to get more attention for the Parapan Am athletes if we were having it at the same time as the Pan Am.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We would never say that to a Parapan Am athlete. These are world-class athletes who can stand on their own, and they would vociferously defend, from the upper echelons of management to every athlete who’s in the movement, the importance of having their own games. So it’s a non-starter for us. We believe that we’re here to create the same opportunities for athletes with a disability that the athletes in the Pan Am Games have, and we’ve taken that approach.

Toronto 2015 and the province have shown great leadership in ensuring that we’re at the forefront of the Paralympic development in the Americas in ensuring that these games are our best effort in helping to continue to grow the movement. Any consideration of combining the games would be against all that I just said and, believe it or not, would cost us a lot more money and a lot more operational challenges.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Fair enough. I have to say that I resent the implication that I was actually demeaning any para-athlete. In fact, I have an intern and assistant who actually just won a bronze medal in the Paralympic Games in sledge hockey, and three other athletes from Barrie, and I know exactly what those athletes go through. They are, in many ways, better athletes than athletes who don’t have disabilities. So, certainly, the implication is resented, and I, actually, am quite offended that you would make such an implication.

The Goldring Centre: tell me about the Goldring Centre. What is it, and why is it not included in the website—under “venues,” obviously?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s not one of our competition venues. We’re simply renting it as a training venue.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Sorry. You’re renting it as what?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: A training venue.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Who are you renting it from?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: The University of Toronto.

Mr. Rod Jackson: For how much?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I’m trying to remember. I don’t believe the actual agreement has been signed for the training venue. If it has, I can get the number for you.

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Mr. Rod Jackson: I think we saw a number of $22.5 million. Does that sound right for a training venue?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s not part of our capital program.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Is it part of your operating program?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s part of our venue program, where we’re renting out a facility as a training venue.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Are you responsible for the rental of that facility?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: We’re responsible for paying the rental, similar to the Mattamy Athletic Centre, which is a brand-new facility that’s only a year old. We’re renting that out as a competition venue. It’s a similar type of relationship that we have with the venue owner there.

Mr. Rod Jackson: What kind of training happens at the Goldring Centre?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Volleyball.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Just volleyball?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Just volleyball.

Mr. Rod Jackson: So the province could be on the hook for $22.5 million for a volleyball training venue?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It wasn’t built as a venue for Toronto 2015. We’re just leveraging the opportunity of having a new venue built on a campus in a location that’s very attractive to us to have as a training venue.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I’m trying to figure out where this $22.5 million is coming from. Who is paying for it?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: As I said, it’s outside of our games’ purview. I would suggest that you ask the province and the University of Toronto what their relationship is on that $22.5 million. It has got nothing to do with our games.

Mr. Rod Jackson: We seem to be getting that answer a lot when we ask these questions about money. It’s a bit of a three-card monte game.

We’re still a year and a half away. We’ve got a couple of examples of a venue that doesn’t even have contractors picked, and at least two of them that are running over time, yet we continually hear “on time and on budget.” How can that be said when it’s not true?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I think I specifically addressed your questions with regard to Hamilton and Milton.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Yes, that they’re not on time, and one of them might even be over budget.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: With regard to the time frame, as I said, it doesn’t impact our operational requirements. So instead of getting these venues 12 months ahead of the games, we get them 10 months ahead of the games.

Mr. Rod Jackson: All right, so it’s another little game of three-card monte, I guess, with taxpayer money.

You mentioned that you’ve travelled quite extensively, as is required through your job. Your total expense claims are about $64,000. During the winter, there is elevated travel to places like Jamaica, Cayman Islands, St. Kitts, Miami, Rio and Mexico. Are these all necessary trips that happened? Were you there to meet your colleagues from other sporting organizations?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I think I addressed your question previously with regard to who my main client groups are, where they’re located and the reasons why I have to attend meetings.

Mr. Rod Jackson: When you fly, do you fly first class or do you fly coach?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I fly coach.

Mr. Rod Jackson: When you fly—I saw a couple of expenses to places like Ottawa—Toronto-Ottawa—and even to Montreal. Those are coach as well?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: In some cases, they’re coach. In some cases, I drive or take the train.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Are there any other venues that don’t have contractors or completion dates or are not running on time?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: The ones I have addressed are the ones that we are aware of at this time that are not on time.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Mr. Jackson, you’ve got two and a quarter minutes to go.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay, thank you, Chair.

Just under half of the venue budget has been spent, and 44% of the capital budget, yet we’re only about a year and a half away. With that said, with only half of it being spent—a year and a half goes by pretty quick—are you still confident that all this is going to happen on time and on budget?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Fully confident.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Okay. Are you prepared for any delays or cost overruns that might happen? Do you have contingency plans in place?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Can you explain some of the contingency plans for one of the ones that might be more of a risk factor?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: All of the construction projects have contingencies built into their cost estimates, so they’re already built in.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Like other venues or substitute venues, that sort of thing?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: That’s correct.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Are they designed to handle 250,000 people, all the venues, the traffic that will come through there?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Absolutely. I think it’s great that we’re projecting 250,000 visitors not only to Toronto but to the greater Golden Horseshoe. You have to remember, our venue base is spread out over 16 host municipalities. It’s a great opportunity for them to share the wealth. I come back to the impact of sport tourism and the great generator it is for economic development.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Do you think it’s odd that they project a 20% reduction in traffic at a time when there are 250,000 new people visiting the city?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I just read a story on Rio. Rio is projecting that they’re going to go from 20% ridership up to 60% ridership on public transit. I think this is an area of legacy that host communities are now starting to explore—what possibilities currently exist to get cars off the road and promote public transportation.

Mr. Rod Jackson: Yes, that’s if they invest in the infrastructure for that mass transit, I guess, like London did with $18 billion for the Olympic Games.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Thank you very much. Ms. Sattler, you have the baton.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Thank you very much. Just a couple of leftover questions from our earlier round: You had mentioned that one of the things you’re focusing on right now is the sports schedules and trying to get all of those finalized. You’ve gone through five major revisions and hopefully have come to the end of that process.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: What kinds of things do you take into account when you’re developing the sports schedules and then when you’re going through this revision process? What forces revision?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: The biggest issue for us is the host broadcaster.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: The host broadcaster?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Right. Here domestically, it’s CBC—ensuring that there is agreement with the host broadcaster on what events will be televised and, with regard to what sports we televise and what the session times are. We also have a number of international rights holders, from a broadcast point of view. Those international broadcast rights holders, which come from the other 41 PASO nations, also have a long list of requests of sports that they want to see televised and when they want to see them televised. Those are thrown into the mix, and there are a lot of negotiations that go on between the host broadcaster and the rights holders. They come to Toronto 2015, and we see if we can find common ground with regard to the sports schedule to best meet the needs of all the broadcasters. That’s probably the number one issue. As you can appreciate, it’s a big dance to get to the final version.

The international and continental sports federations are always tweaking their competition rules. That might require certain tweaking of the competition schedule as well.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: How would a change in competition rules trigger a change in the schedule?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: They might move from a round robin competition to some type of other elimination. They might change the number of teams that get through to the finals, for example, to be more aligned with what they’re doing at their world championship level; as a result, that might require changes at our levels to accommodate what’s happening within their sport.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: I see. So those would be the two big things that require these revisions.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. As I said earlier, I think we’re at about 85% confidence level. The next two versions will get us to 98%. The only changes I envision are going to be driven by those two areas primarily.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: The only thing I had outstanding—you’ve been so accommodating in agreeing to take back requests for more information. One of the areas of questioning that this committee has raised on previous occasions—and earlier today, in fact—is around the awarding of the security contract. We’ve been told continually that it’s MCSCS who was responsible. Given the concerns around the company that has been awarded the contract, Contemporary Security Canada, I wondered if you could take back a request for us to see the RFP that was issued for the security services and to see the checklist that led to the decision to award the contract to Contemporary Security Canada.

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Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I don’t know how the mechanics of the committee’s operations go, but I’m assuming that that’ll be added to the request of the minutes of this meeting, and that will be shared with us so that we have that information.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: That was all I wanted to ask. Thanks very much.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Okay.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): In the information request that you just discussed, is there anything that you’d like to repeat just for the benefit of legislative research, to make sure that we understand completely what it is that you’ve got on the record?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Yes. Thank you, Chair, for that opportunity. So $81 million was awarded for the contract for the security services for the games. The contract was awarded to Contemporary Security Canada, and that is a company that has a record of charges having been laid against it for previous work that that company did for the government around the G20 and G8. Members of this committee have asked the previous presenter today—we asked Saäd Rafi about this—and have always been told that nobody who we’re talking to can get that information because it’s MCSCS.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): What I’m trying to clarify is: Are you making a specific request either of our researcher or of the witness? I just want to make sure that if you’re making a request that we understand what the request is.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: The request is to get access to the RFP that was issued in the procurement process for the security services for the games, and also to get details about what led to the decision to award the security contract to Contemporary Security Canada.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Sir, is there anything in that that’s in any way unclear or that you need any guidance on?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: No, I think it’s pretty clear.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Okay.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: Security, over all, is a major budgetary item of the games, and this contract of $81 million—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: It’s not our area of responsibility, but we’ll certainly pass the information on to the province.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: You’ve been very accommodating for agreeing to do it.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): When I heard you discussing it, I just wanted to make sure that before we moved to the next witness that if there was something you were asking—I wanted to make sure that we understood specifically what it was that you were asking.

I’d just like to ask: Is that enough information for you, if you need to follow up on it?

Ms. Anne Marzalik: Did you want me to follow up on it?

Ms. Peggy Sattler: I thought if I could put the request through—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Toronto 2015, yes.

Ms. Peggy Sattler: —Mr. O’Doherty and get the information—

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): So the witness understands precisely the question asked here?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I do.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): All right. Thank you. I think we are ready to move to the government’s side. Mr. Fraser, you have 10 minutes.

Mr. John Fraser: Thank you very much, Mr. O’Doherty, for being here today and spending a fair amount of time with us, and for your testimony.

I want to ask you, in your role as a senior vice-president for international relations, a question that relates to the possible spinoff in terms of our relationship with the PASO nations: bilateral trades, business to business—the kind of opportunities that come from hosting the games.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: I think it’s a great opportunity to build business relationships. I know both our federal and provincial government partners are exploring those north-south relationships. I think that we’ve opened some doors.

We’ve also galvanized a lot of interest from embassies and consulates located throughout the Americas and the Caribbean that are looking for opportunities to promote and grow awareness of the games in Toronto and get their various communities excited about it, including their business communities. I know of several initiatives that have been undertaken on a country-to-country basis, and sometimes on a regional basis, whether it’s the Caribbean or South America directly with the provincial and federal governments.

Certainly, one of the key legacies coming out of Vancouver and the winter games in 2010 was some of the business relationships that were built out of that and strategically targeted. I think those could be a great legacy of the games and, obviously, one that is sustainable well after the games are over.

Mr. John Fraser: Just in terms of the pre-qualifying events or events that are coming in as we go forward—I guess the question is really related to, are we engaged in that already in terms of building those relationships? The lead-up to the games—it’s not just the games period, or the period immediately around the games that is going to lead to building those relationships—

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Yes. Those relationships are already in place. Just like we’ve established relationships with the Olympic committees and Paralympic committees in every country throughout the Americas, I know our governments have already established relationships with key contacts in those countries on a similar vein through consulates and embassies. We’ve done the same on the arts and culture side as well to ensure that we’re reaching in and providing opportunities for those countries to be part of the celebrations up here.

So what we’re doing on the sports side has been copied on a parallel stream in those other areas of opportunity.

Mr. John Fraser: I just want to relate back to a question you were asked earlier by my colleague which relates to your travel. In your estimation, in terms of the kind of endeavours that you’ve been involved in, obviously, with international sport and other activities, how important is it to be there? How important is it to be there in front of people, to be at a meeting?

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Well, sport is not unlike any other business. To build personal relationships that are going to be successful long-term requires face-to-face meetings. I must admit that we had some challenges early on in the game building relationships throughout the Americas and the Caribbean because we weren’t spending a lot of face time with them.

Certainly, they have to be very confident and secure in their relationship with us before they start entrusting us as colleagues on a collaborative basis. So it’s important that at least once a year we have an opportunity to meet face to face, all the key client groups. As I said, we’ve taken different tacks to do that, where we tend to do that in group environments so that we can meet with them in larger groups as opposed to one-on-ones. But absolutely, it’s critical to the successful delivery of these games.

If we don’t have those strong working relationships in place with the NOCs, the NPCs and the various sport federations, that will lead us down a pathway to not being successful. So we certainly have to ensure that those relationships are strong, ongoing and growing right into games time.

Mr. John Fraser: Thank you very much.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Ms. Damerla, anything else?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: No. We’re done.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Mr. Jackson?

Mr. Rod Jackson: We’re done as well, Chair.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Okay. Thank you.

Mr. Rod Jackson: I have a motion, Chair.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): I believe that it’s now time to entertain motions.

I’d just like to thank our witness for the time that you’ve spent with us and for sharing your insight and answering people’s questions. You are now respectfully dismissed.

Mr. Bob O’Doherty: Thank you.

COMMITTEE BUSINESS

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Chair?

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Ms. Damerla.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: I had a motion on the floor which I’d like to withdraw, and introduce a new one.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): It’s your privilege to withdraw a motion. Is there a motion that you—

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Yes. I’d like to reintroduce it now.

I move one additional date for public hearings on Bill 11 to take place on April 2, followed by clause-by-clause consideration of Bill 11 on Wednesday, April 16 and April 30.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Would you like to give the Clerk the motion so that it can be copied and distributed to the committee, please?

1750

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Yes.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Okay. Does everybody have the motion? I spoke to the Clerk. As the motion is contained within the documents that you have and requires just striking out a few words, we didn’t have a new one typed up.

Just for the sake of clarity, would you please read the motion again while everybody is presumably looking at the same sheet of paper?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Yes, Chair; I’m happy to do that.

I move that one additional date for public hearings on Bill 11 to take place on April 2, followed by clause-by-clause consideration of Bill 11 on Wednesday, April 16 and April 30.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Is everybody clear on what the motion is? Discussion? Ms. Damerla.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: I just wanted to speak to why we are introducing this motion. Essentially, what we are trying to do is come up with a compromise that allows all three parties to move forward on items that are of importance and priority to each party. I know that the Conservatives would like to move forward on hearings on the Pan Am Games, and I know that for the third party, they have an interest in report writing on insurance. As government, we would like to see Bill 11 move forward. This was an arrangement that was made a while back amongst all three parties, where the arrangement was that, in exchange for the opposition’s request that hearings take place on Pan Am, every Wednesday would be set aside to put Bill 11 forward.

Unfortunately, that agreement was changed. The reason given is that the report that might inform us on Bill 11 isn’t ready. But I have been told that the draft report will be ready this week. The final report will not be that different from the draft report. I have spoken to my health critic, and she agrees that the draft report would be substantial enough to inform the committee about any changes that need to be made to Bill 11. We’ve heard Mr. McCallum, who’s the head of Ornge, come forward and say that Ornge has already incorporated changes that the draft report has recommended. What the legislation will do is ensure that when somebody replaces Mr. McCallum—it’s great that Mr. McCallum has introduced these changes, but if they’re not legislated, the next CEO may or may not choose to adhere to these recommendations. Given that Ornge has already adopted them, there is merit to those recommendations. They are based on the draft report. I think it’s in the public interest for us to move forward with Bill 11, to legislate that and use the interim report. To use the excuse that there isn’t a final report and hence we will not proceed with Bill 11 is a little tenuous at this point. That is the reason we’ve come up with this compromise. I respectfully submit and hope that all sides will see the merits of this.

I’ve also spoken to the health critic for the NDP and we have also met in subcommittee, where she was perfectly comfortable going ahead with Bill 11. In fact, we spoke about possible dates for public hearings as well as dates for clause-by-clause. We went to the extent of discussing what would be the best way to advertise, so certainly she was on side.

The health critic for the government is also very comfortable using the draft report. We expect that the draft report will be out shortly—next week—so we’re hoping that we can use the draft report to inform us.

The original reason given—the reason why the PC Party was not comfortable going ahead with Bill 11; i.e. that we need to wait for that final report—doesn’t hold anymore. Given that that concern has been addressed, I would appeal that we find a way to make all three parties move forward.

I do believe that we, as government, are trying our best to make this work. I’m sure that, if you were in our shoes, you would understand how we feel. We had an agreement whereby we would have Bill 11 move forward concurrently with the questioning on the Pan/Parapan American Games. Now we are saying, “Fine. We will also agree to the insurance report writing, but can we also do some work on Bill 11?” That is the reason we have put this forward, Chair.

I believe my colleague John Fraser also has some points to add.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Is there anyone else, at this point, who wants to comment? No? Mr. Fraser.

Mr. John Fraser: I want to concur with my colleague Ms. Damerla. I know that Bill 11 is an important piece of legislation that we all support, and I know that there were some concerns about a report being available to us to inform the committee.

I believe that moving forward with public hearings would be the right thing to do, considering that that draft report should be available this week. Again, given now that we’ve got this information that this draft report is going to be available and the public hearings, we can use that combination to move this forward, along with the other things we’re trying to do as well.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Ms. Scott?

Ms. Laurie Scott: I was just checking: Draft reports are confidential. They cannot be used by another committee. I was just clarifying the rules. I mean, we’re having a public meeting, right? So we can’t discuss their draft report, which is in camera and confidential in another committee. I was just checking.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Ms. Damerla?

Ms. Dipika Damerla: It’s an interim report—not the draft report, but the interim report—that’s ready. I’m using the terms interchangeably, and we’re happy to go back and check—

Interjection.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: We can go back and check, but I do believe there is enough information that is available that would help. Keep in mind that Ornge has already implemented many of these recommendations, so clearly they are in the public domain. I’m happy to—

Ms. Laurie Scott: I didn’t see them, so—

Ms. Dipika Damerla: I’m happy to double-check that nuance, and it’s a fair point.

The other point I did want to make was that, regardless of whether that final report with the pretty cover comes or not, the fact of the matter is that all three health critics have sat through these hearings. They have plenty of information that informs them. They can certainly be a part—they can be subbed on to the Bill 11 committee—and speak to the key changes that need to be made, that they have heard.

I’m not sure that we just hang our hat on this final report—I’m not sure when it will come—when there are other mechanisms to make sure we use the information that has, I guess, been tabled, put forward and assimilated through that committee. I’m sure, if we all put our heads together, that we could find a way to make it work. It’s just a matter of: Do we want to make this work?

That’s where we stand. We’re looking for a way to make this work. We want to move forward your agenda, which is—

Interjection.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: Sorry, did you want to say something? Go ahead.

Ms. Laurie Scott: I think we just want to call for a vote.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: I haven’t finished speaking to it.

Ms. Laurie Scott: Okay. Sorry. It was a good try. Okay.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Mr. Fraser?

Interjection.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): All right. Ms. Scott?

Ms. Laurie Scott: The Chair did ask me, and I said to call for the vote.

Ms. Dipika Damerla: But he can decide whether—

Ms. Laurie Scott: Okay.

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): I can call for the vote when everyone is finished speaking.

Ms. Sattler, did you want to say something? No? Okay. Mr. Fraser?

Mr. John Fraser: I just want to go back to my earlier point. I take Ms. Scott’s mention of whether the report is confidential or not, and I think that’s obviously a valid procedural concern.

I don’t think we need to have that draft report to hear deputants come and have some public hearings. That’s going to inform what we do. I feel strongly that we’ve got to make some movement forward on this. With respect to everyone across the table, everybody has different priorities and that’s how we try to do things here. We’re trying to do it in a way that everyone’s priorities get met.

I think this is an important bill and that we can move forward with public hearings. We can have a discussion afterwards as to how we want to move. Given the questions about the report, we can find out whether or not it’s—

The Acting Chair (Mr. Bob Delaney): Mr. Fraser, I’ve got to cut you off there. It now being past 6 of the clock, this committee is deemed to be adjourned.

The committee adjourned at 1801.

CONTENTS

Monday 24 March 2014

Pan/Parapan American Games review G-539

Pan/Parapan American Games Secretariat G-539

Ms. Nancy Mudrinic

Toronto 2015 Pan Am/Parapan Am Games Organizing Committee G-554

Mr. Bob O’Doherty

Committee business G-570

STANDING COMMITTEE ON GENERAL GOVERNMENT

Chair / Président

Mr. Grant Crack (Glengarry–Prescott–Russell L)

Vice-Chair / Vice-Présidente

Mrs. Donna H. Cansfield (Etobicoke Centre / Etobicoke-Centre L)

Ms. Sarah Campbell (Kenora–Rainy River ND)

Mrs. Donna H. Cansfield (Etobicoke Centre / Etobicoke-Centre L)

Mr. Grant Crack (Glengarry–Prescott–Russell L)

Ms. Dipika Damerla (Mississauga East–Cooksville / Mississauga-Est–Cooksville L)

Mr. John Fraser (Ottawa South L)

Mr. Michael Harris (Kitchener–Conestoga PC)

Ms. Peggy Sattler (London West ND)

Ms. Laurie Scott (Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock PC)

Mr. Jeff Yurek (Elgin–Middlesex–London PC)

Substitutions / Membres remplaçants

Mr. Bob Delaney (Mississauga–Streetsville L)

Mr. Rod Jackson (Barrie PC)

Mr. Phil McNeely (Ottawa–Orléans L)

Clerk / Greffière

Ms. Sylwia Przezdziecki

Staff / Personnel

Ms. Anne Marzalik, research officer,
Research Services