Construction of new Oak Ridges Library stuck in limbo

The $11,863,000 project -- roughly 90 per cent complete -- has come to a halt indefinitely

Yorkregion.com
November 5, 2018
Sheila Wang

With no crews or equipment in sight, the construction site of the new Oak Ridges Library has been awfully quiet for a while.

Its completion date -- which was slated for November 2017 and then pushed back to March 2018 -- is now up in the air.

The Town of Richmond Hill announced last month that it ended the contract with the contractor Bondfield Construction Company Limited on Oct. 3 due to what is called breaches of contract.

The decision came after massive delays on the construction and little progress over an extended period of time despite “the best efforts of town staff,” according to Richmond Hill.

The $11,863,000 project on the corner of Yonge Street and Regatta Avenue -- roughly 90 per cent complete -- has since come into a halt for an indefinitely period of time.

“We don’t have a completion date yet,” said Ash O’Malley, Richmond Hill spokesperson. “It’s premature for us to comment on that until we work out the details.”

O’Malley said there is some exterior and interior work left to be done such as tiling, installation of glass, heating and air conditioning.

But it remains unknown how the town will move forward with the remaining construction after the termination of the contract.

The spokesperson said Richmond Hill is asking Bondfield's bonding company Zurich Insurance to complete or arrange for completion of the project in accordance with the warranty provisions in the contract, according to a press release of the Town of Richmond Hill.

“The town will not be responsible for any additional construction costs to complete the project. However, there may be other project costs, which will have to be addressed,” the press release said.

O’Malley said Richmond Hill has held preliminary talks with Zurich Insurance but details were not yet available to the public.

"It is very disappointing and I think it is a shame that the contractor couldn’t keep things on schedule," said Regional Councillor Vito Spatafora, who has been involved in the planning of the new library from the very start.

How did we get here

The new library has been a long time coming.

The idea of a new library in north Richmond Hill actually came up more than 10 years ago when the town purchased the land where the new library now stands, Spatafora said.

"We waited to build a library until we had funding and the means to go ahead and do that. That took quite a bit of time."

Council approved the project of the new library as part of the 2015 Capital Budget. It will replace the current library, a 28-year-old storefront facility which has outgrown its space in the area.

Construction didn’t start until the spring of 2016 as Richmond Hill awarded the contract to Bondfield following a competitive procurement process, O’Malley said.

At that time, residents were told the new library will be complete by Nov. 17, 2017. It was later postponed to Mar. 28, 2018 due to significant rain delays and other contractual issues, according to the press release.

But it was not completed on time, again.

“It’s safe to say that we’re disappointed,” said Louise Procter Maio, CEO of Richmond Hill Public Library. “But we remain optimistic that the library would be completed. We’re just excited to be moving into a new facility.”

The community has been involved in the planning of the new library every step of the way.

As a joint project between Richmond Hill Public Library and the Town of the Richmond Hill, it has invited local book-lovers and library-goers to rounds of public visioning sessions to help plan for the brand-new library since as early as 2013, as yorkregion.com previously reported.

And it is going to be exactly what they wanted it to be -- large, modernized, and sustainable.

The 19,000-square-foot facility -- three times bigger than the current one -- is expected to offer a wide range of services including meeting rooms, programs rooms as well as expanded library collection of books and magazines for all ages.

The new facility will include a unique maker space that is going to have workshops, planned programming and free play on top of the audio/visual equipment, iMac Creation Station computers, a Memory Lab for conversion of slides and photographs to digital formats, a DIY Artisan Zone with vinyl cutter, laser cutter and engraver and a 3-D printer.

What’s going on with Bondfield

Bondfield, a 40-year-old family-owned firm based in Vaughan, has worked with Richmond Hill on multiple projects in the past, including the Richmond Hill Centre for the Performing Arts, O’Malley said.

The Oak Ridges Library is not the first construction project that the company has failed to deliver, and it doesn’t look like it is the last.

As one of the province’s largest construction companies, Bondfield has been dealing with a great number of public-sector projects that have been either significantly behind schedule or terminated since the start of 2018.

"I think they've stretched too thin," Spatafora said, noting the company has taken on too many projects at the same time.

The projects include the $187-million expansion and renovation in Cambridge Memorial Hospital which has been delayed by 22 months and the $125.7-million Hawkesbury & District General Hospital that has been delayed by 13 months, according to an analysis of The Global and Mail.

"It’s not unusual for delays to occur. However, you tried to mitigate the prolong delays and you try to mitigate through various actions in terms of making up for that time," Spatafora said. "In this case, it has been extraordinary, and it's certainly a disappointment not only because the library isn’t open on time, but because community looks forward to it."

The analysis also finds that there a marked increase in the number of claims against Bondfield in 2017 and 2018, counting close to half of the total lawsuits that have been filed against Bondfield since 1994 across Ontario.