NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi says Green Line cost overruns are the UCP’s fault, not his.
He blames Jason Kenney, former federal Conservative minister and then UCP premier.
But Premier Danielle Smith’s UCP has taken to calling the line the “Nenshi Nightmare.”
The former Calgary mayor says that’s absurd — the bad dreams are all on them.
“They see this as an opportunity to score cheap political points on me,” he said in an interview.
“They think that’s worth telling the people of Calgary, ‘We’re not investing in rapid transit for you, we’re more focused on our own train dreams outside of the city.’”
Nenshi says Kenney stalled the project for two years, just as interest rates and construction costs were about to skyrocket.
He finds it deeply ironic that Kenney, as a federal minister, had originally begged the city to take $1.5 billion from Ottawa to build the Green Line.
“On a Monday night in 2015, I was in council when we got a call from Ottawa, from the regional minister for Alberta,” Nenshi says.
“You might remember him. He was called Jason Kenney.”
Kenney wanted to make a “massive funding announcement” that Friday.
Ottawa asked how much was needed. Nenshi says the project was still at an early stage and the cost wasn’t clear.
The feds insisted on a number. Preliminary arithmetic came up with $1.5 billion, based on cost per kilometre.
“I’m no fool,” Nenshi says. “I took the $1.5 billion.
“They wanted to make the announcement and they did, later that week.
“It’s the only time in my life I’ve seen a federal government move so fast on funding.
“And it was just before the federal election, right? They were worried about losing two seats in Calgary.”
On July 24, 2015, Kenney trumpeted the “the biggest single infrastructure announcement” in Calgary’s history.
He said, “It’s difficult for municipalities alone to finance this kind of expensive, modern, cutting-edge infrastructure.”
Nenshi said the federal money would “change the face of this city forever.”
Justin Trudeau’s Liberals blew the Harper Conservatives out of office four months later, but won only two seats in Calgary — Centre and Skyview.
Four key ridings that would benefit from the Green Line route — Peigan, Hays, Southeast and North — all went comfortably Conservative.
Now, Nenshi says, “I’m fascinated to know what the government ministers from those four ridings think of the fact that the premier and administration have just handed me their seats.”
The NDP under Rachel Notley matched the federal $1.5 billion. In 2019, Kenney’s UCP beat the NDP. Then came COVID-19.
“At that point, construction companies were tripping over themselves to underbid because they were worried about the future and interest rates were close to zero. People were getting incredible deals.
“We would have been ready to go to procurement right in the first phase of the pandemic,” Nenshi says.
“But then the Kenney government put a hold on the whole project.
“Somebody had come up to Jason Kenney — literally a guy he met — who said, ‘Oh, we can do it cheaper than that.’
“Based on that one conversation, the provincial government put a hold on the whole project to try to find a way to do it cheaper.
“They cost us almost two years as they went back and forth on this thing. In the end, they completely agreed with and approved our design.
“Ric McIver (municipal affairs minister) and Jason Kenney cost the city two years for nothing, just when the price started rising.”
Nenshi notes that other provinces, including B.C. and Ontario, often pay 100 per cent of costs for such major projects.
“The UCP are treating their biggest city worse than any other provincial government treats its cities.
“There is a very real likelihood they will kill the project just to try to score political points on me.
“It’s not going to get any cheaper, thanks to them.
“But we need this project really badly. Anyone who’s driven Deerfoot or Stoney Trail in the south knows how much we need it.
“So we need to figure out how to get this built.”
Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald/Postmedia
X: @DonBraid