City spends $345K expropriating Parker home to make way for Southwest Transitway

The City of Winnipeg is poised to spend $345,000 to expropriatea Parker neighbourhood home in the way of the Southwest Transitway expansion.

On Wednesday, council will consider a final settlement that would see the city spend $85,000 on top of a $260,000 advance already paid to the owner of a 1,080-square-foot home and 10,200-square-foot lot on Parker Avenue.

Executive policy committee approved the dealduring a closed-door portion of a meeting on Wednesday. EPC votes on some property and personnel matters behind closed doors.

The expropriated land is required to complete the SouthwestTransitwayall the way from downtown Winnipeg to the University of Manitoba's Fort Garry campus.

The first phase of thetransitway, from Queen Elizabeth Way near The Forks to Jubilee Avenue atPembinaHighway, was completed in 2012 at a cost of $138 million.

The second phase, which also includes the widening ofPembinaHighway at Jubilee Avenue, will cost $467 million.

The city initially allocated $8 million for expropriations but wound up spending up to$20.4 million to acquire Manitoba Hydro land.

Interactive map: BRT land expropriation

The following map shows the approximate locations of properties initially considered for Southwest Transitwayexpropriations.

Robo-cameras coming to city hall

Winnipeg plans to improve the quality of its city council broadcasts with a high-definition system that uses remotely operated cameras.

The City Clerk's department, which manages the city's legislative process, plans to spend $84,000 on new cameras and equipment that would allow one producer to replace a crew of three or four camera operators and producers.

"This would improve the quality of the broadcast as well as create savings (and)efficiencies, through reduced required hiring of ad-hoc staff," deputy city clerk Marc Lemoine writes in a report to council's innovation committee.

Council meetings are broadcast live on Shaw.

The innovation committee, now chaired by newly appointed executive policy committee member Cindy Gilroy (Daniel McIntyre), will consider the report on Monday.

Alarm-permits backlog deprives police of $400,000

The Winnipeg Police Service is short $400,000 because of a two-year backlog in processing permits for alarms.

Winnipeg's corporate finance division says in a report it is continually tryingto catch up with requests to renew alarm permits. As a result, the police have been deprived of$400,000, even though homeowners have been able to renew permits online since 2015.

On Monday, thecorporate finance division will ask for $130,000 in additional funding to bolster back-end processing systems to ensure renewal notices go out on a timely basis and allow new permit holders to apply online.

Marion widening dead, once and for all

It took two months, but city council's public works committee has finally cancelled a $566-million Marion Street widening project opposed by most area residents as well as St. Boniface Coun. Matt Allard.

The committee voted Monday to kill the project, which was deemed too expensive and out of scale for the neighbourhood. It would have required the construction of a bridge or underpass and $20 million a year in debt servicing.

• St. Boniface residents decry 'hurtful' and 'obscene' Marion Street widening

In September, the committee planned to kill the project and conduct a $200,000 studyto come up with a less expensive and disruptive alternative. But that vote was laid over because some residents expressed concern the city would award the contract for that studyto MMM Group, the same consulting firm that helped develop the original plan.

On Monday, public works director Lester Deane told the committee he supported the idea of looking for a new consultant, mainly to help restore confidence.

The committee dismissed that suggestion. New chair Marty Morantz (Charleswood-Tuxedo) said the expense would be unwarranted.