A promised inquiry into the Winnipeg police headquarters scandal won’t cast its gaze toward any other troubled real estate and construction projects in the city’s past.
Premier Wab Kinew said the upcoming inquiry will concentrate on the police headquarters case, but the recommendations will focus on preventing similar mistakes from afflicting other projects in the future.
“Given the current legislative framework that exists in Manitoba today, how do we ensure Manitobans have confidence that your money is going to be invested in big public projects in the right kind of way,” he told reporters on Monday.
The NDP promised in last year’s election campaign to call an inquiry into the procurement and construction of Winnipeg’s police headquarters, which has been the subject of two scathing audits, an RCMP investigation and a civil litigation that determined a city official had accepted a bribe.
The construction of the headquarters was years behind schedule and $79 million over budget by the time it opened in 2016.
In 2017, Winnipeg city council voted overwhelmingly for an inquiry into that project, but also “any and all matters” related to past real-estate transactions and capital-procurement problems that plagued the city during previous administrations.
WATCH | We explain the multi-year Winnipeg police HQ scandal in just over five minutes:
The City of Winnipeg has dismissed claims against dozens of people and companies in the latest development in the years-long scandal surrounding the construction of the Winnipeg Police Service headquarters. CBC’s Caroline Barghout walks us through the newest chapter in the scandal and how we got here.
In 2013 and 2014, the final two years of former mayor Sam Katz’s time in office, a trio of external audits examined what went wrong with the commission of the police headquarters, the construction of four new fire-paramedic stations and major real-estate transactions that included the sale of Canad Inns Stadium, the Parker lands swap and the purchase of the former Canada Post complex in downtown Winnipeg.
Kinew had previously said he was open to expanding the scope of the police headquarters inquiry, but said Monday his government wouldn’t proceed.
He said the province is in the process of drafting the terms of reference for the inquiry, setting out a timeline and budget, and picking the commissioner. Kinew didn’t provide a timeline Monday for when that work would be completed.
No start or completion date for the inquiry has been provided either.
“I think there’s a really important public need for us to understand what went wrong here, what mistakes are made and, most importantly, to look ahead to the future: how can we prevent something like that or, some of these situations that have been described in the media and court, how can we avoid repeating those in the future?”
The former PC government previously declined calls for an inquiry on the basis the police headquarters remained the subject of legal proceedings.
The RCMP investigation into the police headquarters ended in 2019 without any charges being laid. In March 2023, a settlement was reached that called for nearly 40 defendants to pay the city $21.5 million to $28 million, depending how quickly the money is paid. The city has since dismissed its claims against dozens of people and companies, leaving the contractor, Caspian, and Caspian-related defendants on the hook for the entire settlement.
Meanwhile, Manitoba’s Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal from Phil Sheegl against a Court of King’s Bench that ruled the former Winnipeg CAO had accepted a $327,200 bribe from Caspian’s Armik Babkhanians and breached his duties as a public officer by favouring Caspian in the award of the primary police-HQ construction contract.
The province inducted 134 first responders into the Order of the Buffalo Hunt for their bravery following the deadly Carberry crash that killed 17 people in June 2023. As well, the government said its inquiry into the Winnipeg police headquarters scandal won’t examine other real estate and construction projects in the city.