As the journey to procuring a private partner to help fund the downtown event and convention centre progresses, Saskatoon’s Governance and Priorities Committee has added a ‘wage and job quality’ element to their Request for Proposals.
Potential partners will be evaluated on several fronts including their plan related to workforce and supply chain diversity, their proposed social and financial investments, their plan for maintaining existing employees, and now their standards regarding employee wages.
Councilor Darren Hill was one of two councilors who voted against adding a wage condition to the RFP.
“I question building it into the request when it’s not a practice that we have throughout the entire corporation and all of our contract providers, so I just caution us on the weight that we’re going to put on that,” Hill warned.
The other way Councilor Randy Donauer, who stated that meddling in the effort to find a partner by imposing too many conditions might delay the project or prevent it from happening all together.
“I was our employees to get paid well. I think they do, and they will. I am not interested in handcuffing the Administration or a proponent with a living wage on all salaries with the new venue. I think we’d be better off negotiating something along those lines,” Donauer suggested.
Councilor Hillary Gough was the one who suggested that Administration add the element to the list to ensure that future employees will be making enough money to support themselves.
Councilor David Kirton agreed with her, saying it is important to make sure all employees can afford to live, whether they work part- or full-time.
“I’m very concerned if we don’t do this, that it gets lost in the negotiations…and we’re without a living wage, and there’s no benefit, then, to those working in the community,” Kirton worried.
Before the holiday break, the City issued a request seeking firms qualified to submit proposals, and submissions close in the coming weeks. While he didn’t have a final tally, City of Saskatoon Director of Technical Services Dan Willems says the process has generated at least two firms expected to bid on the RFP when it’s issued.
