Aging base may pose health risk
Federal auditor general’s report highlights CFB Edmonton woes
Military officials are fighting a losing battle to keep bases and infrastructure from crumbling and turning into health hazards, the auditor general reported Tuesday.
The problems have led to fire hazards and other health and safety risks that represent a significant danger to equipment and personnel in the short term, while threatening the military’s long-term ability to do its job, Michael Ferguson’s fall 2012 report concluded.
“The Canadian Forces rely on real property such as buildings, airfields and training facilities to carry out its missions,” Ferguson said. “I am concerned that the (Defence) Department is not yet adequately maintaining and renewing its assets.”
CFB Edmonton was among the sites singled out in the report that found problems persisting or getting worse at defence facilities even though the federal government has committed $40 billion over 20 years to maintain or renovate department property.
The base had 44 new Leopard2 tanks delivered earlier this year, but will not have a proper storage facility until at least 2016 because of a lack of planning and funding.
Tanks are currently stored in a large shelter that is so poorly ventilated that its bay doors must be left open at all times, even in extremely cold weather, the auditor general said.
In addition, the report notes noise levels that could cause permanent hearing damage to workers, and a lack of a safety barrier between mechanics and the tanks’ engines, pose a serious hazard to workers during testing.
“The facilities are not ideal, but personnel are still able to do what they need to do,” said Fraser Logan, the media operations officer for the Land Force Western Area in Edmonton.
“If we were waiting for an ideal facility, there would be a loss of time.
“It is important to have the tanks so that we can train people on them.”
Logan said the Department of National Defence is studying whether it is more cost-effective to build a new storage facility in Edmonton or do a retrofit of the current one, which soldiers on the base call the “White Whale” because it is big and white.
“At the end of the day, we are beholden to taxpayers,” Logan said.
Logan also said the storage facility has a system in place to vent any exhaust, staff are provided with ear protection and workers are not placed at unusual risk.
“The safety of our soldiers is paramount,” Logan said. “I can’t speak to the specifics, but nobody here is going to do a job if they feel the environment is unsafe.”
The Defence Department’s real-estate portfolio includes 21 main bases and numerous smaller installations across the country. All told, it has 20,000 buildings, including as armouries and barracks, storage and maintenance facilities and hangars, and more than 13,000 airfields, docks, firing ranges, roads, sewers and fuel tanks.
In 2010, the department reported that 43 per cent of its non-residential buildings and 61 per cent of its infrastructure were more than 50 years old, and said the condition of those properties had steadily declined since budget cuts were implemented in the 1990s.
The auditor general’s report said several factors are to blame, including poor planning, consistent under-estimating of how much maintenance and repairs will cost, and issues with how money is doled out for such tasks. The result is that preventive maintenance has largely been abandoned in favour of tackling problems as they arise.
“The department reports that bases have been using available maintenance and repair funding to perform immediately required corrective actions instead of spending funds on preventive measures,” the report says.
Officials at bases told the auditor general that funds are often received late and do not match construction cycles, which means money allocated for repairs and maintenance can’t be spent.
Meanwhile, the auditor general took particular issue with what some see as an effort to fudge numbers when it comes to reporting how much money is actually required to maintain and replace property.
For example, one recently constructed truck shelter valued at $893,000 was listed as having a replacement cost of $395,000. Similarly, a new control tower at CFB Trenton had a historical cost of $14.6 million, but a listed replacement cost of $5.2 million. The auditor general also examined 12 projects valued at more than $1 million that were tendered to third parties and found the vast majority were late, between two and nearly five years overdue.
John Thompson, executive director of the Mackenzie Institute, a non-profit military and security think-tank in Toronto, said the fortunes of the Canadian Forces are often tied to boom and bust cycles.
“The military is often expected to live off its capital for years, and we coast,” Thompson said. “There is feast and famine and nothing in between. It is never sustained growth.”
On Tuesday, the department said it welcomes the findings and has already begun to implement changes to improve property management.
“As custodian of one of the largest infrastructure inventories in Canada, we are committed to provide the men and women in uniform with the facilities they need to support operations, activities and equipment at home, and abroad,” said a statement on the department’s website.
“We have examined our infrastructure and environment business practices and have a number of initiatives to improve efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of our programs and services already underway.”