Amidst other problems, Dawson suddenly developed a recreation centre crisis in late March when it appeared the roof might cave in. Photo by Dan Davidson

Welcome to the April 9, 2004 online edition of the Klondike Sun, reproducing a selection of the articles and photographs from the April 6 newsstand edition.

The Sun has only recently been updated on the web after a hiatus since the January 16/04 issue. Current issues are now available on the site, and the archives from 1997-2003 are linked to this site.

We have had many inquiries about the absence of current issues here, and we note that the site has had more than 2,000 hits since the final new posting last January.

This issue is fairly hefty as it records one of the keys periods leading to the dissolution of our town council. A lot happened on the political front in late March and early April.

As this new site develops over the next few months you will note changes in the format. We expect to be asking you to pay something in order to gain access to these files, and will be giving you an option of an issue-by-issue or yearly rate. In the time we have been online, since 1997, the site has had free access. We have tried asking for donations, and if the nearly 100,000 hits on the site had each generated a loonie, we’d be laughing right now, but it hasn’t worked out that way. We need to make enough money to pay for the existence of the site, and perhaps a bit more to help our bottom line.

Arena Will Reopen - Gold Show Safe

By Dan Davidson

The arena portion of the recreation centre may be used provided no further snow falls on it to increase the load. This will mean that the Gold Show can be held in May as planned. The report from the engineering firm of Fast and Epp was received by city offices on April 1. While the curling rink is in serious shape, the arena is judged to be safe.

The firm reports that the roof “is structurally inadequate or marginal at best to withstand snow loadsÉ” and that the “flexural strength of the roof purlins may be as much as 35% less than required by Code.”

The curling rink may only be used after all the snow has been removed and any future snowfall must be removed if it reaches 1.5 feet.

The building was closed on March 19 after the purlins were seen to be distorted by curlers.

Mayor Glen Everitt, along with councillors Wayne Potoroka and Bill Holmes faced a crowd of some fifty ratepayers and others in council chambers on Thursday night. Photo by Dan Davidson

“People weren’t doing their jobs properly” draws applause in Rec. Centre discussion

by Dan Davidson

At the top of the evening’s list of subjects at Thursday night’s special public meeting of council in Dawson City was the fate of the recreation centre, which was closed on March 19 amid fears that pieces of the roof structure might be caving in under the weight of the snow.

Fifty or more people crowded the council chambers to hear news on that and other subjects from Mayor Glen Everitt, and councillors Wayne Potoroka and Bill Holmes.

Everitt was able to report that five engineers from Ferguson Simek Clark, Architects and Engineers, were inspecting the structure that night, even as the meeting was going on, and that an engineer from the firm of Fast and Epp, finally authorized by Minister Glen Hart in spite of earlier objections from Supervisor Andre Carrel, was arriving on Friday to do an independent evaluation.

The town had tried to get this done immediately on March 19, but Carrel, who now authorizes all expenses in Dawson unless overruled by the minister, had blocked the administration’s request and then argued over its choice of engineer, delaying the process for almost a week. FSC had sent in its own crew, apparently disturbed by the tone of the reports in the media.

In response to a question from Dawson Hardware’s Susan Herrmann, Everitt obtained from project manager Randy Shewen the information that some of the structural purlins used in the old curling rink had been recycled in the new one, but that the roof materials were new. The skeletal frame of both the curling rink and the arena are both parts of the old buildings, but nothing seems to be amiss with them. It is the new roof of the curling rink that is most obviously damaged.

Chamber of Commerce president expressed concerns about whether the arena would be available for this year’s Gold Show, planned for mid-May. he was concerned that it would be a “killer” blow to the event if is had to be downsized or relocated after having just gotten back on its feet so successfully last year.

Both Everitt and Councillor Bill Holmes indicated that this was one of the first things they thought off when the bad news surfaced last week. It was not possible for them to be too reassuring, except to say that the damage seems to be in the curling rink, and that the arena itself may turn out to be safe on inspection.

Everitt said that problems with the roofs of both parts of the building surfaced fairly early in the construction process, problems including leaks and lack of vapor barriers, but that the contractual process for dealing with such issues had been so convoluted and lengthy that the only way to gain redress seemed to be to go after it once the project was complete.

Susan Herrmann won a smattering of applause from the crowd when she said that “people weren’t doing their jobs properly ... all the way through.”

Gehrig asked if Everitt had been psychic about the roof, since he had mentioned it at the March 16 council meeting as an example of outstanding issues, but the mayor replied that he had used it simply as one of a list of issues that needed to be dealt with in the next stage of solving construction problems, whether that might be in or out of court.

Zlatko Fras of Bonanza Esso asked who had been in charge of oversight on the project. The answer was complex. Initially the town thought it had hired a firm (FSC) to manage the construction, but eventually learned that change notices were being okayed in discussions by the various contractors without council knowing anything about them. By that time, according to Wayne Potoroka, about seventeen changes, amounting to many thousands of dollars, had been authorized and completed.

Martin Gehrig, speaking personally, wondered if change notices weren’t just a slick way of increasing the price of a low bid project. Everitt said he wasn’t implying that.

Shortly after the hotly contested election of 2000, in which all the incumbents who ran were returned and two new faces were added to council, it became clear that there were problems and a new system was put in place to manage the finances and operations. This included Randy Shewen as project manager and Roger Hanberg as an on the spot liaison, along with people from FSC. A few months later the first Project Management Team was formed, including three members of council, the town manager, Shewen and YTG employee Pat Molloy.

Once again, however, this group was more concerned with financial oversight than with where the rivets were being placed.

Former councillor Shirley Pennell asked about the territorial government’s role in all of this. Everitt replied that a building inspection was carried out and the place was certified for occupancy.

He also said he wasn’t worried about who was to blame for the faulty roof. Was it an engineering flaw or a construction problem? He didn’t care. It clearly didn’t matter to the City of Dawson as long as the problems were fixed. Who paid the estimated $970,000 to do that job was not a city concern as long as it was someone else.