Taxpayers in Williams Lake are on the hook for a massive bill.
Williams Lake City Council approved a tax write-off of almost $61,000 in unpaid taxes for the Pioneer Complex on Hodgson Road, in last night’s council meeting.
Gary Muraca, the Chief Administrative Officer with the City, says tax payers are “now on the hook for that building.”
“We haven’t dove into what the costs will be, but we assume it’s going to be north of a $1 million. There’s no doubt in our minds that’s what we’re going to see.”
“There is hazardous materials potentially in the building, it was a shop, but we haven’t been able to do an assessment on there but we don’t know what it contains.”
Muraca adds the City will have to do a hazardous materials assessment as part of the demolition process, and City Staff are in the process of looking into risk management on the site.
“In the interim it’s going to be a cost just to maintain it and protect it from people getting into it.”
Consultants will be brought into for the demolition assessments, and to see what assets can be “salvaged” to mitigate costs.
Councillor Scott Nelson added that the City did try and to see “if there was a chance to put it [the taxes] back onto the company.” However, they were unsuccessful.
Until a final assessment is made, the Pioneer Complex stands derelict.
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