HRM did not submit claim for expenses from post-tropical storm Dorian

The Halifax Regional Municipality did not submit a claim to the province for financial aid following post-tropical storm Dorian in 2019.

During a virtual meeting of the municipality's audit and finance standing committee on Wednesday, Chief Financial Officer Jerry Blackwood said the municipality did not submit a claim for the expenses incurred for repairs and cleanup following the storm that left 400,000 homes and businesses in the province without power.

"It was decided that we did not submit a provincial claim for those expenses…. I think it was looked at from a cost-benefit point of view.… It's a fair amount of work to gather all those costs and then submit in the timeline involved," Blackwood said of the previous leadership. 

Jane Fraser was chief financial officer at the time of the storm.

Mayor Mike Savage said the news surprised him. During the meeting, he asked if the application was not submitted out of concern about getting enough funds to cover the cost and effort of putting the application together.

"That is what my understanding of that is," Blackwood replied.

Coun. Cathy Deagle-Gammon, who represents Waverley-Fall River-Musquodoboit Valley, also expressed surprise.

"I think I'm still processing about the whole Dorian conversation, so I'll go back and think about that a bit," she said during the meeting.

Blackwood also said the municipality currently has four claims on file with the province for other emergency funding and there's no date for when that cash will be received by the municipality, though payment may be between four and six years away.

Both Blackwood and Chief Administrative Officer Cathie O'Toole agreed to submit to the committee a report with information on what the expected claim would've cost back in 2019 and why it was not submitted.

$25M withdrawal for emergency repairs, cleanup

Also during the meeting, the committee passed the motion to approve a transfer of $15 million from a capital reserve into the risk and resiliency reserve, while also approving an unbudgeted withdrawal of up to $25 million from the risk reserve.

As well, the committee approved that the remaining balance of the risk reserve be used "toward unbudgeted costs for remediation and replacement expenditures related to emergency and disaster events."

Finally, any funding received from external sources, including both provincial and federal relief programs, would be placed in the risk reserve, following the committee's vote.

Currently, the municipality is estimating the following costs:
• $4.4 million for post-tropical storm Fiona. 
• $13.7 million for wildfires. 
• $2.4 million for flooding.   

The money will go toward repairing buildings, roads and vehicles, as well as costs from its emergency response like overtime, security, and fuel. But the report says the numbers are only estimates and the final costs are not yet known.