We've heard lots about the state of City infrastructure in recent years.
The need has necessitated significant increases in property taxes in Yorkton in the past few years, with a six per cent jump already approved for 2015.
In this space we have noted the need, and how in the end taxpayers are going to end up paying more, and more, as the needs to maintain, or replace aging water and sewer mains, sidewalks, curbs and pavement, as well as City-owned building grow. The need will become more acute simply based on the increasing age of such infrastructure.
The City situation is not unique, as the Board of Directors of the Sunrise Health Region learned at their recent regular monthly meeting.
Facility Assessments were completed on all buildings in Sunrise Health Region by Vanderwiel Facility Assessors (VFA) in Spring of 2013, and a report circulated to the SHR Board showed the Region's facilities did not rate well.
Sunrise Health Region's average facility condition score of 0.30 which is ranked poor condition as compared to the provincial average of 0.33, explained SHR CEO Suann Laurent.
"We have a lot of infrastructure risk in our region," she said, adding they knew that, but the assessment lends confirmation (See related story Page A1).
The maintenance identified to address conditions identified by the assessment with the SHR and province has a huge price tag attached.
The total cost requirements for the region is $142,224,974, with the provincial total cost requirements at $2.2 billion.
The overriding issue with most facilities, both within the SHR and across the province, is age; with the average age of Saskatchewan's health care facilities is 39 years according to the report.
It is a situation not unlike those faced by the City. Facilities are old. If the average age is 39-years, many have to be far older.
Old buildings deteriorate, and that means additional costs in terms of maintenance, to say nothing of what it would cost to drag all the buildings up to current building code standards.
In many cases, as Laurent pointed out, maintenance is a case of "putting some good money after bad."
But if the shortfall locally is $142 million to bring the facilities up to-date, the cost of replacement, which is obviously the more reasonable vision in the case of decades old buildings, would be far, far higher.
Through the decades governments at all three levels have failed to keep investment in replacing aging infrastructure at a sufficient level to keep that infrastructure current.
And now we seem on the doorstep of having to deal with the shortfall as it draws nearer to a crisis situation, whether it is what lies under our streets, the health care and education facilities we rely on, or the rural roads and bridges to travel on.
Where the billions come from nationally to even make a dint in the growing list of needs will be the great challenge of all governments from Yorkton's City Hall to the Legislature in Regina and on to Parliament in Ottawa.
