The Saskatchewan Progressive Conservative Party and their leader, Rick Swenson, have been probing into questionable land deals that have transpired regarding the Regina-based Global Transportation Hub (GTH).
Last week, Swenson and the party issued a media release saying they had turned the information they had gathered to a CBC investigation team which led to the revelation that millions of dollars in questionable land deals associated with the GTH meant that Premier Brad Wall and the minister responsible for the Hub’s development from the provincial government’s perspective, Bill Boyd, were now on the hot seat.
The NDP’s Cam Broten also revealed he and his party were posing a number of questions about the deal, concerns he expressed to an Estevan audience when he addressed the party’s membership at a rally and dinner last week.
“Open the books,” said Swenson, who later called for a full inquiry led by a committee with subpoena powers to get to the bottom of the questionable land transactions.
“This same minister, Bill Boyd, responsible for SaskPower and their multi-million dollar smart meter fiasco with the massive overruns, the non-performance at the BD3 project at Estevan and the questionable $24 million purchase of land in the GTH by SaskPower, has now added questionable land purchases on the edge of the GTH and the South Regina bypass to his resume,” said Swenson. “The taxpayer can no longer tolerate this minister’s level of incompetence with their money. It does beg the question, how many more of Mr. Wall’s cabinet were aware of these transactions as they flowed across the cabinet table for approval?” Swenson asked.
“Boyd must go, and what does Wall know?” Swenson added.
The provincial Green Party also entered the fray too, asking for an inquiry, as did the Saskatchewan Taxpayers Advocacy Group.
“The Sask. Party government had been buying land for the Global Transportation Hub and nearby roads, paying between $9,000 and $23,000 per acre under threat of expropriation. But, despite knowing for years they would need a specific 204-acre stretch of land, they waited until it had been bought by businessmen, then paid them a cool $103,000 per acre, cutting a $21 million cheque,” said the NDP release.
The government, the NDP said, had the land appraised at no more than $35,000 per acre just before offering two businessmen the giant price — 194 per cent more than its appraised value.
“This land purchase is deeply troubling,” said NDP deputy leader Trent Wotherspoon. “The independent provincial auditor should be brought in for a full investigation and audit of the sale process.”
Wotherspoon said that while it’s possible this deal represents a series of timing coincidences and significant Sask. Party incompetence, the RCMP should not rule out any criminal wrongdoing including breach of trust by Boyd, or any of his cabinet colleagues. A criminal breach of public trust is an offence in which a public official intentionally or through willful neglect uses their office for a purpose other than for public good, including dishonest, corrupt or fraudulent purposes.
Paying three times the appraised value meant “something isn’t right here,” said Wotherspoon. “It’s possible the Sask. Party government cost Saskatchewan taxpayers millions of dollars by waiting too long to buy this land, and doing a devastatingly bad job at negotiating the price. But, it’s also possible that there was some wrongdoing on the part of the Sask. Party here. Saskatchewan people need to know how and why one land owner was paid far, far more than anyone else.”
In 2013, the 204-acre parcel, divided into two plots were owned by two separate people. That year, an Alberta company bought both parcels and flipped them to two businessmen for a $6 million profit in a matter of hours — brokering the deal so that the land titles record showed the sale was directly from the original owners to the businessmen.
By the time the sale closed on Feb. 26, 2013, and the businessmen officially owned all 204 acres, it was no secret the government needed that land — they held an open house showing a new interchange occupying part of the land just two days later, said the NDP statement.
In fact, when questioned by Wotherspoon in a legislative committee meeting on April 30, 2015, Boyd said the land had been identified as critical to the GTH access “probably right at the very outset of our government taking over in 2005, that would have been a priority of the GTH, to acquire those lands to accommodate that free-flow access.”
Asked again if the 204 acres were specifically identified in 2007 as necessary to the project, Boyd answered “A long time ago, yes.”
Since then the government has signed off on the $21 million purchase in February 2014, leaving Wotherspoon and the NDP wondering why they waited while the land rapidly flipped ownerships, then offered a massively inflated price for it.
The NDP then noted that Global Transportation Hub CEO Bryan Richards, was directed by the provincial government to pursue the purchase of part of the land that was sold from the government’s GTH to the Ministry of Highways and Infrastructure after that, for $65,000 per acre.
