Ontario extends Metrolinx CEO's contract despite Eglinton Crosstown LRT delays
CBC
The Ontario government has extended its employment contract with Metrolinx CEO Phil Verster, Premier Doug Ford's office confirmed on Thursday.
The confirmation comes one day after Verster refused to provide an opening date for the Eglinton Crosstown LRT, telling reporters that technical problems in the testing and commissioning phase have led to further delays.
"Any prediction of an opening date at this stage of the project will just be an estimate, and I'm not comfortable giving that," Verster had said at a news conference.
"When I give you a date it must be something I believe in and we're not there yet."
The transit line, known as Line 5, is expected to run along Eglinton Avenue from Kennedy in the east and Mount Dennis in the west.
Work began on the 25-stop,19-kilometre line in 2011. The opening date has been delayed multiple times.
Verster had said in August that Metrolinx would provide a "range of dates" by end of summer for the opening of the troubled transit line.
In a news release on Wednesday, the NDP had calling for his firing.
In question period on Thursday, NDP MPP Bhutila Karpoche asked the government about Verster, saying he has had more than a year to explain the latest delay and no one at Metrolinx seems to be able to hold to account Crosslinx Transit Solutions, a consortium established to deliver and maintain the Eglinton Crosstown.
"Why does Mr. Verster still have a job?" Karpoche asked.
Ontario Transportation Minister Prabmeet Singh Sarkaria responded by defending Verster but wouldn't say whether he knows the Eglinton Crosstown's expected completion date.
"I know how important this project is for the thousands of commuters who will rely on it to get to where they need to go every single day and I know that the public wants certainty on this project. That's why the CEO of Metrolinx was out there yesterday and will continue to deliver those updates to the public so they can have that information," he said.
"This is a very complex project, but we have delivered for the people of Toronto and this province the largest transit expansion plan in the history of this province and North America," he said, adding tunneling on th Eglinton West Crosstown is almost 50 per cent complete and that shovels are in the ground for the Ontario Line.
Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said the government needs to be held accountable for project's ongoing delays.
Aggressive patients and lack of security are making nurses feel unsafe in a rural Western Manitoba emergency union, says the Manitoba Nurses Union.
Saskatoon resident Delynne Bortis knew her commute to work Tuesday morning would be particularly difficult.
WARNING: This story contains details of abuse and intimate partner violence:
The amount of money it takes for people to earn a living wage has increased across the province, according to a new report from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).
The new owner of Ontario steelmaker Stelco says his company "will not disappoint the people of Hamilton and Nanticoke," where the business's major facilities are based.
A Winnipegger is warning others about an intricate scam she says she almost fell for.
Fort William First Nation is opposing a planned redevelopment of the Ontario Power Generation's (OPG) 117 year old Kakabeka Falls Generating Station, which is located in their traditional territory.
A building that sits at the corner of Sussex Street and Brunswick Avenue has had many lives over the last century — being a church, a school and offices. Now it's set to become housing, at a time when the city sorely needs it.
A Waterloo, Ont., elementary school principal will be sentenced in the new year after pleading guilty to child sexual exploitation charges following a joint investigation that involved the London, Toronto and Waterloo police services.
Students at UPEI have let their student union know what they want from the province this fiscal year, and those priorities are reflected in a 2024-2025 advocacy document brought to the legislature on Wednesday.
Larger communities in the N.W.T. will soon see a boost in their territorial funding to maintain infrastructure and deliver services — like water and waste management — but the increase still falls short of what communities need.