Higher than expected quotes to change retail space into parking on the ground floor of the Pelissier St. parking garage has raised more than questions about money.
That's according to ward 3 councillor Rino Bortolin.
Bortolin opposed the move from the beginning, but now that the lowest tender has come in at $888,000, nearly $400,000 more than expected, he says there's no way the project can move forward.
He told AM800 News the way Pride Windsor and Youssef Hair Salon were treated will now be put under the microscope.
"These were good tenants who paid their rent religiously," says Bortolin. "We lost thousands of dollars in revenue ... they were forced to disrupt their business, and start over."
Bortolin says there might have been a better outcome if the city had waited to evict until work was set to begin.
"There are a lot of details in this that are obviously going to create a lot of hard feelings, and not just for pure business sake, it's how we treated our tenants," he says. "At the end of the day, why didn't we go to tender first, allow the tender to come back, and then give them a month or two to leave after the tenders were fielded."
There's isn't an outcome that will make the project viable at this point, according to Bortolin.
"This is definitely not something that we should be looking at as is, and realistically, if we change it are we only going to half and 20 spaces for half the amount, then it's even worse," he says.
Bortolin says opposition to scrapping the project is unlikely.
"I can't imagine any of the councillors or the mayor deciding to spend $1-million of taxpayer money to create 43 parking spots," Bortolin says.
"To me that would be one of the worst uses of taxpayer funds that I've seen in my term."
Bortolin says he plans to raise the question of how the estimate for the project could be so far off at the next city council meeting.