Photo courtesy Kim Adams-Jussila
Windsor Artificial Christmas Tree at $400,000 Could Be Guinness Record
Taxpayers will have to wait until April to find out whether the city called for bids on the $400,000 Christmas tree that was the feature attraction of the estimated $1.5 million holiday Bright Lights display in December, and early January, in Jackson Park.
City Council, in a 6-5 vote on August 28, basically turned over the project to administration to hire a consultant, arrange for all staffing and resources and to purchase a projected $1.7 million worth of lights and displays.
Council approved the expenditure of $3 million for the light show in August, setting off angry charges of frivolous city spending in the face of massive basement flooding across the city almost simultaneous to the Bright Lights decision.
Mayor Drew Dilkens, protecting his political hide, unilaterally announced that only half the money would be spent in year one with the second phase of the project not kicking in until the 2018-19 holiday season.
The cost of the 64-foot tree, placed in Jackson Park’s sunken garden and adorned with copious lights, was not mentioned in the August report to Council, but Dilkens boastfully threw out the $400,000 figure on radio after the tree was lit during the opening ceremonies that drew oohs and aahs from a large audience on December 8th.
Pressed for time in late August, Council had given the city’s purchasing manager authorization “to issue purchasing orders as may be required, subject to all specifications being satisfactory in technical content to the Corporate Leader, Parks, Recreation and Culture and Facilities, and in financial content to the City Treasurer.
When I asked a Senior Manager at City Hall in January if they could tell me the purchasing details of the tree’s acquisition, and if there were any call for bids for the tree and other equipment on display, they responded: “We won’t be compiling the numbers or reviewing things right away . . . we’ll be targeting to have this done in time for the capital budget status report, which will be coming to Council in late spring.”
There have been hints that the Windsor tree might be the costliest in the world, perhaps worthy of a Guinness Book of World Records bid. In a stark contrast to the Windsor reaction, however, there were reports of outrage in Serbia last holiday season about the high cost of a plastic tree erected in the capital of Belgrade for $98,000 U.S.
Sinisa Mali, the shamed mayor of Belgrade, promised to cancel the contract for the 59-foot tree after it was already up. Obviously tough to do.
A Serbian investigative website, reported that a 75-foot Norway Spruce in New York’s Rockefeller Centre cost far less – a little under 62,000 euros, compared to 83,000 euros for Belgrade’s ersatz tree.
Pistaljkr.rs reported that a Christmas tree in Rome cost 50,000 euros, but died, dried out and shed most of its needles long before Christmas. Romans named it Baldy.
Meanwhile, back in Windsor, City Council marched through its 2018 budget session without removing the cost of phase two of the Bright Lights project – another $1.5 million supposedly to be spent to greatly enhance the light show this coming December.
Although this project was not discussed during its 2018 budget deliberations, Council silently agreed to annually fund Bright Lights operations to the tune of $335,000.
To fund the elaborate display last August, Council voted to take $1 million from a 2017 special dividend from EnWin Utilities, $400,000 from a budget placeholder in its failed bid to co-host the World Junior Hockey Championships, $500,000 from the surplus of its annual funding from Caesars Windsor revenues, and $1,1 million from the placeholder funding for a new City Hall parking garage that now won’t be built.
Of course all of this money could have been spent to fix Windsor’s pot-holed roads.
The views and opinions expressed by Alan Halberstadt are not necessarily those of Biz X magazine or its advertisers.
