The former city councilor and former MP Adam Vaughan, one of the most clear critics of Doug Ford’s plans for the coast of Toronto, is now working for Therme Canada, the company that develops a luxury spa in Ontario Place.
In an interview with CBC News, Vaughan revealed that he has been hired as the main advisor of Therme, the Austrian company granted a 95 -year lease contract to build a destination spa and a covered aquatic park on the west island of Ontario Place, the provincial property site in La Lago de la Ciudad.
Vaughan describes his work with Therme as “speaking with the public about how incredible this” and praised the Prime Minister of Ontario for the general vision.
“He would be the first person to criticize Doug Ford if he thought he was doing something bad in Toronto,” Vaughan told CBC News.
“This is a good project and I am totally with all the heart in support of it. When they are new facts, new ideas and, more importantly, great ideas appear on the coast, I will be the first to defend them every time.”
As recently as 2019, when he was still the liberal deputy of Trinity-Spadina, Vaughan made a statement in the House of Commons that criticized the plans that Ford was floating for Ontario Place, and said that the provincial government had “put a sign of sale on the site.”
Vaughan continued to say that Ford’s progressive conservatives were “talking about a shopping center or worse, a casino on the coast.”
“What wasted. What a terrible imagination deficit. The people of Ontario, the people of our city, the Liberal Caucus of Toronto wants to keep Ontario a public place.”
When CBC News showed Vaughan that statement during his interview, he replied: “They left the idea of a casino. They are not building a shopping center. What they are building is a park.”
“It is a mixture of pay attractions, ours is one of them, but it is also an incredible set of new green spaces with restored habitat and beaches to which you do not need mountain boots to arrive,” he said.
Last December, the Ontario General Auditor criticized the management of the Provincial Government of the Ontario Place reurbing, a project that has been inclined to cost the public bag $ 2.2 billion. The auditor called the process to select new tenants in the property neither transparent nor fair.
The auditor’s report found that Therm Group, the International Matrix company of Therme Canada, did not possess and operated five of the six spas cited in its presentation of offers to the ontarium infrastructure.
These findings received renewed attention in April as a result of a history of the New York Times that questioned whether Thermme exaggerated its credentials in its tone, including if the company had the $ 100 million in capital that the province required as a minimum qualification.
Look | How a story of the New York Times on the Ontario Place spa of Therme fell into Queen’s Park:
The Government Plan of Ontario to build a luxury spa in the old Ontario Place site is under the microscope again after the accusations that Therme was falsely presented to ensure the 95 -year agreement. Shawn Jeffords of CBC has the story.
“The reason he won the offer was because we complied with the criteria,” said Vaughan.
“We have three main investors that are part of our consortium,” he said. “That is part of our financial structure. That is what was presented to the government.”
‘We are listening and the province is listening’
The auditor also criticized the province for not conducting any public consultation on the overview of Ontario Place until after his anchor tenants were selected.
But in your interview with CBC News, Vaughan said there have been “a ton of public consultations.”
“We are listening and the province is listening.”
He said the consultations requested things as a path accessible to the Paseo Marítimo, the public beaches that people can swim and the rehabilitation of the contaminated soil on the site.
“All those good things are happening and are happening for the public and they will be free,” Vaughan said.
Therme is investing $ 500 million to build its installation and another $ 200 million in the 6.5 hectares of public space around the SPA, depending on the case of businesses that the province will make public.
Although the commercial case claimed that Therme would pay almost $ 2 billion in lease and maintenance payments during a period of 95 years, the auditor said that the figure does not take into account inflation, and estimated that the net income to the province of $ 153 million in current dollars.
“When you look at the park, when you look at the new beach, when you look at the change, in general, I think it is an idea that we have to support in Toronto,” Vaughan said.
As for supporting a project so firmly supported by Ford, one of his most fierce political opponents, Vaughan said that “he has never been afraid to disagree with him.”
“But when he is right, he is right.”
