More Info on Military Camps for 2010 Security

MOT quarries, Whistler athletes’ village among six sites under DND consideration
David Burke dburke@whistlerquestion.com, February 5, 2009

Whistler – Canadian Forces troops will likely be encamped at six temporary facilities while helping provide security in the Sea to Sky corridor during the 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics, and official with the forces told The Question this week.

Lt. Col. Graham Thornton, Deputy Chief of Staff, Support, Joint Task Force, 2010 Games who is based at CFB Esquimalt, on Tuesday (Feb. 3) said that arrangements aren’t yet final. However, the current plan is to have troops camped along Cypress Bowl Road, at Squamish Airport, on the Canadian Snowmobile Adventures site in the Callaghan Valley, in the Whistler Aggregate quarry behind the Whistler Athletes’ Village, and at two Ministry of Transportation (MOT) gravel quarries at Cal-Cheak and Twin Rivers. The latter is halfway between Whistler and Pemberton.

Asked about the Pemberton Airport, Lt. Col. Thornton said, “There will be a presence in Pemberton, but there will be no temporary accommodation facility.”

Responding to earlier media reports listing prospective sites, Lt. Col. Thornton said no troop presence is now being sought at the B.C. Hydro property near Nesters on which B.C. Transit is building facilities to fuel and maintain hydrogen-fuel-cell buses expected to arrive later this year.

The report, which appeared in the Vancouver-based newspaper 24 hours on Friday (Jan. 30), listed the six sites as Cypress Provincial Park, Squamish Airport, the B.C. Hydro property in Whistler, Callaghan Country Lodge, the Twin Rivers quarry and Pemberton Airport.

The 24 hours story said a total of 1,600 troops would be based at the six sites and listed troop numbers for each. However, Lt. Col. Thornton said, “I certainly wouldn’t be in a position to draw a line on the map and say, ‘That’s how many will be inside that circle and that’s how many will be outside.’ The numbers will change, depending on the circumstances.”

On Tuesday, Defence Construction Canada (DCC) — the contracting and procurement agency for the Department of National Defence (DND) — closed on a request for proposals for “temporary facilities and services” at three potential sites, including the two MOT gravel quarries in the corridor. The third is in Richmond.

The RFP, which states that it comes with “mandatory security requirements,” is for prefabricated, portable buildings, custodial services, accommodation, food catering and laundry services, snow removal, garbage collection and grounds maintenance.

Lt. Col. Thornton said that if they go ahead, those gravel-pit encampments will be what he called “hard-sided (trailer) camps” and that construction would likely begin this fall.

He said officials will know more about the MOT quarry sites later this week, after they see the sort of bids that come in response to the RFP.

He said DND and the B.C. Ministry of Forests and Range have signed a licencing agreement for the Canadian Forces to use B.C. Forestry firefighters’ housing, modified for winter use, for the lion’s share of Canadian Forces housing in the corridor.

DND, in fact, has set up a camp at the Whistler Aggregate quarry behind the Whistler Athletes’ Village and plans to use it to house troops taking part in next week’s Exercise Silver, a pre-Games security exercise being staged by the RCMP-led Vancouver 2010 Integrated Security Unit and also involving Canadian Forces, the Whistler Fire Rescue Service and others, Lt. Col. Thornton said.

“We thought that we could use those camps if they could be adequately winterized,” he said. “We’ve modified them and are using them now, stressing them to see how they work and then (we can) correct anything that goes wrong so that we’re surprised this winter, not next winter.”

Lt. Col. Thornton said the camp at the Canadian Snowmobile Adventures (CSA) site will serve as the primary housing facility for troops providing security for the Olympic facilities in the Callaghan Valley. The Cal-Cheak site, which is 300 or 400 metres from Highway 99, will also include accommodation but will be more of an operational security facility.

“There will be military security at Cal-Cheak, smaller accommodation, more austere, but when they’re off shift, they’ll be living in the slightly more comfortable lodgings (at the CSA site),” he said.

Games-time corridor military camps eyed
David Burke dburke@whistlerquestion.com
February 3, 2009, Whistler Question

A Defence Construction Canada (DCC) request for proposals for
“temporary accommodations facilities and services” at two separate
B.C. Ministry of Transportation quarries near Whistler appears to confirm portions of a media report that plans are in the works to house 1,600 Canadian Forces personnel at six corridor sites during the 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics.

Vancouver-based 24 hours newspaper on Friday (Jan. 30) reported that three such camps — at Squamish Airport, a B.C. Hydro property near Whistler Village and the MOT’s Twin Rivers gravel quarry between Whistler and Pemberton — would house 400 soldiers each.

Three other camps housing 200 soldiers each were anticipated at the Cypress Bowl quarry in West Vancouver, the Ministry of Forests firefighting base at Pemberton Airport and the Callaghan Country wilderness lodge, 24 hours reported.

Brad Sills, one of the owners of Callaghan Country Lodge, on Monday (Feb. 2) confirmed that he had had preliminary discussions last spring with members of the RCMP-led Vancouver 2010 Integrated Security Unit (ISU) about the possibility of Canadian Forces personnel setting up shop there. But he said he had not heard from them since then.

“We had some talk way back, before the summer even, and it was very preliminary about pricing and what not, but I haven’t heard a word (in the past few months),” Sills said, adding that he understood there might be other potential sites in or near the Callaghan Valley.

One potential alternative site might be the MOT’s Cal-Cheak quarry, one of two corridor sites — the other being the Twin Rivers quarry, just south of the Pemberton Stock Car Association race track off Highway 99 — mentioned in the request for proposals obtained this week by The Question.

The third site mentioned in the RFP, which was to close on Tuesday (Feb. 3), was the Department of National Defence’s Sherman Armory in Richmond, near the Richmond speed-skating oval.

The RFP, which states that it comes with “mandatory security requirements,” is for prefabricated, portable buildings, custodial services, accommodation, food catering and laundry services, snow removal, garbage collection and grounds maintenance.

DCC is the federal agency that handles contracting and construction for the Department of National Defence.

Last August, the Vancouver Sun reported that 10 temporary, “austere” camps were being set up to house about 1,800 Canadian Forces personnel from November 2009 to April 2010 at a cost of some $40 million. This
week’s 24 hours article quoted a figure of $43.36 million for the six
camps in the corridor.

The Question’s attempts to reach ISU and DCC officials for comment
were unsuccessful.