The cost of Port Moody's participation in the Trans Mountain Pipeline review process continues to climb with more money added to what Mayor Mike Clay describes as a "black hole" that isn't producing any discernible results.
At Tuesday's meeting, council passed a motion to allocate up to $35,000 in additional funds to continue participating in the National Energy Board (NEB) review of the proposed Trans Mountain expansion.
But estimates on what has been spent to date range from $40,000 to $160,000 in costs and staff time so far, with approximately 70 days worth of staff time used in the latest round of questions alone.
"We're throwing money into a pit to stand in front of a board we think is irrelevant and shouldn't exist," Clay said at Tuesday's meeting.
PoMo applied to participate in the NEB's review process in February 2011 and was granted intervenor status in April 2014. Since then the city has submitted three information requests as well as two notices of motion that point out the inadequacy of Trans Mountain's responses to those queries.
Coun. Diana Dilworth said she wouldn't support additional funding, saying the city had already incurred too high a bill and participating in a federal process "is not an appropriate use of our tax dollars."
But Coun. Rick Glumac said the city's participation in the review process is essential to represent residents' concerns.
"If we don't want to have a voice, then step away," Glumac said. "But if we do want to have a voice and build on the amazing work staff has done in collecting 221 pages of concerns around environmental issues and emergency response, somebody needs to be there to speak to these issues as they relate to Port Moody."
"I do agree the process if very flawed," he said, "but to me that is a separate issue."
In a subsequent vote on adding PoMo's support to a list of municipalities calling on the federal government to put the Trans Mountain proposal on hold until the NEB "addresses the significant deficiencies in its public hearing and review process," Glumac said the board is stacked with oil industry executives and the process is inherently broken.
"Our staff has submitted 221 pages of questions that were not adequately answered," he added. "I hope this process is halted and fixed."
But Clay said it doesn't make sense to spend more money on a process that everyone agrees is flawed.
"This is a colossal waste of taxpayers' money on every side," Clay said, with all levels of government devoting tremendous resources to the NEB process. "We're not even getting to a result, we're just whining at each other about the wording."
Clay and Dilworth voted against the motion to earmark an additional $35,000 for the city's participation in the review; the vote calling for the federal government to put the NEB process on hold passed unanimously.
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