District of Lantzville council has agreed to spend more money on a new fire engine.
Council approved an increase of $8,523 Monday evening, raising the price tag of the Rosenbauer custom pumper/rescue truck from $541,380 to $549,903. A November meeting between the manufacturer and Lantzville fire department officials led to specification changes related to service and safety needs, including increased water tank capacity.
“You do these estimates based on past purchases to some extent and so the fire chief (Tom Whipps) and staff had worked and felt at that time – and the estimate was quite old by the time we went to tender – that that was adequate,” said Lantzville mayor Jack de Jong.
“It seemed that we had underestimated it by a fair amount so we had to bite the bullet on that one,” he said.
According to the district, the $8,523 increase will be reflected in the 2014 financial plan and will come from fire department capital reserves.
The district also avoided spending more money given the current decrease in the value of the Canadian dollar, according to de Jong.
“This truck is being manufactured in the States and so we got our quote in Canadian dollars and since the time that we made the commitment to purchase and put our deposit down, the U.S. dollar has increased almost by eight or nine per cent,” de Jong said. “The timing was just perfect and accidental. Nobody planned that.”
A GST rebate will see the actual price of the fire engine decreasing to $525,354.
reporter@nanaimobulletin.com