City giving final salute to Chief

Mayor Vic Fedeli says North Bay will be saving itself money by selling the Chief Commanda II to the company that’s operating it now, even though the city will pay $78,000 a year for the next five years as part of the deal.

Council approved the development of an agreement Monday night that would see ownership of the vessel transferred the Georgian Bay Cruise Company Incorporated.

The agreement would also include a lease arrangement for the Callander dry docking area the Chief Commanda II now uses.

Lost over $500,000
GBCC took over operations of the catamaran from the city in 2002, and was being paid $75,000 a year to run it over the course of the three-year agreement.

The Chief Commanda II has lost over $500,000 since North Bay acquired it for $1 from the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission in 1998 and is expected to lose another $132,600 this year, states a report by Jerry Knox, the managing director of community services for North Bay.

Fedeli said the costs to operate the Chief Commanda II are "massive and escalating."

"It needs a lot of work, so what we opted to do was sell the Chief to this group, lease them the dock space in Callander that we own, that type of thing,” Fedeli said, following Monday night’s meeting.

Don't create any wealth
The mayor called the pending sale “a great opportunity,” saying all tourism “opportunities” are city-owned.

“And that’s a terrible thing because you don’t create any wealth in a community like that and it just leads to uncertainty,” Fedeli said.

“The ski hill, the Dionne quintuplets museum, the Chief Commanda II, all those tourist opportunities tourist are government-owned, so it’s great to finally shed some of these things.”

Nothing after that
The city is already paying GBCC to run the Chief Commanda II, Fedeli said, and it also pays for insurance and maintenance costs.

GBCC is recommending two engines in the ship be replaced at a cost of $300,000.

Fedeli said the city is already paying GBCC to run the ship as well as the cost of “extraordinary” repairs, and cost of insurance, which have almost doubled over the past five years.

“With this agreement we’d be paying them $75,000 for five years and nothing after that,” Fedeli said.

The GBCC would pay $1 for the Chief Commanda under the agreement and would also be responsible for insurance coverage and all capital outlays and upgrades to the boat and the Callander dry dock.