MP for Prince Albert Randy Hoback wants answers from the federal minister of infrastructure. (File photo/paNOW Staff) 

By Glenn Hicks

funding spat

MP wants explanation on P.A. arena funding rejection

Aug 19, 2019 | 8:00 AM

Local MP Conservative Randy Hoback, has written to the Minister of Infrastructure in Ottawa following the rejection of an application for federal funding for a proposed multi-plex sports centre in Prince Albert. The rejection resulted in a clamour of criticism from various quarters last week.

Hoback has accompanied his request for clarification and reconsideration from the minister with information he suggests shows the Liberal government has been playing favourites with the funding. Political rhetoric regarding the matter has been sharpened given a general election is only a few months away.

In his letter to François-Philippe Champagne, Hoback asks the minister revisit the application by Prince Albert and “apply the same criteria as you applied to the successful projects in government-held ridings.”

“I’m going to give him the chance to do the right thing and come back and re-look at the application and either approve it or not, based on facts and a real reason,” Hoback told paNOW.

He said the reason given by Champagne’s office for turning down the application – that the P.A. Raiders were a semi-pro franchise – is incorrect, and he expected a response to his request.

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“He is the minister and he has to be accountable for the decisions his department makes, and I do expect a response, one way or the other.”

Attached to Hoback’s correspondence is a list of what he said were similar projects that were approved for funding in government-held ridings. He also joined Premier Scott Moe in criticism aimed at the federal governing party’s MP in the provincial capital, and the funding that was approved for big projects there. Moe said last week federal infrastructure dollars for Saskatchewan should not be Ralph Goodale’s “re-election fund.”

“The reality is I don’t think it mattered how well we wrote the proposal for Prince Albert, Ralph Goodale …wanted those two swimming pools in Regina and he got them at the expense of Prince Albert,” Hoback said.

In response, Goodale said the money for the pools was to help Regina better serve low-income inner city children, and he countered the suggestions of Liberal favouritism by pointing out the majority of the project funding requests made by the province was in Sask. Party held ridings.

The political spat aside, Hoback did concede the federal department’s description of the P.A. Raiders as a semi-pro franchise may just have been a mistake.

“You know, that’s what I’m hoping, that’s really what I’d like to see is, ‘Oh we made a mistake, we’re sorry, here is the funding.’ I can live with that, I can accept that,” he said.

Editor’s note: the hyperlinked line in the opening paragraph has been amended. The original version of this story had an incorrect hyperlink.

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glenn.hicks@jpbg.ca

On Twitter:@princealbertnow