Bowman urges Winnipeg's next mayor, council to keep pushing for accountability on police HQ

With five months left in office, Winnipeg Mayor Brian Bowman wasn't able to lay out a long-term vision for the future in his final state of the city speech.

Yet the outgoing mayor did manage to make one pledge in his last address to the Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday: he won't stop pursuing the people and companies responsible the city's police headquarters project.

"We need to ensure that everyone that should be held accountable is held accountable," Bowman said of the $214-million project that has already spawned two external audits, a five-year RCMP investigation and a city civil lawsuit against dozens of people and companies involved in the construction of the downtown HQ.

"Our residents' confidence and trust in government is at stake. It's why I will spend every remaining day in office defending taxpayers and demanding accountability," Bowman said during his state of the city address, in front of about 900 people at RBC Convention Centre.

"It's why the next mayor and council absolutely must see this through."

Bowman, who is not running in October's civic election, urged Winnipeg's future mayor and council to persist with an ongoing lawsuit.

Former Winnipeg chief administrative officer Phil Sheegl is appealing a Court of Queen's Bench ruling that he took a $327,200 bribe from police HQ contractor Armik Babakhanians and must pay the city $1.1 million.

The city is also suing Babakhanians and dozens of other defendants in a second component of the lawsuit.

Bowman said the city may yet add more names to that lawsuit, adding that could include former members of the public service or former members of city council.

"I can't look you in the eye and tell you that everybody that should be held accountable is being held accountable," he said in a scrum after his speech.

"Until a mayor and members of council can look you in the eye and provide you with that assurance, they need to see it through."

Bowman also used his speech to urge the next mayor and council to work on improving public transit or risk experiencing traffic gridlock.

But the bulk of Bowman's speech involved a retrospective of the city's accomplishments since he was first elected as mayor in 2014.

He spoke proudly of working with Shoal Lake 40 First Nation to build Freedom Road and hammering out a service agreement with seven Treaty One First Nations who are developing Naawi-Oodena, the former Kapyong Barracks site in Tuxedo.

The mayor also continued to herald Winnipeg's population growth and claimed, as he did in past years, the city could reach one million people.

The city's population effectively flatlined last year, as the pandemic severely curtailed immigration to Canada.

In his scrum with reporters, Bowman shrugged off some of the promises he was unable to keep as mayor, which included building six rapid transit corridors by 2030 and reopening Portage and Main to pedestrians.

Bowman said the city's pursuit of high-frequency transit routes will be more efficient than dedicated bus corridors and suggested a 2018 plebiscite on Portage and Main may have turned out differently if Winnipeggers knew more about the maintenance costs facing the intersection.

Bowman did not say what he intends to do after he leaves office.

Winnipeg elects its next mayor on Oct. 26.