In April of 2016, ground was broken for a 4.6 million dollar youth facility in the Lake I Community.
The pitch was that the facility - which is right off the new, sinking Lake I Boulevard - and at the border of Gungulung would provide a safe space for youths to engage in sports, arts and culture, literacy and life skills programs.
It was a glowing beacon of promise - that was to be finished by September of 2016! Well, we're lucky if it is finished for September 2018! And that's because the contractor, Wood Brick and Stone Company seems to have chronic liquidity problems. It can't pay suppliers and can't even pay its 25 workers.
Today when we costed none of those workers were there - they are on strike until they get paid which was supposed to be today - and has now been pushed until tomorrow. The only workers were found there were contract workers doing some tiles.
We spoke with the site supervisor - who admitted liquidity has been a chronic problem:..
Reporter
"We came here today because we heard that workers weren't being paid and that work has stopped."
Supervisor
"That's not true. Being the site supervisor here, that's not true. We haven't been paid since Friday. Usually our payments are late but when we get paid we get paid on full. So that's just a nasty rumor."
Reporter
"Wood, Brick and Stone, the contractor I'm told sometimes has a little bit of a liquidity problem."
Supervisor
"They are a bit strap for cash as I can see working for them. The way our payment is structured, we do get paid. But the turnaround date is set in the contract for 28 days and we've try to explain this to the guys that work with us and apparently some of them can't handle the turnaround days, so unfortunately some guys left, most of us are still here."
Reporter
"If you are not paying me to time, every time I put down the grouting, maybe I put it a little sloppy, because this guy hasn't paid me today. You know what I am saying."
Supervisor
"That's my job here. I have a personal relationship with all the guys that we hire here, because I personally bring some of them on site, so when they slack off like that, I would give them a pep talk and encourage them that we will be paid. It's just not on time."
Of course, as you might be able to guess, there's more than a little politics being played here - as we understand one very famous UDP contractor is the moving hand in this construction venture - or misadventure - and that explains the delays and the liquidity problems.
We'll keep following the story…
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