MTO jobs lost with outsourcing

News — 10 January 2012

By Ally Dunham

With Ministry of Transportation (MTO) services changing in the Dryden region this upcoming June, the area will see job loss but the same level of service according to the Ministry.

Currently, highway maintenance is managed by a Managed Outsource Contract, and will be transitioning to an Area Maintenance Contract. What this means is that there are currently multiple MTO employees monitoring road conditions, deploying plow trucks, who are private contractors, and managing the winter operations.

Following June 2012, the entire region will be switched over to a private contract.

“Work is directed into small contracts and the Ministry directs maintenance activities. The new contract starts in June and that is an Area Maintenance Contract (AMC). You will have one contractor responsible for scheduling and carrying out maintenance work for the highway system within the area of the contract. That includes summer and is a year round road maintenance contract,” said David Salter, MTO Toronto.

Salter says the AMC will preserve the jobs of the Maintenance Superintendent and Maintenance Coordinators, but the Patrol Maintenance Technician position will not be required. As for the future of the current plow contractors, that will be up to the successor of the new AMC, Transfield Services. There will be approximately 25 positions lost in the Dryden and Kenora area.

“There is a strong understanding that highway maintenance is very important in the north, and keeping roads safe has to be top priority. In terms of standards, standards have not changed,” said Salter. “We’re constantly monitoring the state of the roads, and enforcing those standards with contractors through a number of different methods including a very high penalty.”

“One way we ensure that standards are met, is every maintenance vehicle that a contractor has is equipped with an Automatic Vehicle Locator system (AVL) which includes GPS and some other data we are able to gather. So, with AVL, we are able to track where every maintenance vehicle is and what it’s doing,” said Salter. “One of our standards are, maintenance vehicles have to be employed within 30 minutes of a winter event. If vehicles aren’t deployed within 30 minutes, there are penalties that kick in right away. Then for every 15 minutes afterwards.”

Salter reports that for a single vehicle that is supposed to be out, the fine is up to $5,000 following the first 30 minutes, and $1,000 for every 15 minutes following.

Nipissing MPP Vic Fedeli has recently demanded a coroners inquest into a series of fatal highway collisions in Northern Ontario that has claimed 10 lives in a span of just more than a week in late December 2011 and early this month.

“I’ve relayed to the Ministry my personal disappointment and just how large the volume of complaints is that we’ve been receiving in my office on this issue,” said Fedeli.

“There’s one common theme in all of those comments – that the work to clear area highways of ice and snow hasn’t been good enough, and not as good as it has been in the past or in other areas of the province.”

Fedeli says Transfield Services assumed the maintenance responsibilities in the North Bay area on April 29, 2010 and reports the Ministry says it’s currently conducting an investigation into whether Transfield has failed to meet certain terms of its contract in recent weeks.

“How the contract works is that we set the standard, and then we measure the performance of the contractor based on the results that they achieve. It’s up to them to deploy their vehicles and deal with the storm,” said Salter. “Some of the standards during a storm, they (contractors) are required to continuously check the road, check weather and traffic, continuously plow snow from through lanes, and then from shoulders, truck-climbing lanes, passing lanes and intersections, apply sand or salt as required and assist the OPP with emergencies and road closures.”

Salter said that although the contractor has 30 minutes to deploy their vehicles, they also have a two centimeter maximum of snow or slush accumulation on the roads set as an additional standard.

Members of the public are welcome to contact the Service Ontario Transportation Info Line at 1-800-268-4686 or email mtoinfo@ontario.ca.

Sidebar:

Highway 17 – Class 2 Hwy

Highway 665 – Class 3 Hwy

Highway 594 – Class 3 and Class 5 Hwy

Highway 601 – Class 4 and Class 5 Hwy

Highway 502 – Class 5 Hwy

Class 2 – Bare pavement within 16 hours after the end of a winter event.

Class 3 – Bare pavement within 24 hours after the end of a winter event.

Class 4 – Centre bare pavement within 24 hours after the end of a winter event.

Class 5 – Excess snow is plowed and sand applied for friction control.

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