No longer tied to a confidentiality agreement with the province, Rank Inc. boss Joe Ramia talks about his ambitious development dream
By CHRIS LAMBIE Business Editor | EXCLUSIVE
Wed, Nov 3 - 4:53 AM / Chronicle Herald
JOE RAMIA says it wasn’t his idea to lease taxpayers a convention centre proposed for downtown Halifax.
The head of Rank Inc. said Tuesday that the province has released him from a confidentiality agreement, allowing him to publicly discuss the $159-million facility. Ramia has come under withering fire in recent weeks from critics who are livid the public won’t own the convention centre once the 25-year lease runs out.
"We put many options on the table to the government. They’re the one, if you look at (the province’s request for proposals), they specifically asked for this to be a lease," Ramia told The Chronicle Herald’s editorial board.
If the province and the city, which also has its name on the request for proposals, want to own the convention centre, Ramia said that would work for him.
"It’s their choice. They can tell us what they’d like."
The federal government will be asked to pay about $47 million toward the convention centre in a lump sum when the project would be mostly finished, likely in 2014. Officials said at a briefing last month that the province and Halifax Regional Municipality would cover the rest of the cost in a 25-year capital lease. The annual lease payment would be $10.2 million, plus another $2.9 million in annual maintenance and upgrading costs.
There are also two five-year options to extend the lease.
Ramia said he is looking at the idea of creating a bond to finance the convention centre.
"They might say, ‘We want to put up the bond,’ " Ramia said of the province and the city.
"We’re open to any options that they come up with that make sense for them."
Rank hasn’t calculated what all three levels of government would have to pay to own the facility outright.
"If they ask us for this, we’ll have to work out those numbers," Ramia said. "They haven’t asked us for it."
The convention centre is part of a bigger project that includes an office tower, residential space and a hotel on the former Halifax Herald Ltd. property. The total price tag is close to $500 million.
The convention centre’s design has faced criticism from local architects who panned it as an underground bunker.
Noel Fowler, Ramia’s architect on the project, said putting the convention centre underground was the best way to go.
"They work better without windows," Fowler said.
The alternative would be "brutal" 21-metre-high blank walls at street level, he said.
"It’s not acceptable to create the super block," Fowler said.
Putting the convention centre underground leaves the street level open to retail, restaurants and bars, he said.
"None of that would have been possible if you tried to put this above grade," Fowler said.
Critics have also compared the overall project to a 1980s-style office complex that speaks nothing of Nova Scotia.
But Ramia unveiled new images Tuesday that show much more modern design options, including foil-shaped curves reminiscent of sails and a tower that looks like a lighthouse at night.
"We have to do a public consultation," the developer said, noting that can happen next year while excavation is underway.
The project’s highlight, he said, would be the 14-storey financial centre planned for the complex’s northwest corner.
Two thousand people will work in that building alone, said Ramia, who noted that he is talking to four Fortune 500 companies interested in leasing space in the structure.
"Financial people — and that’s who we’re really selling to, is only financial people in New York and London — they love their people to be all together in one building," Ramia said.
"We could be filled before we go in the ground."
One company alone wants 80,000 square feet of office space, he said.
As many as 7,000 people will work in the entire complex, said Ramia, noting that 1,700 people will be employed in its construction.
"If you look at Purdy’s (Wharf) I, Purdy’s II (and) Cogswell Tower, that’s what you see coming out of the ground and finished all at the same time. That’s the impact that this building and this project will have on Halifax."
Financial services companies are interested in setting up shop in Halifax because it is a "welcoming city" with a well-educated workforce, he said. Those companies like the low cost of doing business here, good flight connections to Europe and the United States, Canada’s stable banking regulations, and a time zone that puts us four hours behind London and one hour ahead of New York, Ramia said.
Osama bin Laden and the recent recession have also apparently given Halifax a leg up by forcing companies to look for safe venues to set up shop.
The climate of fear after 9-11 "has helped us, no question, and the financial crisis has helped us," Ramia said.
"It’s unbelievable, but it has helped us."
The heart of the complex will be a glass-covered galleria that could include a skating rink, he said.
"In here, there will be retail, there will be food and beverage, there will be entertainment, and it’s a public space."
Ramia is also looking at the idea of teaming up with NSCAD University to stage an international design competition to produce art for the open area.
The developer is suggesting that a section of Grafton Street be closed to vehicles but open to pedestrians.
"But that’s the city’s decision," Ramia said.
An underground tunnel down Grafton will connect the convention centre to the Metro Centre.
Ramia is talking to a Washington-based, 4½-star hotel chain that is interested in occupying the project’s proposed 18-storey hotel.
"This is much bigger than a convention centre," Ramia said of the entire project, dubbed the Nova Centre.
It is slated to occupy two city blocks and be completed by 2015.
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