WHEREAS the quality of highways road and bridge maintenance services provided by the Ministry of Transportation has a significant impact on the safety of our publicly owned highways; AND WHEREAS the provision of quality highways road and bridge maintenance services not only ensures safe road conditions for those traveling our highways but also ensures that the maximum life span of our highways infrastructure can be realized, and the Ministry of Transportation has introduced a self-regulatory model by contracted services providers to assess compliance with required work standards: THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Ministry of Transportation be called upon to ensure that contracted highways road and bridge maintenance providers fulfill their contractual obligations through enhanced monitoring and audits of work performance of contractors conducted by the Ministry of Transportation; AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Ministry of Transportation provide regular accident reports for the service area, conduct comprehensive contractor performance assessments and report any findings semi-annually to key community stakeholders such as local governments, school boards, emergency services, chambers of commerce and other relevant stakeholders in the service area.
Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure For the 2003-2004 round of maintenance contracts the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure transferred the responsibility for Quality Assurance to the maintenance contracting industry. As part of the contracting process, and movement towards a performance based contracting model, the maintenance contractors were required to deliver a comprehensive Quality Management System that fully demonstrates how they will ensure both Quality control and Quality Assurance functions are to be carried out including how such functions are to be staffed. This will allow contractors more opportunity to show innovation as well as become more effective and efficient in delivering services to the public. The changes noted above however do not mean that maintenance contractors operate independent of government as the Ministry conducts District audits, Regional Assessments, Stakeholder assessments and direct work monitoring activities in its role as owner and contract administrator. There are 117 ministry staff, including area managers, district operations technicians, and district operations managers involved in this process. Ministry staff work with municipalities, regional districts and other stakeholders to obtain important feedback on important transportation issues affecting them including highway maintenance. Specifically this includes a minimum twice annual meetings, one just prior to winter to discuss emergent issues and one post winter to review actual accomplishments. Public concerns regarding highway maintenance should be addressed first with the local highways contractor as they are most able to respond to issues that are raised and in those circumstances do not necessarily result in involvement by Ministry staff, although there may well be follow-up or discussion with staff depending on the issue. The Ministry has posted the highway maintenance specifications on its website as well as its quality plan and comprehensive contractor assessment program. Local Ministry staff are available to meet with municipalities and regional districts to explain our contract monitoring process and to address any local concerns.