Has Richmond Skating Oval become a money pit?

There’s a growing controversy over what was supposed to be a valuable legacy of the 2010 Olympics.

The Richmond Skating Oval is a landmark that you can easily see upon arriving at YVR.

Inside, the long track speed skating ice surface is long gone, replaced with two Olympic size hockey rinks.

The rest of the main floor space is filled with a 23,000-square foot fitness centre, 18 badminton, 13 volleyball and 10 basketball courts.

This could be the biggest gym in the country if not the world, and it’s expensive to operate.

There were funds in place to convert the building into something useful after the Games, but the funds have all but run out. Work is still being done to add new retail space and other costly improvements, including a multi-million dollar museum.

“The downside of the Olympic oval is it has to be so large in order to house a speed skating function that it is practically unusable after the fact,” says Jordan Bateman with Canadian Taxpayers Federation. “Calgary still has theirs in operation. It is a national practice center. Richmond has not been able to convince Team Canada to change the location. So this thing has now been repurposed into smaller ice rinks, basketball courts and other things, but it costs taxpayers money.”

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Since building the Oval at a cost of 155 million dollars, an additional 24.3 million dollars has been spent converting the floor space to what you see today.

That money came from the Olympic Oval conversion budget — money set up by VANOC even before the Games for this very purpose.

But three years after the Games opened, Richmond taxpayers are paying annually just to keep it operating.

The cost of simply running this facility is about double the amount of revenue it generates every year in admission and other fees.

“We knew that this facility would not pay for itself strictly in terms of the money you can raise from memberships and admission fees,” says Richmond city spokesman Ted Townsend. “So like any major recreational facility that is operated by the city, the city contributes three million dollars a year towards the funding.”

Townsend says the money that is provided to the Oval and the other facilities is paid out of the interest income that the fund makes and not out of the principal amount.

The latest audited budget for the Oval shows operating expenses in 2011 came in at 8.64 million dollars, but revenue from admission and memberships came in at just over four million.

So to balance the books the 2010 Games operating trust fund had to kick in 2.74 million, and the city of Richmond had to go to taxpayers for more than 4 million, leaving a surplus of 2.27 million. But that’s after close to 6 million in taxpayer money.

“They are subsidizing this facility more than the admissions are bringing in,” says Bateman. “That is bad news for taxpayers.”

But there’s more to come out of taxpayer pockets.

The city of Richmond has just committed another half a million dollars towards a six-million dollar Olympic museum, and it’s hoped that will generate new revenue.

The good news is that there are hundreds of new condos in development immediately around the oval and that should translate into higher usage.