INDUSTRY CONNECTIONS
CFB Shilo Part of the Local
Construction Economy
By Lori Truscott, Public Affairs, Canadian Forces Base (CFB) Shilo
For over 100 years there has been
a military presence in southwestern
Manitoba. CFB Shilo has had
a few names over the decades:
Camp Sewell, Camp Hughes, Camp Shilo
and CFB Shilo. While the name may have
changed, the purpose has not. It still strives
to be a place that enables military training,
operations and force generation.
Camp Sewell started as a government
work relief camp during the Great
Depression. By 1934, the infrastructure at
Camp Hughes was gone and in 1945 Camp
Shilo had been established as a permanent
military camp and the Royal Canadian
Artillery moved in. However, a large
military training facility does not operate
without support and a positive relationship
with its neighbours.
Over the last three years alone, over
$22.6 million dollars has been injected
into the local construction economy by
CFB Shilo. The projects ranged in size
and scope from new buildings to house
new armoured vehicles to roof repairs and
replacing boiler systems in existing buildings.
Work has also been done on more
typical ‘army stuff’ such as improvements
to weapons training ranges.
“We value the work local contractors
do for us,” said Base Commander,
Lieutenant-Colonel Jeff Lyttle. “We don’t
have the expertise to do most of this work
ourselves. We rely on the skills that our
civilian contractors bring to these jobs.”
For example, boiler systems in two
major buildings on the Base required over
$1.2 million worth of replacements. Several
other buildings needed new roofs resulting
in over $4.5 million in work.
The post-war boom saw the face of
Shilo change significantly from its pre-war
configuration. Construction of housing
for military families began in 1949. Nearly
all of those houses are still in use today.
The Canadian Forces Housing Agency
contracts work annually to renovate the
housing stock held on the Base. There are
yearly investments in both partial and complete
renovations of houses at Shilo, work
that is done primarily by local construction
firms. The aforementioned dollar value
for construction work does not include
this spending.
“At any given time, we have people here
working on a project of some type. Repairs,
renovations, new builds … all sorts of
work. Work done in both our operational
and residential areas.” said Lt.-Col. Lyttle.
Supporting local business makes
good business sense for CFB Shilo and it
always has.
Back in 1946, the Camp Commanding
Officer, weighing the odds of making Shilo
a permanent camp, noted that hiring civilians
was considered essential at the time as
it was “beyond the capacity of the Army to
operate” those facilities.
At the time, the concern was primarily
with hiring employees, but construction
work was in heavy demand during that
post-war boom. While the current
construction boom is certainly not as pronounced
as it was at that time, it is still
obvious that local firms and their workers
are important to the work needing to be
done today.
Even though the work needs to be done,
sometimes smaller local firms find it challenging
to work through the sometimes
onerous processes involved.
“Ninety-five per cent of our construction
contracts are competitively tendered
and we are aware the paperwork can be
daunting,” said Lt.-Col. Lyttle. “We can
work with potential bidders to unravel and
explain the process so they have an opportunity
to do some work for us.”
Local contractors interested in doing
business with CFB Shilo can visit the following
websites:
• www.buyandsell.gc.ca/
procurement-data/tenders
• www.dcc-cdc.gc.ca/english/
contractors_consultants
Or they can call the CFB Shilo office
of Defence Construction Canada at
204-765-3000, ext. 4879. n
PHOTO COURTESY O F CFB SHILO
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