Waterfront Toronto followed the rules when it decided to increase its budget for the redevelopment of Queens Quay by $35 million, according to the organization’s board chair.

The group was legally entitled to hide the spending increase from the public for 10 months, said Mark Wilson, pointing to the provincial law from 2002 that founded the Waterfront Toronto corporation.

“We’re not city council, so we don’t operate with the rules of procedure of city council,” he told the Star on Thursday.

“Our concern first and foremost was to ensure that the public money was well spent.”

The organization, which was created through a three-way partnership between the city, province and federal government, revealed Thursday that it held a vote in secret last February to increase its estimated budget for the Queens Quay revitalization project to $128.9 million from $93.2 million. Waterfront Toronto said unforeseen obstacles and construction challenges forced them to renegotiate payments with construction contractors.

Wilson told the Star that revealing the budget increase would have “jeopardized” those talks, potentially making the hike in spending even steeper.

The legislation that governs Waterfront Toronto was passed by Queen’s Park in 2002. That law stipulates that the City of Toronto Act is the authority when it comes to closed meetings by the Waterfront Toronto board, pending “necessary modifications.”

Municipal lawyer George Rust-D’Eye, who is not involved in the Waterfront Toronto situation, said that act says “all meetings” should be open to the public, but there are exceptions.

When told of Waterfront Toronto’s rationale for keeping the budget vote hidden from the public, Rust-D’Eye said that could fit under some exemptions.

“Anything that would involve confidential commercial activities,” said Rust-D’Eye, “that’s the kind of thing that could fall under ‘necessary modifications.’”

Waterfront Toronto, as its own corporation, also has a bylaw dealing with closed-door meetings. According to its own rules, closed meetings are allowed when the board is ruling on something that pertains to the “security of the property” of the organization.

Spokesperson Andrew Hilton said that in the eyes of the organization’s lawyers, this includes the money spent by Waterfront Toronto. In other words, the secret budget vote was to protect the organization from having to spend too much money on its renegotiated construction contracts, he said.

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