TORONTO

The Kathleen Wynne government must think we’re stupid.

As if last Thursday’s latest instalment of “Move the Pan Am Budget Shells” was anything more than a pathetic effort to justify paying out $5.7 million in bonuses to 53 executives with TO2015 — the group that organized the Pan Am sporting spectacle.

We don’t know whether those bonuses have actually been paid out as of yet but they probably have. Jesse Wright, spokesman for Tourism, Culture and Sport Minister Michael Coteau, told me Monday they will “all be paid” by Dec. 31.

When I heard Coteau proudly announce — with a straight face, yet — that the Pan Am Games would come in at just over $2.4 billion, slightly less than forecast in their 2009 bid, and the games were the “most transparent” ever, I had to laugh at his unmitigated gall.

The budget has been such a moving target and the true numbers so jealously guarded, Coteau’s pronouncements make a mockery of the very idea of accountability.

Despite contentions from games chairman David Peterson and Wynne’s ministerial lapdogs to the contrary, taxpayers were always led to believe that the bid was $1.4 billion and that figure included all venues to be built, including the Athlete’s Village.

Wright referred me to page 184 of the 2009 Bid Book in which a tiny, virtually hidden, reference is made at the bottom to the West Don Lands (site of the village) budget of $1 billion.

Yet the Bid Book itself repeatedly reiterates the total games budget as $1.4 billion and no attempts were made by the organizers to correct that impression until the beginning of October 2013, right after my revelations about the expense abuses of the Pan Am brass. Organizers were blasted at the time for hiding the $709 million it would take to build the Athlete’s Village.

That’s not all.

Let’s not forget that Coteau gave the games organizers a $74-million bailout on Sept. 23, 2014 or the fact that sometime this year, the province pulled both the security and transportation costs out of the Pan Am organizing budget and funded it out of their own ministries — the cost of both totalling $174 million in the original bid.

That doesn’t include the costs I’m betting they plunked wherever they could in a variety of provincial ministries and the hundreds of provincial bureaucrats seconded to work on the games — something I suspect we will never know more about unless Ontario auditor general Bonnie Lysyk undertakes a full audit of Pan Am expenditures.

Unfortunately, that will be done long after the bonuses are paid and the games gypsies — those who move from one world event to another — are off to collect six-figure salaries at the Rio Summer Olympics or the 2018 Winter Games in PyeongChang.

Paul Henderson, a Canadian Olympian and retired IOC member, said there’s no question Coteau’s “spin” was carried out to justify paying out the bonuses.

“I have always said the total (cost) is $4 billion,” he said. “(It’s) not the smoke and mirrors to pay the retention bonuses.”

THE PAN AM SHELL GAME

• From 2009 Bid Book:

Pan Am Games budget: $1.4 billion.

That included $707 million for new facilities, retrofits and legacy projects.

West Don Lands site separate line item at $1 billion.

• October 2013: Then-tourism and sport minister Michael Chan reveals the $1.4-billion budget for TO2015 doesn’t include the $709-million cost of the Athlete’s Village or $10 million to fund the province’s Pan Am Secretariat.

• March 2014: Security budget climbs to $239 million from the original $113 million.

• September 2014: New Tourism and Sport Minister Michael Coteau gives TO2015 a $74-million bailout.

• November 2014: Provincial auditor general Bonnie Lysyk confirms the transportation budget is $61 million.

• Early 2015: The province takes over costs of security and transportation, removing $174 million from the games budget.

• November 2015: Coteau claims T02015 saved $54 million on security, $23 million on transportation, and $20 million on the $74-million bailout.

• By December 31: $5.7 million in bonuses to be paid out to 53 executives for a job well done, including $428,000 to CEO Saad Rafi.

sue-ann.levy@sunmedia.ca