CIC financial report includes official closure of STC

The Saskatchewan Transportation Company is officially no more.

As the Crown Investments Corporation (CIC) released its final report for fiscal 2018-19 on Wednesday, it included final numbers on the closure of the public transportation service.

Part of that process included selling off the company’s last building, a maintenance facility on Ninth Avenue, off of Winnipeg Street, in Regina.

The CIC sold off the building for $4 million, chief financial officer Cindy Ogilvie said during a technical briefing.

That money went to the province’s general revenue fund (GRF) for the fiscal year, along with $2 million in grant money that the CIC no longer has to pay to the now-shuttered Crown corporation, she said.

In total, more than $28 million has gone to the GRF since the province closed the bus company in 2017, CIC Minister Joe Hargrave said during a media conference Wednesday.

At the time of the closure, Hargrave said the company would have needed $85 million over five years in provincial subsidies to stay afloat.

Among the other highlights of the CIC report are: $256 million added to the GRF by way of dividend revenue from the province’s seven Crown corporations; the CIC’s total earnings went up for a fourth straight year, to $540 million, compared to 2014’s low revenue of $162 million; and, SGI Canada had only $12.5 million in dividend revenue, down from a projected $39 million, thanks to an increase in insurance claims, Ogilvie said.