In a closed-door meeting, city administration has given an undisclosed sum of public money to Peak Fitness to buy the private company's sports equipment at the Canada Games Centre.

At their weekly meeting Monday evening, members of city council briefly discussed a deal reached between city hall and Peak Fitness.

It will see the city use money earmarked for a city project to buy Peak's gym equipment and full control of the multiplex's wellness centre (weight room).

Details of the discussions between Peak and council and the amount of money changing hands have not been made public.

The deal reached between city administration and Peak, according to council documents, was discussed by council last Friday at a meeting closed to the public.

The funds being used to buy Peak's equipment, according to council documents, is coming out of money that was to be allocated for the construction of a staircase between the Games centre and the Mt. McIntyre Recreation Centre.

In a 2005 agreement, the city agreed to lease equipment from Peak for the fitness area of the Canada Games Centre.

Peak was to receive five per cent of the revenues from monthly memberships sold at the Games centre until the centre's membership exceeded 1,900 monthly passes.

It was to receive seven per cent of revenues until the total number of monthly passes exceeded 2,000, at which point the fitness company would earn 10 per cent of monthly membership revenues, according to the 2005 agreement.

Parks officials could not be reached to confirm the average number of monthly passes being sold.

When council officially accepted the deal Monday evening, Coun. Doug Graham said he did not agree with using money from the staircase budget.

When asked for details of the negotiations and the amount of city money being used in the deal, members of senior city management said the information has to remain confidential in accordance with the Municipal Act.

According to section 213 of the Municipal Act, which relates to public and private meetings, there are some occasions where meetings can be held in camera.

Council and council committee meetings must be held in public unless council decides to discuss a matter as a committee or the matter relates to:

• commercial information which, if disclosed, would likely be prejudicial to the municipality or the parties involved;

• information received in confidence which, if disclosed, would likely be prejudicial to the municipality or parties involved;

• personal information, including personnel information;

• the salary and benefits and any performance appraisal of any employee or officer;

• a matter still under consideration and on which the council has not yet publicly announced a decision and about which discussion in public would likely prejudice a municipality's ability to carry out its activities or negotiations;

• the conduct of existing or anticipated legal proceedings;

• the conduct of an investigation under, or enforcement of, an Act or bylaw;

• information, the disclosure of which could prejudice security and the maintenance of law; or

• the security of documents or premises.

In an interview this morning, Mayor Ernie Bourassa said while he agreed with the negotiations remaining private, he didn't feel the amount of public money being spent as a result of those negotiations should remain so.

'I don't agree that the amount should be kept secret. For me, it's all part of public spending,' the mayor said. 'I think full disclosure is necessary.

'Our staff is getting a legal opinion,' Bourassa said.

If the city's legal team determined the amount being given to Peak should be public, the city would release that information, he said.

The staircase, Bourassa added, was on hold in line with a council decision made in July.

The issues were with regards to disabled people, the mayor said, adding that a staircase was thought to be prohibitive to citizens with mobility issues.

Ideas to improve access included a ramp and an elevator, neither of which would have worked for the project, he added.

'A ramp was impractical and an elevator was prohibitively expensive,' he said.

'The decision was made that there wouldn't be a staircase at all.'

Contacted this morning, Peak owner Lee Randell said he did not want to discuss the matter but had issued a media release to explain his position.

Randell's media release did not specify how much money he was receiving for his exercise equipment.

'We appreciated the opportunity to be involved in the first year of operations at the Canada Games Centre, but we feel that it is important for the city to take over all aspects of the fitness services at the facility,' Randell said in the release.

'While both parties worked hard to ensure the success of the project, the focus that one organization can provide should improve the day-to-day operations for the end user.'

The release also states the agreement reached between the city and Peak related to sports equipment and operations of the Games centre's wellness centre.

'Under the agreement, the city will purchase all equipment currently in the wellness centre and will be responsible for fitness programming.'

The previous agreement, which also included a discount for Peak Fitness members at the Games centre, will end Friday.

However, the city will honour Peak Fitness member discounts for the remainder of the month, the release states.