As for the City of Victoria, in what capacity was City Hall involved? I'm not sure I understand why the City of Victoria would be working to attract West if the direct beneficiary of the operation would be a municipality three municipalities removed from the City of Victoria.
I think that the belief was that 1,500 people generating an income would benefit the entire region and help to reduce some of the social problems we have in Victoria.
In fairness to West, there are not too many locations in Victoria or Saanich that could support the size of the workforce they were trying to achieve. Central Saanich is at most a 15 - 20 minute drive from most areas of town and is against traffic at most times. It is serviced by public transport but not as much as downtown Victoria obviously.
From what I have been told, the primary problem at West was work ethic and employee turnover. There were enough employees to fill all of the seats but the average seat was turning over twice a year.