There was a rush to point fingers Tuesday as city officials in Vancouver searched for answers to the latest financial conundrum facing the Olympic Village.

Soaring costs have jeopardized plans to build 252 units of affordable housing at the site in Southeast False Creek, it was revealed this week.

"It's infuriating to inherit yet another big problem," Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson said.

His Vision Vancouver party has sought to pin the blame on the former ruling party, the NPA, which had oversight of the project for three years.

But the project was started under a previous Vision/COPE government with more ambitious social housing targets in mind. The NPA toned down those goals when it came to office in 2005, but it was responsible for choosing development group Millennium to spearhead the project, which has been besieged by cost overruns in completing the overall project.

"It would be wrong to point to any one decision," said Suzanne Anton, the lone NPA councillor at city hall. "There were a series of decisions made over eight years."

But Anton couldn't help pointing out the city could be in a tougher bind today if it had gone through with Vision's original plans for 1/3 affordable, 1/3 mid-market and 1/3 market housing in the project.

"This shows how hard it is to build social housing," Anton said. "We took out the mid-market piece for mid-income earners. Imagine if two-thirds of this was subsidized. Imagine how hard it would be to build."

But the finger pointing isn't being restricted to just civic leaders. Quietly and otherwise, city councillors are raising questions as to how the project has been managed and why the extra costs appear to have caught them by surprise.

Why were costs like $7.5 million in fees to Millennium, nor $4.85 million in fees to B.C. Housing and others, not factored into the original $65-million budget?

Why was council not given the option to reduce the $5 million it will take to build the project to LEED Gold building standards?

And who approved the use of high-quality exterior materials like Swiss pearl panels, stainless steel and etched glass, on the project so that it would align aesthetically with the market-priced units Millennium is concurrently developing on the rest of the site?

"The numbers are quite startling," said newbie Vision Coun. Andrea Reimer. "It seems completely incomprehensible to me how the costs could double."

There's some question as to when exactly city hall knew the affordable housing aspect of Southeast False Creek was in trouble.

It's clear incumbent councillors had some idea of cost overruns in December 2007. That's when, during an in-camera meeting, the previous council (minus COPE's David Cadman, absent from that get-together) approved up to $95 million in financing from the city's "capital financing fund" to complete the project.

Back then, councillors were apparently under the understanding that much of the funds would be recovered from B.C. Housing, even though there was no specific commitment to do so.

On Tuesday, that expectation turned into a wish.

"There's a hope some money may come from B.C. Housing, but that hasn't happened yet," Ian Smith, the manager of development in the city's Southeast False Creek/Olympic Village office, told council.

Some councillors wondered why the December 2007 decision was made behind closed doors. I'm told no one present at that in-camera meeting objected.

And while the escalating costs of finishing the affordable housing project couldn't have come as a surprise to those city councillors this week, the tens of millions it might take to keep the project affordable did.

The city now faces dishing up to $77 million more to keep future rents for the project subsidized, or scaling back the level of affordable housing.

But given that the affordable housing was a key part of Vancouver's bid book promises that won the city the Olympics, it appears the city is unlikely to go with the latter option.

Robertson on Tuesday suggested the city might consider building out the affordable housing units off-site from the Olympic Village property itself.

"We've got to deliver on affordable housing somewhere in this part of the city," he said.

Irwin Loy writes for 24 hours and appears regularly on the Hook. This story was originally posted on his blog.