Councillors hope for last-minute reprieve for Kelvin rec centre
Last Updated: Tuesday, January 22, 2008 | 3:29 PM CT
CBC News
Two Winnipeg city councillors are hoping eleventh-hour efforts at Wednesday's council meeting will stave off the planned destruction of the Kelvin Community Centre.
Elmwood Coun. Lillian Thomas and St. Boniface Coun. Dan Vandal will make a motion Wednesday requesting that two groups who want to take over the closed club be allowed to speak.
Recently, a city committee voted to demolish the centre, located at 281 Henderson Highway in the Elmwood neighbourhood.
But Thomas says the East End Aboriginal Resource Centre wants to run programming out of the building, and the Manitoba Métis Federation wants to fund it.
Thomas hopes it will be enough to change councillors' minds.
"Now, with the money situation and the board situation and the programming situation being taken care of, I can't see any logical reason why they would want to do this," she said.
The $100,000 offered by the Métis federation is more than double the amount the city spent to fund the centre.
"We're pretty confident because it's a pretty unique situation, what we're offering," said federation vice-president Ron Chartrand. "We're coming across with some monetary value and also some support towards this project."
The federation wants the city to give it the opportunity to operate the building for two years.
Winnipeg city council voted to close Kelvin Community Centre in January 2007, despite protests of angry neighbourhood residents who crowded council chambers and hallways outside in a last-ditch fight to keep it open.
A city committee concluded last year that the 58-year-old centre was in poor condition, uneconomical to maintain, required significant repairs and was in a state that made the cost to maintain or replace it prohibitive.
Instead, the city wants to spend $3.9 million to expand the Bronx Community Club a few kilometres away.
If the city's plan goes ahead, the former community centre building, splash pad and playground site would be demolished, according to committee documents. The majority of the site would remain as a recreation area, and the field house and garage would remain.
