LETTER – More options should have been considered for arts centre site
(Image: Mel Rothenburger file photo)
This City administration is directing council to get taxpayers to agree to a $275-million City loan with an incomplete financial proposal, along with a lack of respect for general inquiries and public consultation.
It’s a good guess that there was most likely very little input at the Build Kamloops Committee level regarding alternate sites for either the arts centre or multiplex arena.
I agree it makes economic sense that a community arts centre should be built in either the downtown core or Tranquille Market area to generate growth but does it have to be the former ‘Daily News’ site?
like the idea of the former Penny Pinchers property at the corner of Fortune & Tranquille at 7,446 sq.m. The larger Northbridge Hotel property would also have been worth considering, before cut in half.
I would have also investigated purchasing the Kamloops Square site on Seymour as a more usable property (9,928.5 sq.m versus Daily News site 5936.4 sq.m). This property is directly across from city parkade with 195 stalls, this property was identified for future downtown development by the five private consultants hired in 2018 for input into the Downtown Plan.
Since the costs associated with building an arts centre have skyrocketed almost 400 per cent for taxpayers, I think residents should have had more opportunity to explore best options, including blue-sky ideas, to create more support and buy-in from the public.
DENIS WALSH
ArmchairMayor.ca 
It is not only the long-suffered PAC but also all the other stuff plus more of what McCorkell has in mind or will come to his mind…never mind what is actually needed (like alternatives to single vehicle occupancy i.e. safe cycling connectivity throughout the city) versus what’s “wanted”.
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Such a loss for the community to lose a voice of sanity in the echo chamber of council.
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will there never be an end to this. The latest tact from the usual suspects seems to be, we need more time to consider locations etc. Up until recently I had never heard the old Penny pinchers location being put forward as a possible site for the PAC, now, “they” are all over it. Enough already.
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