Council to cover half of hall repair costs
Clearview Council agreed Monday night to contribute half the cost of bringing six of its community halls up to code, as long as the total cost doesn’t exceed $220,000. A decision on making all of the halls accessible, which the province is pushing for by 2025 and would cost upwards of $1 million, has been deferred until the Township completes its capital asset management plan later this year or early in 2014.
The future of the halls in Dunedin, Avening, Duntroon, Nottawa, Sunnidale Corners and Brentwood has been uncertain since an engineering report commissioned by Council last fall found varying degrees of structural deficiencies in the buildings, as well as the big potential price tag if they are to be made accessible. While the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act doesn’t make compliance mandatory by 2025, it’s the provincial government’s plan to update the Building Code to apply accessibility standards to all public and private sector organizations constructing new buildings or renovating existing ones.
The engineering report also recommended that the halls undergo fire and electrical safety inspections immediately to determine the scope of work that needs to be done. The results of those inspections were presented to Council Monday night. The “elephant in the room,” as Mayor Ken Ferguson called it, was addressed right off the start, with correspondence from Township Chief Building Official Scott McLeod stating that any work on the halls to fix the fire, electrical and structural deficiencies would not constitute a “substantial renovation under the Building Code,” and could therefore be done without any obligation to comply with the AODA, should the accessibility standards come into effect in the near future.
About 60 members of the public were in attendance at Monday’s meeting, including members of all six hall boards. They sat grimly as Township Transportation and Recreation Manager Steve Sage went over the fire and electrical reports for each hall and estimated the cost of correcting all of the listed problems, as well as fixing the pressing structural problems laid out in the engineering report.
The estimates were as follows: $73,000 for the Avening Community Centre ($48,500 to meet the fire code, $2,500 to meet the electrical safety code and $22,000 to fix structural deficiencies); $25,500 for the Brentwood Community Hall ($7,500 to meet the fire code and $18,000 to fix structural deficiencies); $25,500 for the Dunedin Community Hall ($17,500 to meet the fire code and $8,000 to fix structural deficiencies); $50,000 for the Nottawa Memorial Community Hall ($33,000 to meet the fire code and $17,000 to fix structural deficiencies), $37,500 for the Nottawasaga (Duntroon) Community Hall ($28,500 to meet the fire code, $2,000 to meet the electrical safety code and $7,000 to fix structural deficiencies); and $4,500 for the Sunnidale Corners Community Hall ($4,500 to meet the fire code).
The estimated grand total for short-term repairs, therefore, was $216,000. To be made accessible, another $1,011,000 would be needed ($298,000 for Avening, $60,500 for Brentwood, $135,500 for Dunedin, $200,000 for Nottawa, $187,500 for Nottawasaga and $129,500 for Sunnidale Corners).
Council heard several impassioned arguments in favour of community halls from members of the audience, most notably from Bill Hewitt of the Avening Hall Board and Marc Den Bok of the Nottawa Hall Board, each of whom spoke of their respective hall’s long history in the community, noted the importance of continuing to have meeting places like these in each of Clearview’s rural settlement areas and talked about the potential for raising the halls’ profiles – and therefore revenue – in the greater community.
Discussion among Council then centred on the long-term feasibility of the buildings, with two members of Council, Councillor Shawn Davidson and Deputy Mayor Alicia Savage, asking some tough questions about how the halls fit into the Township’s slate of priorities.
“We are blessed with a lot of meeting space in this municipality,” said Davidson, noting that in addition to the six halls in question, Clearview boasts the Station on the Green, several church halls, three Legions and two arena halls. Councillor Brent Preston, however, responded that many of the events that take place in community halls won’t migrate elsewhere if those facilities cease to exist. “It will alter the fabric of our entire community if those halls are closed,” he said.
Davidson also questioned whether the buildings themselves, regardless of their community function, are worth putting large sums of money into, particularly given the potential for an even greater price tag in the not-so-distant future. And while the accessibility requirement has no teeth at the moment, Savage noted that in most cases, provincial initiatives eventually do come to fruition.
Davidson’s final concern was one of logistics – if the short-term work needs to be done immediately to avoid the halls being shut down for fire and electrical infractions, that means the Township will have to front-end the total cost of repairs. That would leave the hall boards attempting to raise 50 per cent of the money in a situation where the work is already done. Davidson suggested it might be more difficult to encourage people to donate money given those circumstances.
The hall board representatives, however, disagreed, with Hewitt promising that Avening, who he noted was not in the habit of coming to Council “cap in hand,” would come through with the money, and Sage noting that the hall boards have a long track record of coming through on their commitments.
With that, Davidson made a motion, seconded by Councillor Deb Bronee, to have Council commit to half the cost of the short-term repairs and have the hall boards raise the rest. He included a clause, however, which generated some controversy. Rounding up the total estimated cost from $216,000 to $220,000, Davidson’s motion put a cap of $110,000 on the Township’s contribution. Sage questioned whether this was necessary, noting that both the Township’s engineering firm and he himself had had a good look at the numbers and, if anything, had estimated conservatively, but he deferred to Council on the matter.
That left Councillor Thom Paterson as the main objector to the notion of a cap, stating his opinion that the hall boards had come to the meeting prepared to raise whatever it takes to save their buildings, and that Council should meet them in the same spirit and be willing to offer the same. When Davidson characterized that as “writing a blank cheque” and questioned how fiscally responsible such a move would be, Paterson responded that the fiscal responsibility for the Township in this situation was to “spend money in a manner that is good for the community.”
Council then passed Davidson’s motion unanimously, directing staff to work with the hall boards to acquire firm quotes for the work that needs to be done.
Several Councillors noted that with the decision made, the onus is now on the hall boards and their respective communities to decide whether their halls are worth saving. Should they decide not to fundraise for the work, the halls could either be sold as-is or after the repair work is completed.
There is one more “elephant in the room,” so to speak, which may influence the decision to move forward by at least two of the hall boards. One of the failures on the fire reports was that several of the halls did not have their occupancy loads posted. In the absence of that information, Clearview Fire Chief Bob McKean has calculated new occupancy loads for the six buildings. The Avening Hall and the Sunnidale Corners Community Centre now have upstairs capacities of 107 and 76 persons respectively – barely half of what their boards previously understood to be their limits.
Representatives of both hall boards noted Monday night that their abilities to raise money for ongoing operating costs, let alone capital repairs, would be seriously hampered if the new numbers were to remain in effect. While McKean defended his calculations on Monday night, he told the Echo on Tuesday that he was willing to work with the hall boards to try to find a solution to the problem.
