Children’s Museum seeks extra $1.2M to speed up renovations

The new Children’s Discovery Museum wants an additional $1.2 million from the City of Saskatoon so it can tackle building upgrades at the Mendel building sooner rather than later.

Because the building is owned by the city, the city is responsible for costs to renovate it. Last summer, the city pledged $1.5 million to upgrade the fire alarm system, replace the boiler and do other renovations deemed high-priority. Other building upgrades — such as renewing plumbing fixtures and replacing aging wiring — were identified as lower priority fixes; the Children’s Discovery Museum board initially said they could be done within the next five years.

Now Dave Hunchak, chair of the Children’s Discovery Museum’s facilities committee, said more than $500,000 can be saved in the long run if the city does the renovations all at once instead of in two phases.

“It makes sense in every way to do that work at the same time,” he told a city council committee on Monday.

Council will approve its 2018 budget in December, but Hunchak said he needs to know before then if there’s money for the renovations.

“If we wait until the budget decision to move ahead with all the detailed design, we’re delaying the project another year basically, and I don’t think any of us think that’s acceptable,” he said.

Councillors asked city administrators to prepare a report on the issue and will likely vote at the end of June whether to dole out the additional $1,247,675 toward building maintenance this year. If that happens, renovations will begin on the building later this year, with a projected opening date in early 2019.

Councillors warned Hunchak this is not a good time to ask the city for money. The elimination of grants-in-lieu revenue from the provincial government this spring meant the city lost $8.3-million in anticipated funding this year and will be out roughly $11.4-million a year in future years.

“Finances are at a premium,” Coun. Bev Dubois said. Hunchak remains optimistic. “It is a significant savings to the city to do it now instead of later, because they won’t have to reopen the building,” he said.