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Convention centre gets closer to expansion

By: Bartley Kives

Posted: 07/15/2011 11:49 AM | Comments: 0

The convention centre wants money to expand. (BORIS MINKEVICH / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS ARCHIVES) Photo Store

The Winnipeg Convention Centre has taken another step toward its expansion across York Avenue.

As the Free Press reported in June, all three levels of government have agreed in principle to finance a convention-centre expansion that will cost approximately $180 million.

Today, the Winnipeg Convention Centre issued tenders for the work, which may get underway this year, president and CEO Klaus Lahr said,

The plan will see the convention centre cover about 10 per cent of the cost itself, with all three levels of government splitting the remaining 90 per cent, said Lahr, declining to put a more specific price tag on the final number in the hopes of keeping prices down. The 250,000-square-foot expansion should be complete in 2015, Lahr said.

The tenders are subject to formal approval from all three levels of government, but that is considered a formality. The city started collecting funds to pay for the project when it instituted an accommodations tax three years ago, while the province and Ottawa expect to recoup their investments very quickly through taxes.

Built in 1974 at 132,000 square feet, the Winnipeg Convention Centre was once the largest building of its kind in Canada. But its elite status disappeared after 15 other Canadian cities built sizable new convention centres or expanded existing facilities.

The non-profit organization has been warning politicians since 2001 it needs to expand to remain competitive. A study later commissioned by the centre said Winnipeg's hotel industry will lose $6 million to $8 million in annual convention business if the expansion does not take place.

In 2008, the convention centre went public with its expansion plans, asking all three levels of government to fund expansion across the south side of York Avenue. This new wing would include 65,000 square feet of additional exhibition space and 30,000 square feet of additional meeting space.

Former Manitoba premier Gary Doer, however, was cool to the initial plan. In 2010, the convention centre applied for federal money under the P3 Canada Fund, but that plan was rejected for being a poor fit, as the convention centre is a publicly owned, non-profit facility and the P3 fund is intended for public-private partnerships.

All three levels of government have since reached an agreement they can live with, sources at all three levels confirmed.

In a parallel move, the city and province have agreed in principle to place the Winnipeg Convention Centre within the boundaries of a new sports, hospitality and entertainment district, or SHED, that would encompass 11 blocks of downtown Winnipeg.

The district would also encompass the MTS Centre, the new development planned for the north side of Portage Avenue, the Burton Cummings Theatre and the Metropolitan Theatre, which is about to secure $1.5 million in city funding toward a $16-million renovation.

Under the SHED plan, developed by CentreVenture, some of the new property taxes flowing from improvements within this zone would be reinvested in the immediate vicinity. But the money would not be returned to private property owners in the form of grants.

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