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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

CMU starts $11-M drive for additions

By: Nick Martin

Posted: 06/16/2012 1:00 AM | Comments: 0

An artist's rendering of the overpass over Grant Avenue, which will be the most prominent feature of the planned additions to Canadian Mennonite University. (FRIESEN TOKAR ARCHITECTS)

Canadian Mennonite University has launched a record $11-million capital campaign to build a new library and a learning common.

And it will finally build the long-discussed pedestrian walkway over Grant Avenue west of Shaftesbury Boulevard, which is what will catch the eye of pretty well everyone not associated with the campus.

Retiring president Gerald Gerbrandt told a campaign-kickoff gathering Friday the pedestrian walkway is "both for safety and accessibility considerations.

"Our campus is split in half," he said succinctly.

When CMU opened in 2000 as a confederation of three former private colleges, it encompassed Founders Hall on the north side -- formerly the school for the deaf -- and one of the founding colleges on the south side.

Originally, the pedestrian bridge was touted as a much larger project, with a restaurant overlooking the roadway. Now it will be a pedestrian connection across Grant.

That's one of CMU's two major challenges, said Gerbrandt. Scholastically, the far more important is the library, which is now totally inadequate, he said.

"The space allocated to our library is in a dark, dank basement," he said.

The capital campaign already has 40 per cent of its total in hand, but has yet to sell naming rights to any of the new projects, Gerbrandt said.

CMU has asked the province for money, Gerbrandt said in an interview. "We have no commitment from the province -- we have had conversations."

Premier Greg Selinger, who attended to laud the library project, said later the province may help with a capital grant, even though there is a policy of not providing capital grants to a private school.

"That's something that's discussed by the council on post-secondary education," Selinger said.

Two years ago, the province provided money under the federal-provincial infrastructure renewal program for so-called shovel-ready projects, and another is likely coming, Selinger said.

"We will have a new infrastructure program, federal, provincial, municipal," Selinger said. "It's being done across the country."

Coun. Paula Havixbeck (Charleswood Tuxedo), who is a sessional instructor in public relations and entrepreneurship at CMU, said the pedestrian bridge will not require a public hearing, though the city will need to approve the site plan.

Prof. Cheryl Pauls will become CMU's second president Nov. 1.

nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition June 16, 2012 A1

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