Gordon Bell inches slowly towards fundraising goal

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/07/2011 (5500 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Gordon Bell High School won the battle for its greenspace last year, but still has a long way to go to meet its fundraising goal to turn its “field of dreams” into a reality.

The school has raised about $200,000 of its $1.5-million target, principal Arlene Skull said in a recent interview.

It’s a lofty goal, Skull admits, but the school is focused on raising at least the $500,000 needed to install artificial turf over the concrete parking lot.

“It seems formidable,” Skull said, “but it doesn’t seem so formidable to the students and that’s what keeps us powering along.

“We just need some major donors.”

The space will feature an 80 by 47-metre playing field encircled by a track and landscaping. It will be sunk about three-quarters of a metre below street level.

The design incorporates a field large enough for football and soccer practices, and will be converted to a skating rink in the winter.

The rest of the money the school is raising will go towards an outdoor theatre, classroom and art gallery, a running track, benches, decorative totems and other beautification projects.

The Winnipeg Foundation has kicked in $95,000 to the project, Skull said, and Manitoba Hydro has said they will pay for trees and lighting over a three-year period. A challenge has been issued to about 600 alumni to donate $100 each to the project, Skull said.

Construction of the field was expected to begin this spring, but heavier than expected flooding across the province has kept heavy machinery operators busy, Skull said. She hopes construction will begin by the end of August.

“There will be a big party when we do the sod turning and get the bulldozers out there,” she said.

A battle for the triangular piece of land adjacent to the school on Portage Avenue — a former car dealership — broke out in fall 2008.

Canada Post originally planned to build a mail processing plant on the site, but the province caved to demands from the school and student rallies and bought the land for $5.3 million. The province has also kicked in $1 million for its development, much of which went to environmental cleanup of the land.

matt.preprost@canstarnews.com