Mat Hassen, chair of the Osoyoos New Museum Committee, and Gayle Cornish, the Osoyoos Museum’s curator, want a new museum. Here, they look at a dugout canoe currently stored in the museum. They say the artifact has suffered damage over the years due to the lack of proper storage. Near the canoe, a puddle of water has formed, likely from the leaky Quonset roof the museum is now housed under. Photo by Laurena Weninger - Click on picture for larger image

OSOYOOS TIMES-January 27, 2010

By Laurena Weninger - Osoyoos Times

“Let’s get busy and find that $5 million somewhere,” said Coun. CJ Rhodes after a committee presentation at the Jan. 18 Osoyoos town council meeting by a group determined to build a new museum in Osoyoos.
The presentation was made by Mat Hassen, chair of the New Museum Committee established by the Osoyoos Museum Society.
The bottom line is that the museum’s current building just isn’t up to par.
“Quite frankly, this building is an embarrassment as a facility,” Gayle Cornish, the museum’s curator, said in an interview after the council meeting.
The building currently housing the museum’s artifacts used to be a curling rink and while there is heat in one part of the building, most of the displays are set up in the Quonset portion of the facility.
In that part of the building, there is no heat and no air conditioning.
Hassen said such conditions are destroying some of the artifacts.
“Our collection is dying out there,” he said. “The extremes of temperature are wreaking havoc.”
For example, a dugout canoe salvaged from Osoyoos Lake in the 1960s is warping and cracking and needs to be in a more consistently controlled atmosphere.
“It may be a national treasure,” Cornish said.
Near the canoe, a puddle of water has formed, likely due to the leaky Quonset roof.
Likewise, antique printing equipment and box makers are starting to rust.
The proposal for a new building includes a construction cost of $3.6 million, said Hassen.
But the committee has included all the extras in its proposal.
Furniture is going to cost $535,000, design fees are estimated at $357,000 and a contingency allowance of $223,000 has been included in the final $4.7 million estimate.
The committee wants a new building that will be “a visually appealing, easily accessed, energy efficient, multi-purpose facility which attracts visitors and provides them with a memorable, thought-provoking, educational experience based on the rich history and heritage of the Osoyoos area.”
The group wants the building to be  two floors with a total of 1,115 square metres of space.
Of that, there will be 400 square metres of fixed display space and 120 square metres of rotating display space.
In addition there will be 120 square metres of archive space, 200 square metres of storage space and 100 square metres of multi-purpose space.
There will also be a reception and gift shop area, meeting room space and kitchen space.
The committee considered nine potential locations for the new building, and came down to two top choices.
Their first choice is near the current location, either next to the Gyro Beach band shell or across the parking lot, facing the lake.
The second choice is where the public health building now stands.
That building, which is now empty due to Interior Health’s move of public health services to the former Sagebrush Lodge facility, would need to be demolished.
Council expressed its support for the proposal and Cornish said there is a lot of community support for the move as well.
But the next step is to a make a commitment for the location, Hassen said, and then they will be able to move on to the fundraising and grant application part of the process.
They are hoping to have their ducks in a row by 2012.
The matter may also have to go to municipal referendum if public borrowing is involved.
reporter@osoyoostimes.com

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