The end-of-December deadline has passed for the $5-million fundraising drive for a new museum at the Shipyards but campaign organizers aren’t sharing the results until later this month.
Campaign chair Don Evans said the group will make a presentation at the Jan. 25 City of North Vancouver council meeting.
“I really don’t have a lot to tell,” Evans said. “Until we present to council we’re not releasing anything. We obviously want to talk to them first and we have to do that properly.”
In mid-December, Evans told the News the group was 80 per cent of the way to reaching its goal with three weeks remaining until the deadline.
In July 2013, the North Vancouver Museum and Archives received conditional approval from council to develop a museum inside the Pipe Shop at the foot of Lonsdale Avenue but there was a caveat: the group needed to raise $5 million by Dec. 31, 2015. If that target was reached the City of North Van pledged to match all non-municipal cash contributions up to $5 million.
Evans said the group continues to raise funds. “The fundraising process isn’t a click one day and someone gives it. With the larger (donors) it takes time. So there are things still in process and gift agreements being done.”
Prior to the start of this past Monday’s council meeting, representatives from the Squamish Nation and Tsleil-Waututh Nation strongly endorsed the plan for a new museum at the Shipyards.
“I was delighted to hear that,” Evans said, who was in attendance.
The museum at the Shipyards is planned as an interactive cultural history museum. At the new location, the museum would nearly triple its square footage and be able to deliver expanded programs and exhibits.
The council-endorsed Central Waterfront Development Plan for Lot 5 development, created by Roger Brooks, includes a spot for the museum, which it describes as including “rotating interactive exhibits and will be open into the evening hours setting the standard for museums across the country.”
