Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - July 12, 2004, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg free press monday july 12, 2004 province a5 no College for old health Centre site Cost of retrofitting Brandon buildings too High by Mia Rabson p lans to expand Assiniboine Community College on the site of the vacant Brandon mental health Centre have been scrapped because of the overwhelming Cost of retrofitting the Century old buildings. The doer government has for the last several years spoken highly and almost exclusively of using the 113-year-old property to House the College which has grown out of its current space. Then last week the province announced it had hired a Brandon Engi Neering firm to oversee Community consultations on the Best use for the site and acc president Brent Mills said the College in to looking at the health Centre site any longer. We re acting on the Assumption the mental health Centre will not be a part of our future Mills said. Brandon mayor Dave Burgess said the Cost to renovate the existing buildings on the health Centre site would Range from $44 million to $66 million a Cost he said can to be defended. There a some who say move it at any Cost but i Don to agree with that Burgess said. Mills said the College needs to expand because its student population has grown As much As 40 per cent in the last five or six years but now the focus is on expanding and modernizing the existing Campus. Construction on a new culinary arts facility could begin on the Campus As Early As this fall he said. Plans to redevelop the adult High school Are also Well underway Mills said. Despite that family services and housing minister Christine Melnick denied the province has canned the idea of acc moving to the health Centre. She said the province just wants to explore All the options. The province has paid about $3.6 Mil lion ? $600,000 a year ? to maintain the buildings while they be sat vacant for the last six years. Just after the facility closed the former tory government put Winnipeg Developer Joe Bova in charge of a consortium to develop a plan for the site. Dozens of ideas were put Forth including a 27-Hole Golf course wellness Centre museum entertainment Complex and seniors housing. But it was the possibility of using it to expand Assiniboine Community College that piqued the interest of the doer government when it came to Power in 1999. In the 2002 throne speech Premier Gary doer promised to continue to work on moving acc to the former men Tal health Centre site and government sources said $25 million was about to be approved for it. But a report showed the costs to be higher than the $25 million. ;