The hunt for Barrie Sports Hall of Fame’s new home — and funding to match — begins in earnest at this week's city council meeting.
Tom Ewles, the hall’s chairperson, will make a presentation on Wednesday, Oct. 25 outlining the organization’s needs and wants for the future.
“We’re planting a seed and an awareness,” he said of the presentation. “We’re very much a part of culture here in Barrie, so we want to re-establish ourselves.”
Ewles said at some point hall of fame officials will be asking for new, permanent space in a city facility, as well as funding.
“Our specific (request), I think, is going to be coming in the spring,” he said. “They (the city) recognize we need a new home.”
Since 1985, the Barrie Sports Hall of Fame has been an integral part of Allandale Recreation Centre, using 275 linear feet of wall space there, including about 100 wall portraits, seven display cabinets up the ramp, and three more in the upper lobby.
Some of the inductees include Fanny ‘Bobbie’ Rosenfeld, Red Storey, Hap Emms and Mike Gartner.
Ewles said the hall can still work at the Allandale Recreation Centre, for a few more years, but it’s running out of space. A determination needs to be made how a new model would work, and where, for an anticipated 5,000 square feet of space to display paintings and artifacts for the next 25 to 50 years.
“That’s sort of the holdback right now,” he said. “If we had a location, we could get down to nitty-gritty. If council accepts the square footage, then we can get down to preparing a business plan and a model, a plan for the next five years.
“Is that one location, is it a hub with many substations, throughout the city, interactive area or computers, displays, etc.?”
A business plan will also come next spring, including how much annual funding is needed and how it would be spent.
“We’re coming (to the city) for an ask, but I don’t think we have that (number) because we don’t know what it’s going to look like,” Ewles said.
Coun. Sergio Morales, council’s appointee to the hall of fame’s board, has thoughts about how it should work and be funded.
“I believe in a hub-and-spoke model for the Barrie Sports Hall of Fame, which will both give it a proper, dignified home to showcase the rich history and stories of our local athletes,” he said, “but also bring it to the corners of our communities so that our past athletes can inspire our youth.”
However, Morales said it's too soon to determine where the hub would be, as the board itself should determine this through its processes.
“It's also too soon to determine a percentage split for capital and operations funding,” he said, “but if we want a future where the Barrie Sports Hall of Fame is immersed in our community the way it should be, the time has come for the city to move away from one-off grants to them, and move towards stabilizing their funding.”
Location possibilities include an expanded Sadlon Arena, the nearby new YMCA location, future south-end community/recreation centres and a new performing arts centre.
In August 2021, Barrie councillors looked at resizing Sadlon Arena. At the time, the expansion would have possibly included a new home for the Barrie Sports Hall of Fame.
Earlier this year, Barrie councillors heard a presentation about expanding and upgrading Sadlon Arena that includes six options, ranging in price from $12.3 million to $43.5 million, and increasing seating from 4,200 now and adding 580 to 1,210 more.
But this council, elected last October, has made no decisions on expanding and upgrading Sadlon Arena, and whether that would include a new home for the Barrie Sports Hall of Fame.
And there are other potential sites.
The Salem recreation centre is to be built sometime between 2029 and 2031 on the south side of McKay Road West, between Veterans Drive and County Road 27.
At last look, the Hewitts community centre was to be financed and built between 2023 and 2026, and the Allandale Recreation Centre itself was to be renovated and expanded by the end of this decade.
These community centre projects are part of the city’s capital budget, a 10-year document which is adjusted annually in terms of financing and construction.
For more information on the Barrie Sports Hall of Fame, visit bshof.ca.
