ELORA – The Elora Centre for the Arts (ECFTA) along with Riverfest Elora are looking to proceed with a long-planned outdoor performance pavilion on ECFTA this fall.
Should council approve it at a Monday meeting, a $100,000 grant will be released as the proposal has met all the criteria and neighbourhood engagement has been completed.
Lianne Carter, ECFTA executive director, explained in a phone interview the grant was approved years ago and it appears the permanent outdoor pavilion can finally move forward.
“We’ve got architectural stamped drawings, we’ve got site plans ready to be approved,” Carter said. “Things are moving forward in a direction where we would like to build it in the fall.”
She said the community services advisory committee had previously asked to do some work around sound mitigation and neighbourhood engagement.
Carter stressed they want to be a good neighbour but also noted the outdoor venue is not intended to be a “rock n’ roll stage every weekend.”
“This is like a little pavilion where the Elora Festival Singers might utilize in a performance or the Elora Community Theatre will do their Shakespeare in the Park,” Carter said. “If you don’t inform people they might jump to conclusions.”
The pavilion has been designed in a way to minimize some noise however the report noted it would be impossible to completely eliminate it outdoors.
Carter said the pavilion is triangle shaped to direct sound. It’s about 25 feet at the widest part and will be accessible.
There will be a full presentation at Monday’s Centre Wellington council meeting where it later could get final approval to move ahead.
“I feel like we’ve been working on this for so long but these are the final little steps, hopefully they’ll say yes,” Carter said.
