VANCOUVER — The Vancouver park board has voted in favour of a proposal to partner the Bloedel Conservatory with the VanDusen Botanical Garden to allow the conservatory to continue operating.
Tuesday night’s decision reverses one by park board commissioners last November to close the 40-year-old conservatory because it was costing the board $250,000 a year to subsidize its operations.
The latest decision came after the board heard from speakers and mulled over two of the most viable proposals it received for keeping the conservatory open.
Representatives from the VanDusen Botanical Garden and the Friends of the Bloedel preservation group argued for the partnership, saying it would expand on a successful pre-existing relationship and lead to an expansion of educational and informational programs.
"Many teachers avoided outings to the Bloedel simply because it was a self-guided tour,” said Friends of the Bloedel member Christina Bolzner, whose nine-year-old daughter Emma raised $240 in a bottle drive to keep the conservatory open.
“It’s exciting to imagine the educational possibilities under the new partnership with VanDusen, which would better promote this unique and natural facility to schools.”
Preliminary projections indicate that under the partnership, the conservatory would break even next year and earn surpluses in 2012 and 2013.
“I take comfort in the fact our staff have looked at all the numbers and feel they are doable,” park board chair Aaron Jasper said.
The other proposal came from a company referred to only as LMTP Inc., which aimed to develop the conservatory into a “destination park” that would include a three- or four-storey multi-functional building.
Jasper said the proposal provided more questions than answers and the public “would have probably pushed back quite a bit on a built structure.”
No LMTP representatives were at the meeting to elaborate, a fact commissioner Ian Robertson said “speaks volumes.”
Further details of the partnership will be discussed at a park board meeting on Sept. 20.
After the board voted last year to close the conservatory, there was an outpouring of public concern that led to several proposals for revitalizing the facility.
awoo@vancouversun.com
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