Possible demolition of Civic Arena continues to be an emotional issue.
After substantial back-and-forth Monday, Vernon council carried Coun. Brian Quiring’s motion to send an updated letter from a 1988 engineer’s report to a quantity surveyor to explain the costs of making the building safe for use.
“We don’t know what we want to do with it, so we don’t know what it will cost,” said Quiring.
Council had originally planned to have a second report done to ensure the first study was correct. A commitment had also been made to the public to acquire their input into Civic Arena’s refurbishing.
“There’s a great interest in the public to see how it could be repurposed,” said Coun. Scott Anderson.
“We promised the public we’d take it to them and we owe it to the public to (follow through).”
As building codes have been updated since the original report was done, Quiring expects the findings to have got worse.
“It’s a waste of money, and it’s a waste of time,” Quiring said. “We need to stay on our plan and knock that building down.”