{"id":25435,"date":"2019-12-18T19:14:16","date_gmt":"2019-12-19T00:14:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=25435"},"modified":"2019-12-18T19:14:25","modified_gmt":"2019-12-19T00:14:25","slug":"library-square-budget-tops-51-million","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/library-square-budget-tops-51-million\/","title":{"rendered":"Library Square budget tops $51 million"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Council this week is poised to consider a total budget\nfor the redevelopment of Library Square set at more than $51.6 million, an\nincrease of nearly $2.1 million from previous estimates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Special Council meeting dedicated to the redevelopment,\nwhich is intended to revitalize Aurora\u2019s historic Downtown Core with an\nexpansion of the Church Street School building, the Aurora Public Library, and\nan outdoor gathering space between the landmarks, is set to take place this\nweek.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Going into the meeting, Council members will be asked to\napprove a budget of $51,611,700, which is $2,056,800 more than previous\nestimates \u2013 but is also a figure that includes nearly $1.7 million in\npreviously approved capital works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The more focused budget figures reflect a \u201crefinement\u201d to\nthe Library Square design details since they last hit the Council table and\nincorporates a pedestrian bridge linking the Aurora Public Library to the\nChurch Street School, which was previously approved by Council over the summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additional changes to the plan include changes to the\nperformance hall, a black box theatre space designed to be the centrepiece of\nthe Church Street School addition, to incorporate better acoustics, a redesign\nof planned washroom facilities to reflect changes to codes as well as space\nlimitations on site, the removal of a green roof for the pedestrian link\nbetween the two buildings following concerns over the weight it would bring to\nthe structure, and a reconfiguration of external lighting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Town\u2019s Library Square Project\u2019s recommended funding\nstrategy will be heavily influenced by its potential success in obtaining\nfunding from its outstanding grant applications,\u201d said Jason Gaertner,\nFinancial Manager for the Town of Aurora. \u201cThe Town\u2019s application requesting\n$23.1 million from the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program (ICP) will\nhave a significant influence on the final funding strategy deployed by the\nTown.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Should the Town\u2019s grant applications be successful, $31.6\nmillion will be flowing into the Town to make Library Square a reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA grant receipt of this magnitude would allow the Town\nto reduce its planned draw from the Hydro Investment Reserve back to just what\nhas been formally approved and transferred to the project to date by Council\nand eliminate the project\u2019s requirement for external funding that is funded\nfrom the tax levy,\u201d said Mr. Gaertner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If this is not the case and the grant applications aren\u2019t\nsuccessful, the landscape will change significantly. While there might still be\ngrant opportunities under the Canadian Cultural Spaces Fund, $24.3 million\nwould need to be used from the Town\u2019s Hydro Reserves, leaving a balance in this\naccount of $6.66 million, with rest of the funds coming from a tax-levy funded\n20-year debenture ($7.5 million), various reserve funds, development charges,\nand the Federal Gas Tax Grant. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWith the recent Class \u2018B\u2019 cost estimates in hand for the Town\u2019s planned Library Square development and subsequent to staff and their consultant\u2019s value engineering of the most current square\u2019s design and this estimate, the current identified project requirements of $51.6 million now exceed the previous estimate by $2.0 million,\u201d concluded Mr. Gaertner. \u201cStaff are recommending that Council approve the updated funding strategies as presented in this report.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir <\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Council this week is poised to consider a total budget for the redevelopment of Library Square set at more than $51.6 million, an increase of nearly $2.1 million from previous estimates. A Special Council meeting dedicated to the redevelopment, which is intended to revitalize Aurora\u2019s historic Downtown Core with an expansion of the Church Street […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-6Cf","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-07 05:59:37","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25435\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}