The public got an inside look at the new town hall.
On Monday, the Town of Bonnyville hosted a ribbon cutting ceremony to christen their new facility, which was completed in February 2018.
"We're here to celebrate the grand opening of our building, which has been in operation for about a year," noted Mayor Gene Sobolewski. "We've managed to work out a lot of the kinks, and we think we've got a very functional building."
Although construction wrapped up last year, some final touches had to be made before the town opened their doors to residents.
After years of waiting for the building to be completed, the public was invited to tour the facility to see all of the amenities available for town administration and community-use.
Town resident Donna Padlesky was among one of the first groups to take a look around. She believes the facility was long overdue, and well worth the wait.
"Our old town office was pretty dark and small. They've got room for expansion, and what they said on the tour was they have 75 years of potential growth and expansion. It's great, proactive, and smart."
The final price tag for the project rang in at $8.2-million, less than the $8.8-million budgeted.
Before shovels were in the ground, a lot of time was spent figuring out the best site for the new facility.
"You might imagine the town knew exactly where to put this, but they were really thoughtful and very diligent as council and as leadership to make sure that we looked at every single possible location for this new town hall," recalled Vivian Manasc, principal architect with Manasc Isaac Architects, the Edmonton-based firm who worked on the plans. "We considered eight different locations, and worked carefully with the community to understand what the benefits and risks were for all the different possibilities."
After combining all of the information, the decision was made to remain in the same area as the old town hall.
"They were really committed to have a building that's accessible to the community, that's walkable, senior-friendly, that's fully accessible to all members and anybody that happens by," Manasc explained.
The situation created a unique problem due to having the old structure located right beside the construction site.
"That gave us a bit of a challenge because we had to keep the town hall operational, and we certainly didn't want to make the move twice. We had to keep the old town hall operational while the new one was built," Manasc said.
Once town employees moved into the new building, demolishing the old facility was the final step before landscaping.
Construction for the project was award to local company GenMec ACL Inc. for $6.9-million, which partner Maurice Mercier described as an honour and a privilege for them to be a part of.
"As part of the $6.9-million, $3.4-million of that was spent with 16 local subcontractors and the building was completed with approximately 15,000 injury-free man-hours," he detailed.
Sobolewski stressed the importance of working closely the contractors and architects on the project.
"It wasn't a contractor or architect relationship, it was all a partnership and that's what the Town of Bonnyville is all about. We try to partner with any and all," he expressed.
