THUNDER BAY – A city councillor is proposing the city waive rent for the Lakehead Transportation Museum, saying the step would recognize early challenges outside of the museum’s control and help it establish itself as a waterfront attraction.
Coun. Aldo Ruberto served notice Monday of a motion he'll bring forward on Aug. 8, seeking to offer five years of rent relief to the museum.
The volunteer-driven museum pays the city around $5,000 a year to lease space adjacent to the Pool 6 dock – an amount Ruberto called “peanuts” for the city.
Ruberto’s motion required special notice because it would require amending a previous 2020 decision council made in closed session, after the museum requested rent relief, pointing to the impacts of COVID-19 and road construction that delayed its opening.
City staff note the step would require overriding a 2002 policy setting out a standard 25 per cent discount from market rates for non-profit groups, up to a maximum of 25 per cent of the appraised land value or $25,000 a year, whichever is lower.
The policy was created to set a fair standard for the large number of non-profits that look to the city for support, said Joel DePeuter, the city's director of planning and development services.
“The city receives a lot of requests to use land and city-owned space,” he said. “It’s very difficult, if not impossible, to distinguish between organizations that are deserving, very deserving, very, very deserving. So as a result, at actually greater cost to the city, the city provides an equal discount to all relevant organizations.”
The policy has been upheld with few or no exceptions in recent years, he said.
Ruberto argues the city should do what it can to help the museum during its early years at the waterfront.
“The man-hours they’re putting in as volunteers is off the charts. They’re not getting paid. Why are we charging them rent before they even bring in revenue? This is to just give them a break to get on their feet, and hopefully the transportation museum takes off.”
With cruise ships starting to arrive at Pool 6 and plans for a nearby art gallery and potential science centre, the city is hoping to develop the area into a hub in the coming years.
That makes it all the more important to support the museum, Ruberto said.
“You’ve got to think, what does this do for our waterfront?” he said. “It creates another key piece of the puzzle for tourism. Our tourism department should be supporting these people left, right, and centre.”
Charlie Brown, president of the society that runs the museum, is happy to see the issue back on council’s agenda. If approved, the money would be invested right back into waterfront improvements, he said.
“That money would be put to better use, as far as we’re concerned,” he said. “If we were given the opportunity not to have to pay the lease to the city every year, all of those funds now get generated back into the operation here. So we’d be painting more on the [Alexander] Henry, we’d be improving the property.”
The museum’s future plans include further landscaping, including a pergola and other improvements to support concerts and other events, a canopy to protect its historic Brill buses, and potentially welcoming the historic James Whalen tug.
Along with insurance, the lease is the museum's biggest expense, Brown said.
“I think we're a benefit for the city,” he said. “We are a tourist attraction – over the last four years since we’ve been open, we’ve had thousands of visitors.”
That includes people from around the world, and a few who come specifically to see the museum’s exhibits, he said, like a Vancouver man who recently made a trip to see its two Brill buses.
The museum has been a leader in efforts to transform the city’s waterfront into a major destination for both residents and tourists, he said.
“For years, people have been talking about Duluth and what they do down in Duluth,” he said. “Well, we’ve brought it home to Thunder Bay.”
“We’re the only thing that’s been down here for the last five years. Now the art gallery is coming in, Science North – we’re really looking forward to them participating and generating a lot of [traffic]. If we’re allowed to enhance our operation here and expand, I think we’d really make an impact for the city.”
Council will debate Ruberto’s motion on Aug. 8.
