THUNDER BAY -- A group of community arts leaders is looking to build a performing arts hall of fame at the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium but city council isn't sold on the idea just yet.
The proposed Thunder Bay Performing Arts Accolades Gallery would be a 30' by 40' stand-alone building connected to the auditorium near the coat check at the facility's entrance. It would include a permanent exhibit commemorating the city's success stories like Paul Shaffer and Bobby Curtola.
Thunder Bay Performing Arts Accolades Board chairman Don Harris said few people know, for example, that one of the first synthesizers known as the Electronic Sackbut was built by Thunder Bay's own Hugh Le Caine.
Stories and characters that have unfolded both in the city and across the world, Harris said, can give young people inspiration.
"Kids in Thunder Bay, how do they know they can become something in the performing arts if they don't have people to look up to?" he asked.
Gallery board member Phil Hordy was among those who led a 5,000-person survey in 1973 that culminated in the construction of the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium 12 years later. He said the accolades gallery team has been working on the concept since 2010 and it's a project worth following through to the end.
"It's everything within the last 50 years that made an impression or something people should have known about," he said. "whether it's an instrument or a song a song written by a famous person."
City council voted to refer the issue to administration at its meeting on Monday night, putting no timeline on when the gallery board and city staff might return with a more concrete business plan.
"I think the concept is good but before I can approve it, I'd need to know more about the business plan," said Coun. Paul Pugh.
"The rest of it looks quite interesting and quite laudable but we need more information on how this thing would be financed before we could take this on in any serious way other than saying we approve of the concept."
Harris was optimistic after the meeting that administration and city council would come to see both the value the project would bring to the community and the monetary value his team would be able to bring to the table.
"We can start inducting," he said. "We just have to get our organization together."
