High school graduation ceremonies will be hosted at the Memorial Arena this year due to expected construction that will be ongoing at Western Financial Place this summer.
The arena barrel roof is set for replacement this year, which will impact use of the facility beginning in May, according to the city.
The planned construction is also set to affect the Key City Gymnastic’s annual year end show.
Given the pending project, the city proactively reached out to Mount Baker Secondary School and the gymnastics club well ahead of time, according to a press release.
“Its an unfortunate situation, but due to the small window of opportunity to get these projects done we really didn’t have any other options other than relocating Grad,” said Stacy Paulsen, Facility Operations Manager with the City of Cranbrook. “We have promised to stay in touch with Mount Baker through this process and if there is any chance that we can somehow manage to accommodate the grad ceremonies in WFP we will certainly make it happen. We wanted to make arrangements well in advance to ensure that the committee had ample time to plan and provide an alternative solution.”
The project is expected to include the roof replacement, videotron installation, new arena boards and glass, roof beam welding electrical work, and other improvements.
“I want to thank the staff for their outreach to the Mount Baker grad organizers and working with them to coordinate other arrangements for grad ceremonies,” said Mayor Lee Pratt. “Our construction window on Western Financial Place is small and unfortunately falls in line with grad and the Gymnastics club’s year-end show.”
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