We are Excited! Here’s Why!

August 2009 Update

ST. MICHAEL'S HOUSE UPDATE

The big news is the Site Development Commission, through its agent, has submitted the development proposal for St Michael's House to the City Planning Department. It is hoped that a public hearing will not be required, but if that is the case we are looking at six weeks to two months to move through the process. If we do not require a public hearing the process will take only a few weeks. The Commission is reasonably optimistic that the shorter period will apply.

Given the above, we expect to be in a financial position to start building in the fall. The new St Michael's House will -retain its originalsize but some of the interior work will be deferred in light of costs.

It has been a long and sometimes fiustrating process but we all should be proud of the accomplishment and extend our gratitude to the Site Development Commission for all of their work.

Communications Committee: 30/08/09

June 2009

As you know we have raised approximately $836,000.00 by pledges and donations.  This is an outstanding accomplishment for which we have every right to be proud and grateful. For those people who are still planning to pledge, we would ask them to consider doing so as soon as possible. In order to go to the banks for interim financing, we need to present an accurate picture of our situation.  

In the meantime, our architect is completing his final drawings.  The schedule now is that the mechanical/electrical and structural engineers cost estimates will be submitted very soon. With that information, we will be able to go to tender.  The bottom line is that things are moving ahead.

The project will still feature the new building being connected directly to the Cathedral and until the excavation is dug, we will not have a complete idea of any structural work that must be done in the northwest corner.  However, every indication is that this repair will not need to be substantial.  Other than the work necessary in that connection, little will be done in the Cathedral itself except for new electrical connections. Also running (hot!) water and proper drainage will be provided to the Sacristy. 

As soon as we have specific details as to the final projected costs and the monies available to meet those costs, you will be given full details of the proposed building and a projected schedule for progress of construction.  In the meantime, your Project Board will continue to meet regularly to monitor the progress.

We are at last getting into the exciting part, thanks to every parishioner's hard work and generosity!! 

PLANNING NEWS July – December 08. See what we are building!

~ The Site Development Project Board has 9 key members.  They are Bishop John Privett, Dean Alan Reed, Percy Tinker, Cass Crest, Andy Griffin, Howard Soon, Bob Crang, Dale Knowlan and Diane Fletcher.  This Board has been meeting at least once a month to assess the developments in our building project, and to make decisions to steer it forward.

 ~ The Board was very pleased that Dale Knowlan agreed to join their group as she has much experience in managing construction projects and in working with City Hall.

 ~ Our building project has been well publicized in the Chatter and in the Sunday pew bulletins.  A detailed presentation was made at our Patronal Festival in the fall.

 ~ A special prayer dedicated to our project is offered at the beginning of each service in the Cathedral.  As well, various parishioners have spoken at the services to tell about their participation.

 ~ The Diocese Office is moving from the Rectory on March /09.  This will allow for more parish space in the building.

CONSTRUCTION NEWS

 ~ Two large geo-technical holes were dug on site to test the water table, with positive results for construction.  A gravel bed and weeping system will be installed at the base of the new building.

 ~ The flat roof design was chosen in order that the new smaller structure not take away from the dominant Cathedral.  The materials being used will eliminate any danger from leaks.  There will be a concrete wearing surface with skylights providing natural lighting for the 2 Sunday School classrooms below.

 ~ Rock facing is desirable for the outside finished areas of St. Michael’s House to match the Cathedral as much as possible.

 ~ Percy Tinker is authorized to request the consolidation of the interior lot lines of Lots 1, 2 & 3 in Plan 7431 with the City of Kelowna once the approval of the Administration Committee of the Diocese is obtained.

 ~ The next step is to formalize the design, then get engineers involved with he construction drawings.

 ~ The Project Board has initiated meetings with the City about obtaining a required Development Permit.  Dale Knowlan will coordinate all necessary information to obtain this.

FINANCIAL NEWS

 ~ The first phase of the Financial Campaign ends on December 31.  To date $646,030.00 has been raised in pledges.

 ~ Costs in the industry are dropping slightly, but the cost of the development is still $1.5M.

 ~ The Cathedral now has an accountant; it may be possible to initiate a spreadsheet of both Cathedral and Site Development financials.  Bob Crang will confer with Sheila Mulgrew to obtain said spreadsheet to lender(s)when setting up loans or line of credit.

 ~It is estimated that the bank will issue a Line of Credit based on 65% of pledges to date.  Because of this, it is very important that pledges are received as soon as possible.

 ~ An application will be made to the Anglican Foundation for funds.

 ~ Ideas are being proposed for widening the circle and obtaining outside funding.

 ~ There is a need to focus on what the building will do for our Congregation, bringing about a regeneration and renewal.

KEEPING UP

If you have questions or are in need of information you can contact Garth Homer, Hilary Shirreff, Mike  Bullock, Diane Fletcher or Cass Crest. Information will be posted on the site development board at the back of the church and minutes will be in the binder in the narthex.

July 24, 2008 Update

 Fund raising and review of pledges:

 As of July 20 we have given - $460,622 with 58 pledges. [Now - September 2 - at $463.000.00]The fund raising committee thinks this is a good rate of pledging since only about 1/3 of our congregation has been contacted.  This program is intended to go throughout the summer and into early fall, with a conclusion in November 2008. Some of these pledges are in the form of immediate cash. Most are amounts that will be given over a period of time, up to 3 years. If you wish to contribute ahead of time you can contact the Cathedral office. It may be you will have more questions, so please feel free to contact Howard Soon at 250.763.0568 or see him after the 10 AM service.

Fund Raising: The future:

Paul Nahirney continues to guide the fund raising initiative. As we have a significant amount in pledges, the next step will be to contact the Diocesan Administration Committee for permission to seek a short-term loan to fund our building project. Once permission is given, we can approach lenders (banks, mortgage brokers) and obtain a Line of Credit (LOC) up to the amount pledged. We will also be approaching the Anglican Foundation for assistance in 2009.

The Building:

There are two parallel tracks we are trying to run in Site Development: One is the fund rising, the other is the building plans. The Project Board will be making a decision regarding whether we will be going ahead with the building based on the pledges received to date and try to secure a line of credit. If we go ahead the following will need to take place:

• Obtain from our Architect, Kees Prins, a set of design drawings.
• Approval of final design drawings by the project board, diocese and congregation and commission working the drawings.
• Approval from Administration Committee of the working drawings and authorization to apply for interim financing to pay for 1 or 2 above.
• A little further down the line:
• Approval from the city for any zoning or site issues.

(b) Tenders for construction from builders.

(c) Once a builder has been chosen construction can start, assuming pledges have reached the cost of the contract. 

Some outstanding issues: What we can do.

We would like to get people throughout the diocese involved and to that end the communications committee will be writing an article for an upcoming issue of the Highway outlining our project.

We also need to decide as a congregation what to recommend to the Diocese as suggestions for dealing with will be done with the parking lot area and the area vacated by the Old Hall. A number of creative ideas have been suggested.

The most important point is that once people have been contacted, either through personal visits or hosted small groups, they need get their pledge in fairly quickly because the pledges will be the basis for any loans to be granted by a bank or a credit union. Please participate and/or host more fund raising activities. The intention is to have a Congregational Meeting in the fall and report on our progress.

June 2008 update

The old hall is now a thing of the past; the area, and it is a big area, that is used to occupy is now used for parking. Meanwhile, two processes are being pursued.  The first is that preliminary working drawings of Phase I, St. Michael's House, are being prepared.  The second activity is that fund raising in our Cathedral community is well under way.  A team of volunteers is leading a series of coffee meetings to outline the proposal and to help members in shaping their contributions.  Currently these efforts are paying off, and the amount raised is approaching $500,000.  The target is $1.5 million, so there is a way to go!  Your prayers, your support, and your contribution are all vital parts in helping St. Michael's achieve its goal!

                                                                                                                                                                  April 2008 update

“According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it.  Each builder must choose with care how to build on it.  For no one can lay a foundation other than the one that has been laid; that foundation is Christ.” (1 Corinthians 3:10-11)

The above has been adopted as the theme for our campaign to build a new hall, and will be used as a foundation for all our publications.

Events are moving along quickly even if it does not seem so. The Project Team has had a number of meetings, the last being April 8th.  This small group is charged with giving executive oversight to the project. The team is made up of Percy Tinker (chair) Bishop John Privett , Dean Allan Reed, Bob Lemon, David Irving ,Bob Crang,  Andy Griffin, Cass Crest , and Howard Soon.

The gas cut-off will happen the week of April 21st.The wood flooring has already been removed and placed in storage for future use. The plans for St. Michael’s House include re-using at least some of this flooring. One reason we received the good price we did on the demolition is that the contractor will remove and re-use various elements of the building.

Our former Dean, Jack Greenhalgh, has consented to be our official photographer so we have a record of the old hall.

Plans are underway to hold a neighbourhood information meeting. We want our neighbours to be aware of our plans and to be ready for the increased construction activity.

Commissioning of the fundraising team has been scheduled for June 1st, 2008.

The Cathedral Redevelopment Commission is currently solvent, with sufficient funds on hand to meet immediate needs. However, there will be requirements to cover a number of costs before new construction begins. These will include primarily architectural costs for design work and preparation of engineering drawings for construction work. These costs are an anticipated and normal part of a construction project.

A press release about the demolition of the hall is currently being created and will go out to the local newspapers next week. In addition Shaw cable television has been contacted.  We hope to be able to notify the parish, and make an event of it.  (However, if the contractor is ready to go at some mid-week point, we won’t be able to ask him to stop and wait until we have told everyone).

So in summary, we are moving along. The design end of things will move into high gear as funding becomes available.

March 2008 Update

We are finally underway!  The AGM in February approved motions to proceed with a two-phase development (See the January 2008 Update below), approved a motion to inmmediately demolish the old hall, and approved a motion that included the wording

• construction of a Phase 1 building to be built in accordance with the plans presented today by our Architect, and to house, in two levels, washrooms, galley kitchen, space for coffee hour, spacing for dining seating of up to 40 people, custodial closet, room for singing groups to rehearse, classroom space and nursery space.  Such construction to start as soon as the necessary funding has been received or fully committed;

The demolition work will begin with removal of hazardous materials.  (Thre will be no immediate visible change; this work will go inside the building).  When that is done, then demolition of the rest of the building will take place.

Note other key dates in the following story.

January 2008 Update

Some big news has come out of the joint Site Re-development Commission (CRM) -Cathedral Council meeting of January 8th where the following decisions were taken:

A bid for the demolition of the hall has been received and accepted by the Commission. LRM Contracting was the successful bidder. Final arrangements will be worked out by January 23rd, but we were heartened that the bid came in well below the initial estimates. More information will be forthcoming at the AGM on February 10th.

It has been decided the development of the site will be a phased development. Phase 1 will be the creation of an approximately 5000 sq.ft. building (on two levels). It will be attached to the Cathedral and schematic drawings will be available for all to see at the AGM. Phase 2 will be the result of a 5 year capital building plan including the establishment of an ongoing building fund. Development of the parking lot may be part of this building plan. The columbarium will be created through a separate a separate funding initiative and development plan. Work on this funding and creation is under active consideration.

As the pace of the development quickens it has been recognized that a smaller more nimble committee is required to deal with fast moving events. The CRM has created a Project Board to oversee events. This group is made up of the following:  The Bishop, the Archdeacon, Site Chair and Vice-chair, the Dean, Wardens (with link to Communication Team) and a financial person (with link to Capital Campaign).

The capital campaign that kicks off on March 3rd received a big boost with a one time donation of $55,000. What a great start to this important initiative!

Other important dates:

January 31st Outline for the capital campaign completed

February 10th the AGM and site development plans announced.

March 3rd: Capital campaign launched

April/May: Construction plan developed

Communications Committee, January 14th, 2008

(Garth Homer, Hilary Shireff, Diane Fletcher, Mike Bullock)

The Original Story

It is the Mission of our Cathedral parish to

…be a caring Anglican Community living out the love of Christ in worship, prayer and ministry in the world”

Central to our ability to fulfill this mission are two things: our personal commitments of faith, and our physical resource.

The physical plant of the Cathedral - the church(1913), the hall(1948), and the “old rectory”(1956), are all well aged structures. For several years the parish has been thinking about how to deal with the inevitable need for renewal. This task has been made more urgent by a major failure of the hall roof, which was assessed as too expensive to usefully repair. So we now have a portable on site as a minimal temporary replacement.

After a great deal of prayerful, thoughtful study, the parish is now committed to a major Site Redevelopment. 

Our initial hope, supported by a professional viability study,

was to incorporate a new hall/office space in a residential

building located where the hall now is.  Our equity was to be the land. The housing was to provide supported housing at moderate cost. A great deal of detailed work, involving our own people and a professional project coordinator, was done over a period of two years.  But escalating building costs have now shown this model to be impossible to achieve.

As of January 10, 2007, the congregation decided to focus on designing a building program to achieve as much of our original objective as possible, but without any housing.

Three things will happen, God willing:

Cathedral to be Renovated and Restored

There are structural issues in the church itself.  These are to be assessed and repaired.  It is hoped that it will be possible to enlarge the church to the west at the same time.  The increase in size will allow the Cathedral to be more efficient in hosting large festivals, like Christmas and Easter, and other large gatherings like weddings and funerals that we cannot now adequately accommodate.

In addition, various rearrangements of space will be undertaken to meet current and anticipated needs.

Cathedral Annex and Hall

The Cathedral currently is deficient in space for choir robing, clergy preparation for services, storage for sanctuary linens and other supplies, book storage, and so on.   There are no washrooms.  (These are currently provided in a portable "washhouse").  Offices for both the Cathedral and Diocese are housed in the "old rectory" in totally inadequate space.  These needs are to be met in a new Annex structure, probably to be built to the north of the church and connected to it, which would also provide a large assembly area with kitchen and meeting rooms, and appropriate space for the ministry to children and youth, as were formerly available in the hall. The current hall, no longer in use, will be demolished.

Outreach Building

It is also the intent of the parish to build, alongside the Annex, an Outreach Building. In further fulfillment of our Mission, this would provide a space to be a resource for service to the local community. The exact nature of this facility is under review, and partners are being considered.

Financing

All of these plans will be the subject of study and consultation with the congregation to determine details and priorities.   A Fundraising Consultant has been engaged to assist the congregation in determining its resources for this project, and to help it throughout a fundraising phase.  It is hard to say when a spade will go into the ground, but hopefully by the fall of 2007 or early 2008.  In the meantime, regular Newsletter will be posted elsewhere on this site to keep parishioners informed.