Marine Museum in danger of running aground
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LOCAL HISTORY: Facility will have exhausted its cash reserves before officials go to council seeking funding next month
Posted By TYLER BALL FOR THE WHIG-STANDARD
Posted 1 month ago
The Marine Museum of the Great Lakes may have to close next month before it gets a chance to ask city council for emergency funds to save it.
"Before the next council meeting we will have depleted our cash reserves," said Mark Siemons, chairman of the museum's board of trustees.
"Full-time staff have been laid off already," he said. "All of the summer help that has been employed for the bed and breakfast have been let go as well."
Much of the museum's main parking lot has been out of use due to renovation of its drydock, in which rests the Alexander Henry museum ship.
The ship acts as a bed and breakfast each summer, bringing in significant revenue for the museum but asbestos was found on the ship during a spring inspection and it has since been closed while the substance is removed.
"We're trying not to close but we definitely do not have the cash to pay everyone between now and the end of August," Siemons said.
"If staff can hang on without pay until we can figure out what we're doing, that's sort of where we're at."
On Tuesday council passed a motion to have city staff "conduct a preliminary investigation of the extent and nature of the current problems" and to report back to council Aug. 24
The museum is facing an approximate $65,000 operating loss by year end.
"We're hoping to meet with staff as soon as possible to work together in discussing the options," he said.
"It's a significant drastic situation that were facing right now."
Siemons said he is confident the city will co-operate.
"In my last five and a half years of chairman ... we've never had such a good working relationship with the staff and council that we have in the last four years," he said.
"I feel cautiously optimistic," said Siemons.
In the future, Siemons hopes to direct the museum into a position to earn more money.
A large part of this plan is the construction of a deepwater dock at the end of the museum's dry-dock, allowing tourist ships to tie up.
"Kingston is becoming a port of call for a number of tour ships that go up and down the St. Lawrence," he said, adding that the plan has the support of council and the Downtown Kingston Business Improvement Area.
"For that all to happen the property needs to be in the public realm," he said.
The museum property is owned by the federal government, and was originally leased to the city or 30 years to develop the museum.
When the lease expired two years ago, the museum faced another period of uncertainty and faced possible eviction.
The property was deemed surplus by the government and may have been sold, but instead it decided to inject money to improve the site.
"Thirty-two years ago the buildings were derelict, but through those 30 years the city and the museum volunteers have worked together to build what is now an internationally recognized museum," said Siemons.
The museum recently completed a commemorative integrity statement, establishing its importance in the "cultural fabric of Canada".
"Everyone changed their minds," said Siemons. "Now we all agree that it's important that the site is restored to the calibre of a nationally designated site."
tball@thewhig.com
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