Editor:
Monday, March 27 marked 110 years since the land was acquired for the first Redrooffs Resort in the area now known as Coopers Green. It will soon be 10 years since the local Community and SCRD agreed to work together to develop a new replacement hall at this location. (There has been a hall on this spot for almost 110 years!)
It boggles my mind how in the last few months this project to build a replacement hall at this prime heritage location, has unravelled and become so contentious.
Yes, we have climate change issues causing a degree of ocean flooding but this issue is being effectively mitigated in many other coastal B.C. communities. When ideas were presented to SCRD, they were ignored. Instead, they proposed an alternative location for the hall.
Yes, our current economic environment is difficult, but there are ways to reduce building costs which when presented to SCRD staff were ignored.
Yes, it is not an enviable position for the SCRD staff and our elected board to have to deal with and balance these issues, but the community has spoken repeatedly over the past 10 years and most recently in a survey, in which 64.5% of the community wanted Coopers Green to stay as the cultural centre of Halfmoon Bay with a hall to support year round activities.
So, don’t compound this travesty by relocating the Coopers Green Hall to Connor Park and ruining an environmentally sensitive park area.
The citizens of Halfmoon Bay deserve better than this!
Sandi Cunliffe
Principal, Halfmoon Bay Heritage Endowment
