At the Nov. 5 Castlegar city council meeting, Val Field and Audrey Polovnikoff from the Kootenay Gallery gave a presentation which included a slide show.
The two said that the gallery had a strong season and benefited from a Community Basin Trust (CBT) community initiatives grant through the city. They also said the gallery could benefit from a change of location into the downtown core.
"Happily, we can report that it was a very good year," said Polovnikoff, the gallery's vice chair. "We are benefiting from being a part of a community that recognizes that art and culture are important components of a healthy, vibrant community with a supportive and proactive municipal government. Yet, as recognized as a priority in our 2011 strategic planning sessions, the gallery continues to be challenged by its location and is forced to find creative solutions to let the world know we're here."
In response to a question from mayor Lawrence Chernoff, Field, Kootenay Gallery executive director, said they would love to move the gallery to a location downtown.
"We're just in the early stages," she said. "It's something we'd really like to do, but we need to do some planning and get some community people on board. Ideally, that's where we'd like to be, but we'll need to do some intensive planning first. We'd need to be well prepared to present to the city and to funder. So it's just in the very early, early stages."
Field said being downtown would help the gallery attract foot traffic and also help revitalize the area.
"We've seen how Sculpturewalk has done that by bringing walk-in traffic to the downtown businesses," she said. "We think adding more things downtown, more culture, more reasons for people to come would really go far."