This week I've been back to work on the house at 702 Main Street. Originally, this was the house RiVA was fixing up to be a community arts centre. A couple of years ago the Board decided not proceed with this project - it is a gigantic mountain to climb, no doubt about it. Since then, our "Centre for Culture and Creativity" business has reached an agreement with the owners to fix up the house with the plan of eventually relocating our teaching there (along with a rental office, public art gallery and an apartment). It's still a gigantic mountain to climb.
This week I have been arriving early in the morning to continue with the demolition and cleaning. We had a pretty extensive meeting at Town Hall yesterday and got some detailled information about what it's going to take for us to get to the next step - approval of our development plan and getting a building permit.
We are undertaking this project because we have a vision for the house and the important role it can play in our community. Right now there is no dedicated space in Woodstock for people to experience visual art, live music and to access educational programs and artistic resources.
I have always been interested in making change - not for the sake of change, but so that our communities better meet the needs of our citizens, and so that everybody who would like to make a contribution is enabled to do so. Today as I was trucking up and down the stairs, I realized exactly how difficult that is going to be - with a plethora of rules we are faced with. I am not complaining - I am determined that this project will prevail. It may take far longer than I care to think about, and it may require some serious sacrifices on my part, but I think it's tremendously important for our community to have a place for people to develop themselves artistically and to experience a caring community.
