Rental fees set for library/park area in Village of Barnwell

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By Cole Parkinson
Taber Times
cparkinson@tabertimes.com

Barnwell council has set some new rental fees for the old library building and park area.

During their regular meeting on Feb. 15, council discussed what fees would be appropriate for renting the two areas.

Village of Barnwell administration did some digging on what fees were being charged in similar facilities in Taber including the public library and community centre.

They discovered the colour rooms at the community centre charge $20.50 an hour, the board room at the Taber Public Library costs $15 a day and the other available room at the library costs $25 an hour along with a $100 damage deposit.

Council felt the $20.50 mark was high for what they were offering and they were more comfortable with a slightly lower fee.

“When you said the Civic Centre rooms, they’re kind of the same size, a little smaller than the library I’d say. So do we take around the $15 dollars an hour, that sounds fair to me,” said Mayor Del Bodnarek. “I kind of like the idea around the $12.50 to $15, somewhere around there.”

Another question they had to answer was whether they wanted to charge by the day or by the hour.

Both have an advantage but there was also the possibility of having the flexibility of charging by the hour at a flat rate and by the day at a discounted price from said hourly rate.

“Say somebody wants it for karate on a Tuesday night from 7-9, you don’t want to charge them $50,” said Deputy Mayor Robin Hansen, who also questioned when the day would start and end. “If somebody wants it for the whole day, is the day over at 6 p.m.?”

With the two facilities being intertwined, there was talk of renting them both at the same time.

While councillors were fine with people renting the two at the same time, they still preferred to keep the fees separate in order to allow two separate groups to rent the facilities at the same time.

“If somebody rents the park and they want to rent the building along with it, just so nobody else is there or just in case it rains, they can do that. If they don’t, somebody else has the opportunity to rent it,” added Wendy Bateman, CAO for the Village of Barnwell.

Some fees suggested by council were set at $12.50 an hour, $50 a day (making the final four hours free) and $25 for the night.

The day would start at 8 a.m. and end at 5 p.m. while the night fee would kick in at 6 p.m. with no real end time suggested.

Another matter council discussed was renaming the old building.

Councillor Deb Hansen suggested three names — Cottonwood Centre, Willow Park Place and Bountiful Building.

Council quickly came to voice their opinion that Willow Park Place was the best choice for the building.

A motion was made to tentatively set prices at $50 a day, $12.50 per hour, $25 for night and rename the building Willow Park Place.

Coun. Kent Bullock was absent from the meeting.

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