Duane Hicks
The Fort Frances Tourist Information Centre will remain open a month longer this season (through the end of September) and re-open next May under a new lease at a lower cost.
After giving the province notice in February that the town was terminating its lease effective Aug. 31, citing it no longer was financially feasible to pay to keep renting it, the province contacted the town and the two parties since have re-negotiated the lease, Fort Frances CAO Doug Brown told council at its regular meeting Monday night.
“They actually reduced the rent by 47.7 percent,” Brown noted.
“We pay a higher monthly fee but we only pay that fee for the months we operate the centre,” he explained.
The 2015 and 2016 base rent was $10,850 per year, or $904.15 per month.
Under the amended lease, the rent will be $1,200 per month. But if the town only operates the centre from May 1-Sept. 30 (five months), it only will cost $6,000–a $4,850 reduction in base rent per year.
Looking forward, council will determine through its annual budget process whether the town is in a financial position to operate the centre for another year (the lease has a six-month “out” clause).
Meanwhile, economic development consultant Tannis Drysdale secured a one-time operating grant in the amount of $20,000 from Tourism Northern Ontario, with the understanding the centre will remain open until Sept. 30, 2017.
Tourism Northern Ontario, one of the Regional Tourism Organizations (RTOs) funded by the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, also has committed to finding a long-term funding solution before December working with the town and economic development office, she added.
This is good news. For the last couple of years, the town has shared the cost of renting the building with the Sunset Country Tourism Association.
But when it understood the grant from Tourism Northern Ontario no longer was available starting this year, council was left with the decision to stay at the centre and pay the full share of leasing the location (about $27,500 annually) or cancelling the lease.
The town had chosen the latter.
But Drysdale noted when the decision was made in February to close the centre at the end of this season, the town wrote a letter to Tourism Northern Ontario.
Its reply indicated it would like to partner with the town and keep the centre open this year.
“We are really happy that the province decided to support tourism at this critical point of entry,” Drysdale told the Times.
