City of Edmundston Unveils Plans for Multi-Million Dollar Arena

Volunteers spearheading the local civic centre project in Edmundston, New Brunswick on Tuesday unveiled some key aspects of the proposed 21-million-dollar facility.

Plans for the arena, developed with the help of a consulting firm, include 2400 seats for ice sports and 3680 seats in a show configuration, according to project co-chair Paul Albert.   It will enable the community to host major shows, fairs and other large-scale cultural and community events, as well as ice events.

The group of civic centre volunteers has been working for the past two years on this project, which will be located next to the Sports Pavilion, the Cité des Jeunes A-M-Sormany High School, as well as the Edmundston campuses of the Université de Moncton and the New Brunswick Community College.

The project can only be completed with the financial backing from the federal and provincial governments, in the amount of $7 million each.  The municipal contribution is also $7 million, with $1 million coming from the sale of the old Forum, $2.5 million from the major fundraising campaign and $3.5 million from a residual contribution of the City of Edmundston.

The funding applications to the provincial and federal governments have been sent and we’ve had an excellent reception to the project so far, said Edmundston Mayor Cyrille Simard.  “We are confident that this is a solid project that has the backing of the community.  The major fundraising campaign is underway and we feel genuine enthusiasm in the community.”

The project is expected to create 385 jobs during its construction phase , and 221 permanent jobs once the new civic centre is operational.