Federal government mum on 2017 celebration plans

Tories pledge $210 million on events but are uncertain about the details

With barely 18 months to go until Canada’s sesquicentennial year, the federal government has still not determined how it will celebrate the country’s 150th birthday in the National Capital Region.

Through the Canada 150 Fund, the government has pledged to spend $210 million on events, activities and celebrations across Canada between now and 2017.

But the allocation of funding for celebration activities in the capital region “has not yet been determined,” the Department of Canadian Heritage said in an email.

“While you can expect to see enhanced celebration activities in the NCR and across the country in 2017, Canada 150 project funding decisions have not yet been taken,” the email said. “Once funding decisions are made, information on supported projects will be shared.”

According to the Canadian Heritage website, there is no established deadline to submit an application for Canada 150 Fund money. Moreover, applications for “signature initiatives” — highimpact, large-scale projects that are national in scope — aren’t even being accepted at this time.

Contrast that with the City of Ottawa’s ambitious plans, which have been in development for months.

Guy Laflamme and his team of 10 at the Ottawa 2017 Bureau have been asked to develop about a dozen signature special events and attract 1.75 million more visitors than Ottawa typically sees in a year (which is about eight million).

Mayor Jim Watson rarely misses a chance to mention 2017 and nearly always wears an Ottawa 2017 pin on his lapel.

“We got out of the gate early and worked hard to position Ottawa as the destination of choice for 2017,” he said in an interview.

“If there’s one city that should be the epicentre of those celebrations, it should be the nation’s capital. This is our city’s moment to shine on the national and international stage.”

Watson is lobbying for Ottawa to host the 2017 Grey Cup, an NHL Heritage Classic outdoor game and the Juno Awards and has plans for a dozen or more new “signature attractions.”

Before he retired earlier this year, former foreign affairs minister John Baird was briefed by Watson about the city’s concept and vision for 2017. The mayor has also met with former Canadian Heritage minister James Moore and the heads of several Crown corporations and national institutions.

But not Shelly Glover, the country’s current heritage minister.

“We tried to arrange a meeting, but it just didn’t happen,” Watson said, adding it likely never will now that Glover has announced she won’t seek re-election this fall.

The mayor said he’ll try to meet with the department’s deputy minister instead and will also raise the city’s 2017 plans when he meets with Nepean-Carleton MP Pierre Poilievre in a few weeks.

“I don’t anticipate any announcements or really any movement on decisions until after the election,” Watson said.

He’s also briefed Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne, but said the provincial government’s focus right now is on the Pan-Am Games, which will be held in Toronto this summer.

Much of the focus on 2017, so far, has been on big events, but a number of major projects at national museums and cultural institutions have been timed for completion that year.

The $80.5-million renovation of the crumbling Canada Science and Technology Museum, now under way, should be completed by the fall of 2017, according to a museum spokesperson.

After a $110.5-million “re-imagining,” the National Arts Centre will unveil its new clothes on Canada Day 2017. Spokeswoman Rosemary Thompson says the NAC is planning a “weekend celebration” to open the renewed arts centre, running from Friday, June 30 to Sunday July 2.

■ The opening will happen during the Canada Scene Festival, showcasing artists from across Canada during a month-long celebration.

■ At the Canadian Museum of History, the opening of the new 44,000-square-foot history hall, which will present a chronological account of Canada’s history from prehistory to the present, is far and away the big event. The history hall, the centrepiece of the museum’s 25-million makeover, will open July 1, 2017.

“The museum really expects with that hall, and with other projects and partnerships that we’ve got on the go, to be at the centre of the celebrations here,” says museum spokeswoman Patricia Lynch.

In addition, the museum is planning two special exhibitions in 2017. One, scheduled to open in March 2017, is on the history of hockey in Canada, coinciding with the 100th anniversary of the NHL.

The other, opening in October 2017, is a collaboration with Parks Canada focusing on Sir John Franklin’s doomed expedition to the Arctic. It will feature some of the artifacts recovered after the discovery last year of the HMS Erebus, Franklin’s ship.

The exhibition will examine Franklin disastrous final voyage of 1845, the fame and failure of subsequent searches, the critical role played by the Inuit in the Franklin mystery and Parks Canada’s breakthrough discovery of the Erebus in 2014.

The city, meanwhile, is anxiously-awaiting the opening of an expanded Ottawa Art Gallery, which is a key part of the $100-million redevelopment of Arts Court. The groundbreaking is set for July 15, with the new gallery expected to open in late summer or early fall 2017.

As more 2017 banners and street signs go up across the city, Watson said Ottawa residents are beginning to see that it could be a big year for the city.

Yet it’s different than in 1967, when the centennial celebrations, particularly in Montreal, saw an incredible construction boom, he says.

“We don’t have that advantage,” Watson said. “But what we will do is a series of very exciting, innovative events that will not only please people here in the city, but really act as a magnet to attract people from around the country.”

Canada 150 project funding decisions have not yet been taken. Once funding decisions are made, information on supported projects will be shared.