We submitted a rezoning application to Town of Canmore's Administration department in March 2022.

Our application PASSED first reading in the May 2 Council Meeting. A Public Hearing is scheduled for June 6.  To help prepare for the hearing, we've put together a document to help each one of us prepare to voice our support. Click here to get your copy.

Check here for updates as meeting details and schedules should come out later.

You can find information about our application here.

Please pray that God will continue to lead and guide us as this project proceeds and that Town Council and Administration will look favourably upon our rezoning application.

"After many months of negotiations and regular Church Business / SGD Update meetings, we have an offer to purchase a 2 acre parcel of land on the western outskirts of Canmore. We also have a conditional offer on the sale of our current property on 1717 BVT. Both deals are conditional on the Church receiving re-zoning approval on the property we have a conditional offer on. We are finally at a point whereby our application, which was submitted last March 2022, will be presented to Town Council May 2,2023.

The following is an excerpt from the SGD status update in our Trinity Directions Weekly News Letter;

We submitted a rezoning application to Town of Canmore's Administration department in March 2022.

Our date for the First Reading of our application by the Town Council has been delayed to May 2. You can find information about our application here.

We're still hopeful that the re-zoning process will continue as smoothly as possible. We will update the prospective timeline as it becomes more clear.

Please pray that God will continue to lead and guide us as this project proceeds and that Town Council and Administration will look favourably upon our rezoning application.

Since our last SGD status update on March 7th there has been a lot of ground covered, namely;

• We have selected and onboarded an Architect ( Robert Pashuk Associates - RPA) and a Construction Manager ( Ashton Construction Services - ACS). Steve Ashton is a local Canmore contractor, Robert Pashuk is based in Calgary. Together these two companies have partnered in the design and construction of the Valbella renovation. They are very excited to have been chosen to participate in our project and are eager to work with us.
• We have in place "Short form" contracts with both RPA and ACS to facilitate the commencement of the work. We are in the process of finalizing the " Long-form" contracts with both contractors.
• To date, RPA has reviewed TBC programming needs and has worked up "adjacency diagrams" ( identified what activities/rooms need to be close to each other). They have also completed a site optimization study for 1717 BVT ( our current location) and concluded the best spot for the building is where the current church footprint is located. To commence further in the design process, RPA has advised we need to settle on a building site location, either stay at 1717 BVT or secure an alternate building site, before progressing further in the design process. Contrary to what we thought, RPA believes the actual building layout and design are highly dependant on the specific building site.
• Extensive effort has gone into finding a potential alternate 1-acre building site in Canmore. This is still very much a work in progress and your prayers for God to clearly show us His will is vital. To date, none of the potential sites explored have resulted in a firm option that we could bring to the congregation for an endorsement.

You may ask why are we spending so much time and effort searching for an alternate building site? Why not just move on with the originally planned renovations at 1717 BVT? There are two new pieces of information we have learned over the past 6 months that were not known when the original SGD plan was developed;

1. The all-in cost projections for the project based on the proposals submitted from the 4 contractors we reached out to is higher than the original SGD estimate. The Capital Campaign target of $750k was set based on the original estimate, the balance of funding was to come from bank financing. We could scale back the extent of the renovations to try to bring the cost back in line with the original estimate but the end result may not meet all our needs. Further complicating the cost side of the project is the higher than expected cost of building materials such as lumber which is now 4 times higher than a year ago. Expectations are building materials costs should reduce in a year or so but may not return to pre-COVID levels which will impact the building costs, we will have to see if any price correction materializes.
2. The new owners of the adjacent property to TBC (the AKAI) are extremely interested and motivated to purchase the TBC property which would significantly enhance their planned development. We have made it very clear to them we would only sell if we found a suitable alternate building site and the cost of the site plus the increased cost of a new build vs our planned renovation costs was factored into the sale price of TBC's property. The AKAI owners are aware of our price expectations and remain very interested in the possibility of acquiring our property if we can find a suitable building site.

We continue our property search since we believe, should God want us to, in the long term it would be the best option for TBC from a facility/parking and financial perspective. However, we are extremely grateful for God's wonderful provision of 1717 BVT to TBC and, if His answer is for us to stay then we know His will is perfect and we will proceed with all diligence and joy. Please pray for us as we Seek God's Direction.

Your SGD Team