Elliot Lake officials working to determine future of civic centre after roof collapse

Officials are still working to determine the future of the Lester B. Pearson Civic Centre in Elliot Lake, after a roof collapse two months ago.

On Feb. 21, the roof of the 360-seat theatre came down due to snow load. There were three people inside at the time, but no one was injured.

CAO Daniel Gagnon says the building is closed to the public.

"We've been slowly working with engineers to determine the state of the rest of the building," he said.

"It turns out most of the building, except for the auditorium area is structurally sound."

Gagnon says crews have been working to remove items from the safe parts of the building, including artifacts from a museum and pieces of work from an art gallery.

He says now, discussions are happening to figure out what to do next.

"We will at some point have some reasonable expectation we will get some funding from the insurer," he said.

He says from there, a decision will have to be made on whether to do repairs, demolish and rebuild the centre or pick a new location all together.

Gagnon says the city has worked to accommodate events that were set to take place at the centre.

"We repurposed another solid building, older but in good shape," he said.

"It was our grocery store when lost the mall and now it's our new theatre."

This isn't the first time the community has dealt with a roof collapse. Seven years ago, part of the roof at the mall collapsed, killing two people.

Meanwhile, the local arena in Elliot Lake was closed to the public as a precaution following the civic centre collapse.

Gagnon says they city wants to do a more detailed structural review on it, but a decision is expected in a few weeks.