But-no place to eat their lunch IT’S HARD to relate the new North Vancouver District hall to the old. By Martin Millerchip , Contributing Writer + Which, after all, was the idea of building the new building. Glass, light, space and high tech- nology have replaced gloomy municipal working q:sarters that met --. neither. building ‘nor! safety stan- 28 dards, The old council chamber was So small that’ many nights residents strained on‘tiptoe for a glimpse of the proceedings ‘from..the hallway . outside, Lip-reading was a, useful .° Skill, since the sound system never : ~.-séemed to work. on nights when it was needed. The $11.5- million, rebuild. opti- on mistically referred to as a renova-. tion, was also optimistically budget- » ed at $8.2 million. © - However, the hall is still referred to: as “on-budget” by. senior: man- ‘agers since ‘council approved the .extra $3.3 million. - Whatever the cost,’ the upgrade “has :resulted in- an award-winning, . : handsome space that gives staff the”. room to move for. the first time: in years. a “ [. The public, too, “gets, lots of ; space to admire while ‘paying: its - taxes. A large, stone-flagged entry-., -- way'leads to a four-storey high atri- -um ‘soon to be graced by $60,000 ; worth of metal sculpture. Some staff: live. in secret : hope - that it will be big enough to screen. “them from public view as they eat their lunch by the vending machines - at the bottom of the atrium. ... .- =" They say that the lack'of a dedi- “cated funch room forces: them ‘to , take their breaks i in front of visitors to the hall. : ar “The ‘new. council ; ‘chamber is - walled j in’ glass to increase the pub- ‘lie’ 's awareness of council. : “Unfortunately, the view from the West Queens access point is’ often » ig pyle geal et TE 1 ee “1998 eer | ’ LITTLE LEAGUE “CHAMPIONSHIP ~ July 29 - August’ Te : Chris. Zuehike Park’ 19th & Jones © North, Van, . 11-12 year | ‘olds “from all over the! province Howe Sound “West. Vancouv Highlands 3 - yan Vatley Forest. Hilts" N: Central Mi. Seymour one of closed blinds. . Inside the hal, however, access to the new and much larger chamber is improved. Three sets of double doors elim- inate the old kaliway bottleneck but, until recently, tripled the amount of distracting doorbanging during debate. - However, the crash bars on the new. doors have just been replaced with ones: that can be locked in the “open position during council meet- ings. At least there have been no com- plaints about the sound system, which provides the same quality of audio reinforcement from any, point in the chamber.:~ Except for one. During recent high-profile debates on land-use plans for Cove Forest and Mountain Forest many East Seymour “residents complained that they were shut out of watching and listening to the final decision of council.” ‘An interior meeting room with Your Choice ‘Reg. up to $12. 93 we * Boy's Knit Shirts, Shorts” ; Si winnwear (SML)} Girl's Swimwear, Shorts & | Shirts (7-16) Rompers & ; . Shorts Sets"(Newborn-6x) ns SPECIAL, CHI _ CLOTHING ¢ CI So 00 Reg. up, to $7.96, Boy audio and video links to the council : chamber, designed for just such an overflow situation, remained locked to the residents. : Instead, they waited in a corridor underneath public address speakers that were not. wired to the council- chamber sound system. Still, many of the other compo- nents in the $160,000 audio/visual budget seem to be working well, although the News was unable:to , find anyone who had actually used the infra-red sound system for the “hard of hearing. A In fact, none of the regular ¢ coun: ’ cil watchers knew about it. | ; A room: with restricted access houses microphone mixers, ampli- fiers, large screen projector ;equip- ment and video recorders. together” with more exotic and less compre- hensible video/data . selectors, a matrix switcher, three audio/video modulators and several other myste- rious black boxes. i : Much of, this equipment is See New municipal hall page § (Beside McDonald's) ..- -Murchie’s to sell wares at WV Memorial Library HAVE A cup of coffee with your read und contribute to West Van" Memorial Library’s collection. ' At its Monday night meeting, West Vancouver District Council gave the nod to an’ agreement between the library board and Murchie’s Tea & Coffee Ltd. that will permit the company to offer its own brand of refreshment near the washrooms on the northwest side of the library's main floor. 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