A deep dive into the performing arts centre plan

The Township of Langley is planning to build a 1,600 seat performing arts centre. The Mayor says it will cost $85M. The Township’s own ACC bylaw says $150M. However, when you look at what comparable facilities are actually costing in BC right now, in Kamloops, Kelowna, and Burnaby, the real number should be much higher. So much higher that we may not actually be able to afford to finish what we start.

That’s not a political opinion. That’s just the math.

In October just before the by-election it was announced the Township had received a grant from the federal government for $25M to build a performing arts centre at the LEC. A million was approved to begin design work, but there hasn’t been discussion at council so we don’t know all the details.

One condition of the grant is that construction must begin by early 2027 or the funds will be withdrawn, so we should expect an announcement soon.

The Financials

The ACC bylaw estimates the total cost to be $150M while the most recent interview with the mayor he says the current estimate is $85M. Net of the $25M grant, we are looking at needed $60M to $125M of financing

There aren’t reserves for this so almost all of this will need to be funded by debt. I’ve discussed this slide extensively in prior articles but the 2026 Capital budget slide shows that the Township can only borrow $166M and stay under the provincial limit. This is a hard cap from the province, we cannot borrow more without special approval from the Province.

Projected budgets show we are going to consume the majority of our remaining available credit for this project.

The Risk

After the loan we take out, we are going to have 41M to 106M left of credit room. The risk is what happens if cost overruns occur once we start running low on credit room. We’ll be stuck with a half built shell until taxes can be raised enough to complete construction.

Cost overruns are a constant with government contracts so is there real risk of this?

Kelowna

Kelowna recently finished costing a plan to build a 1,600 seat theater in their downtown. Their latest cost estimate is this project will end up costing $221M. ($138k per seat)

Kamloops

Kamloops is currently building a performing arts centre with two halls that add up to 1,550 seats. This project has been mired with cost overruns and is now projected to cost $210M. ($136k per seat) The $85M quoted by Eric is closer to what Kamloops pre construction estimates were a decade ago.

Burnaby

Burnaby is currently building a performing arts space, the James Cowan Theatre. It is going to have 364 seats and cost $55M ($151k per seat).

It’s unclear how the Township of Langley expects to be able to build a performing arts centre as large as we are for between $85M to $150M.

The going per seat rate from other BC projects is between $136k per seat to $153k per seat. The Township project has a low end of $53k per seat and a high end of $94k per seat. These are substantially lower numbers than everyone else is coming up with. We need a real explanation of why the Township thinks this can be done so cheaply in a net zero building.

Let’s be realistic though. The numbers here aren’t ambiguous. At current BC construction rates, the Township cannot complete this project within its legal borrowing limit, even if it builds nothing else. At Kamloops rates ($135k/seat), the project requires $191M in borrowing. There is no path to actually completing this project based on what every other similar facilities per seat costs. The only option for completion would be a dramatic tax increase or special provincial intervention. We risk pouring tens of millions into a foundation we legally cannot afford to finish.

We risk sinking millions into a project we cannot complete, having an empty shell in the LEC parking lot for years.

About the Grant

The grant announced from the federal government needs a little closer scrutiny. The grant comes from the Green and Inclusive Community Buildings fund. The fund’s purpose is to subsidize the cost of making buildings Net Zero, which is significantly more expensive than more traditional building methods.

It’s important to understand this isn’t a grant to build arts space, it’s to create more climate change resilient buildings. Letting the grant expire means we can build cheaper. It’s rushing our decision but it’s in reality not really making what we are building that much cheaper because of the net-zero strings attached.

The grant also isn’t a flat $25M like reported. It’s tiered funding. They match 60% of township funding on the first 10M and 50% on the rest to a cap of 25M. If we are just looking at how to spend so we use the grant most efficiently, a smaller facility makes best use of the funds we are spending.

What’s The Alternative?

This isn’t an argument against a performing arts centre. Langley needs one, but it needs the right one.

Look at the Evergreen Cultural Centre in Coquitlam with 257 seats. Check their calendar – something is happening virtually every single day. Local theatre, comedy, music, family programming, art exhibitions. It’s a real community asset that gets used constantly. Loved by the community.

Now look at the Bell Centre in Surrey with 1,100 seats. It is large, impressive but a mostly empty calendar.

Size doesn’t make a performing arts centre successful, programming does. Local programming fills 300 seats, not 1,600.

I’ve written before about how Langley builds for game day not every day. Our arenas and athletic facilities are all optimized for the big moment that happens rarely instead of everyday community use. The 1,600 seat performing arts centre is that same mistake, just much more expensive.

A smaller venue in the 300 seat range would cost a fraction of the current proposal based on comparable projects. It would serve local artists every week, have a full calendar, use the federal grant efficiently, and leave borrowing room for the pool and roads Willoughby was actually promised.

High School Graduation

Proponents cite high school graduation as a key use case and it’s a fair point. A 1,600 seat venue does solve that problem and I won’t pretend otherwise.

But with 9 schools, that’s 9 events a year. At $200M+ in construction cost plus ongoing operating expenses, that’s an extraordinarily expensive solution to a once-a-year problem. The math doesn’t justify the scale.

A mid-sized 800 seat theatre could address this but we start running into the debt cap constraints that even a facility that size will eat all our borrowing room at the expense of amenities residents were already promised like the Willoughby pool. At $130k per seat on the low end we’d be looking at a $100M facility. The remaining ~$60M in debt room can’t cover a pool, 202St and whatever other borrowing might come up. What is more valuable to Langley, one day or everyday?

Tomorrow’s Performing Arts

The math on this project doesn’t work. It didn’t work in Kamloops when they estimated $91M a decade ago and watched it balloon to $210M. It doesn’t work in Kelowna where a comparable venue is coming in at $221M. It’s not going to work in Langley where we have $166M of total borrowing room and no reserves.

Nobody is against the arts, but building a half-finished concrete shell in the LEC parking lot because we ran out of money isn’t supporting the arts, it’s wasting taxpayer money on a vanity project we were never going to be able to afford.

Langley deserves a performing arts centre. It deserves one we can actually finish.