Arnie Warner takes a stroll through the foyer of the Richmond Hill Centre for the Performing Arts, illuminated by the morning sun shining through a wall of windows. His eyes wander to the restored schoolhouse on the far side of its courtyard, to the rack of flyers that boast a litany of high-profile shows that have come and have yet to come: Art Garfunkel, Rigoletto, Romeo and Juliet.
For Warner and Richmond Hill, it’s a 20-year-old dream made real, years of teamwork and great personal sacrifice come to fruition. To this, he flashes an easy smile and says laconically, “I’m just a lowly Ward 2 councillor. It wasn’t just me.” The town councillor’s modesty doesn’t do justice to his steady leadership, and he certainly doesn’t believe he’s deserving of our nod for Richmond Hill’s Person of the Year — an honour Warner has earned for his efforts in building the centre, restoring the old schoolhouse and turning the municipality’s downtown area into a more business- and family-friendly place to be.
Warner was certainly not alone in the project — it took the work of hundreds of people over many years — but one doesn’t have to look far to find praise for his chairing of the steering committee to build the 600-seat, $30 million venue. “Any building like this needs a crusader, someone who will lead the charge when it comes to securing funds and the public’s interest and support,” says Eli Lukawitz, the centre’s marketing and development co-ordinator. “Councillor Warner has always been the face of this theatre. He has worked tirelessly to further the cause of this venue. And as the chair, he and the rest of the committee were the reasons why we hit the ground running. They set us up for success, and the community of Richmond Hill owes Councillor Warner and the committee a debt of gratitude.”
The centre boasts a floor-to-ceiling glass wall, a street-width floor in the lobby, a 30-seat orchestral pit, a 150-seat rehearsal hall that can be repurposed for community and corporate events and the only fly tower in York Region — allowing for shows with high-end production values. The centre is expected to generate up to $3 million per year for local shops, restaurants and other businesses. “We needed an acoustic space, and this space resonates very well,” says Philip Trow, president of Opera York, currently in residence at the centre. “It has all of the good things and there are more of them. Everyone is gaga about how good the acoustics are there. It also provides a focal point for the arts in Richmond Hill because there hasn’t really been a good theatre in that town ever where artists can come and do things. Now we can do anything, and if we can get bums in the seats, we’ll do it.” The idea of the centre was brewing since the 1980s but was put off due to cost concerns. In 2003, the town finally approved the site location at Yonge Street and Wright Street, on the site of Richmond Hill’s old town hall. The next year the steering committee, led by Warner at the behest of then mayor Bill Bell, was assembled to get the project on its feet. “We wanted to create a people place, and quite frankly, the village core needed revitalization,” says Warner. “You had the remnants of the old strip clubs, there were adult video places, and they’re mostly gone.… People weren’t coming to Richmond Hill, certainly not downtown Richmond Hill. So we decided it should be here. It started some fiery debate and it even became an election issue. But this was the right spot.”
As a resident of Richmond Hill with more than 35 years of experience in public service, Warner was tapped to lead the charge on the arts centre. Tempering democracy with efficiency, Warner balanced input from all sides while keeping the endeavour moving. There was, however, a tremendous personal cost. Warner’s wife, Kathy, died in April, a little more than a month after opening night. It was a tremendous weight to bear for the councillor, while working on the project, though his wife wouldn’t stand for his grief getting the best of him. “It absolutely made working on this more difficult,” says Warner. “I didn’t even want to go to opening night. I wanted to stay with her. But my wife wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The key to success, says Warner, has been to listen to everything that everyone has to say but not be shy about coming to a decision as time ticks down. Not everyone will get everything they want, but a consensus is the ultimate democratic goal. “You need a strong chair to steer something like this, and he steered it all right,” says Suzanne Stoner, a citizen member of the committee. “He ran a tight ship and he didn’t fool around.” “I can offer that Arnie had a real vision on the ground, and the town has felt a huge impact as a result,” adds Richmond Hill Mayor David Barrow. “There was a fraction of the people frequenting the downtown core before compared to now.” Of course, such a project doesn’t come easy, or cheap. Unco-operative weather, problems with materials and a price tag that more than doubled from the original estimate of $12 million delayed opening night for months.
Counc. Nick Papa argues that had construction begun when he first started pushing for the project in 1993 the final tab would have been less severe. Council, however, had been gun-shy of the idea for quite some time. “I know for a fact that in the beginning nobody wanted to do it. Everyone was scared to even start thinking of building one because they were concerned it would cost too much money,” Papa says. “But when Arnie did come on, he was really good. He was able to organize and get everything together for the centre to open.”
The arts community of York Region says the venue is nothing short of a godsend, unlike anything of its kind in the area. A happy end result for the largest project in the city’s history, and for Warner’s part, the most involved project that he has ever undertaken as an elected official. For that, he and the rest of the team are very proud. “We [Warner, city council and the committee] took the stage on opening night after the performances,” he says. “And I remember, as we were getting this standing ovation, that I turned to the mayor and said, ‘We really did this.’ We’re proud of it, and I think, as a town, we should be.”