Proposed Brooklyn Park Arts Center a Collaborative Effort
The Center for Innovation and the Arts at Brooklyn Park (CITA) is still in the preliminary stages. Collaborators held an open house in Maple Grove this week.
CITA is a collaboration between North Hennepin Community College, Metropolitan State University, Hennepin County, Osseo Area Schools and the city of Brooklyn Park. Organizers are still getting feedback at open houses. They hope to find out how the facility might best meet the needs of the community.
North Hennepin Community College president Barbara McDonald says the college needs the space. CITA would be located on the corner of 85th Avenue and West Broadway.
“Our current facility is failing and it’s time for us to move into a new space,” says McDonald. “The place is primarily for educational purposes.”
But the space will also be used between cities and schools. At the Maple Grove event, collaborators heard about a need for space for performing arts groups as well as a way to incorporate fine arts.
“Why we’re having these community conversations with our area cities is to have that opportunity to see what their needs are,” says McDonald. “And how some of their needs might be able to be answered through usage of our space as well.”
Preliminary plans call for a more than 80-thousand-square-foot facility with a price tag of more than $80 million. A predesign image has been released, but organizers agree it’s a long time before the project breaks ground. McDonald says she’s hopeful that will happen in the next three or four years.
