Town & Country

BY JIM TIMLICK Thompson could soon become home to a year-round research and education facility designed to showcase one of the province's most enigmatic residents if a group of local community organizers has its way. M embers of Spirit Way first an- nounced plans to build a Wolf Centre of Excellence about four years ago. The aim of the project would be to promote human and wolf coexis- tence through research, education, science and ecotourism. The estimated cost of the project is $2 mil- lion and Spirit Way officials have already raised about $500,000 towards that price tag through corporate sponsors like Calm Air and Via Rail. Plans are for the group to launch a formal fundraising campaign later this year. Its efforts recently received a boost from the Churchill Regional Economic Development Fund, which provided funding to develop a business plan for the project. Spirit Way president Keith MacDonald, who also serves as vice-president of the Thompson Chamber of Commerce, says the centre will be the first facility of its kind in the world. "It will be more than just a building. We want to create a whole programming component as well to help educate people," says MacDonald, who has lived in Thompson since 2005. It could take up to two years to complete the project, MacDonald says, depending on how long it takes Spirit Way to wrap up its fundrais- ing efforts. In the meantime, Spirit Way officials have begun designing a wolf habitat that will be part of the Boreal Discovery Centre located on Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation (NCN) traditional territory. The habitat will measure about one and a quarter acres in size and could house up to four animals at one time. MacDonald says plans haven't been finalized yet on how the centre will obtain animals for study, but it will most likely be rescues who are born in captivity and are un- able to survive on their own in the wild. Plans are also being drawn up for a wolf learning centre where students and other visitors could learn more about the animals. One of the compo- nents of the learning centre will be a 50 to 60-seat theatre where visitors will be able to observe the wolves interacting with each other in their natural habitat through glass walls and via video cameras located throughout the habitat. As part of its longer-term plans, centre organiz- ers hope to develop partnerships with other local groups. MacDonald says the centre would love to work with University College of the North (UCN) to develop some kind of research program that could use the centre to gather data on wolves. It also hopes to develop some kind of environmental teaching program in conjunction with the Boreal Discovery Centre. Once work on the centre is complete, Spirit Way plans to apply for certification from the Canadian Aquariums and Zoos Association (CAZA) which sets the standards for such facilities. The group plans to exceed some of those standards, MacDon- ald adds, including the installation of a 10-foot high fence around the habitat rather than the six- foot fence required by CAZA. Although Spirit Way and its members have been proceeding cautiously with plans for the Wolf Centre of Excellence, they have set some lofty goals. MacDonald says the hope is that it will one day become a major tourist draw similar to Churchill and how its polar bear population attracts people from all over the country. In fact, MacDonald says Thompson's close proximity to Churchill could make it a natural stop for many of those tourists headed to the city's northern neighbour. "If you are taking a seven-day trip (to Churchill) we want to be one of your stops along the way," he says. "You could stop overnight in Thompson and look at our facilities and our infrastructure and tour the town. On the way back south you could stop back and see what you didn't finish seeing the first time." Canada is regarded as home to one of the world's largest populations of grey wolves and it's estimated that 10 per cent of those 50,000 animals reside in Manitoba. Wolves have achieved something akin to rock star status in Thompson. It all started in 2005 when artist award-winning mural artist Charles Johnston was commissioned to create a 10-storey reproduction of wildlife painter Robert Bateman's Wolf Sketch on the side of a building along Spirit Way, a popular two-kilometre walk- ing and biking path. It generated so much buzz the city's former mayor declared it the "Wolf Capital of Canada." A few years later the city hosted the first-ever International Wolf and Car- nivore Conference that drew researchers from all over the world and eventually commissioned a series of two-metre-plus painted wolf statues. "Wolves are highly controversial in other parts of the world but they're also a very charismatic species," MacDonald says. "We don't know exactly how many we have on our Spirit Way site but we have been tracking a lot of sightings from other people." 6 WINNIPEG FREE PRESS, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 14, 2019, 2019 THOMPSON The FLIN FLON ARTS COUNCIL Supporting Art in the north and northern Artists Create. Participate. Enjoy! www.flinflonartscouncil.ca The learning centre at the proposed Wolf Centre of Excellence will be a place where students and other visitors can learn more about one of the province's most fascinating residents. (TOP) Members of the group building the Wolf Centre of Excellence are hoping to have the facility certified by the Canadian Aquariums and Zoos Association. (RIGHT) Spirit Way officials have begun work on a wolf habitat that will be part of the Boreal Discovery Centre located on Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation traditional territory. Hungry for the wolf PROPOSED CENTRE WILL SHOWCASE REGION'S MOST ENIGMATIC RESIDENT

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