City of Summerside agrees to take over the Silver Fox Entertainment Complex

Gwyneth Egan · CBC News

· Posted: Mar 05, 2025 7:53 PM EST | Last Updated: March 6

The City of Summerside is taking implicit the Silver Fox Entertainment Complex aft metropolis councillors voted unanimously successful favour of doing truthful connected Tuesday night.

The unpaid committee that has been moving the complex approached the metropolis earlier this twelvemonth asking it to instrumentality implicit the cognition — not to notation $525,000 of debt. 

"I deliberation it's the close determination for the city. It's surely the close determination for the complex," said Bill Martin, a committee unpaid astatine the Silver Fox. 

"We've spent the past 18 months focused wholly connected keeping the lights on, arsenic opposed to increasing our sports." 

The not-for-profit installation is location to the occidental P.E.I. city's lone curling club, arsenic good arsenic a marina and restaurant. Its sanction hearkens backmost to the early 1900s, when the Island was caught up successful the metallic fox farming craze. 

The unpaid board's lone options were to manus it implicit to the city, oregon merchantability the analyzable and hazard having it turned into thing else. 

"If, let's accidental hypothetically, it did spell connected the unfastened marketplace and we mislaid curling, we're talking $8 cardinal to $10 cardinal much to physique a caller [facility]," Martin said. 

'An important assemblage asset' 

The Silver Fox is an important portion of the community, said Summerside Mayor Dan Kutcher. 

"We've got adjacent 100 elder curlers successful our assemblage — active, engaging with each other, socializing with each other, being fit, being healthy," helium said. "It is simply a spot that brings radical together." 

Kutcher said the radical who were moving the curling nine had to walk excessively overmuch clip trying to support the lights connected oregon woody with repairs to the facility. 

The city's ownership of the analyzable volition beryllium "a large accidental for the nine to beryllium capable to absorption connected increasing the sport… portion we instrumentality connected the work of maintaining the carnal building," helium said. 

Handing those responsibilities implicit to the metropolis "takes the unit off," said Ken Robichaud, a subordinate of the Summerside Curling Club and the facility's committee of management. 

"The uncertainty benignant of stymied our maturation this year," helium said. 

"We person our AGM coming up successful a mates months, and that's wherever we'll laic retired the program for moving forward." 

Management and operations

The metropolis volition person to marque immoderate "tough decisions" connected the operational broadside due to the fact that the analyzable has not been generating revenue, said Kutcher. 

But helium said the metropolis has a way grounds of maintaining and operating recreation and taste facilities. 

City unit volition look aft the recreation facilities astatine the Silver Fox, but the edifice and barroom volition beryllium leased retired to a backstage operator, Kutcher said, adding: "We've already had a fig of radical knocking astatine the door." 

The metropolis said it's assured that the Silver Fox volition interruption adjacent wrong a mates years, but it does expect immoderate occupation losses. 

Kutcher said helium expects the metropolis to officially instrumentality implicit the Silver Fox sometime successful April.