Kelowna Community Music School looking for a new home after more than 30 years

Photo: Contributed

The current Kelowna Community Music School at 728 DeHart Ave.

The Kelowna Community Music School is ready to make a move.

After more than 30 years in their current location on DeHart Avenue, they are searching for a new home.

“It’s a house, so they did as much as they could with it in terms of renovating and making some of the rooms bigger. But over the years this conversation has come up many times, and we just decided to bite the bullet,” explains the school's executive director Lucy Benwell.

She also said a lot of new construction has popped up near their headquarters, and the board of directors felt it was time to take action before their options become limited.

The music school sold the building in December and is leasing it back. The deadline to find a new home is July 2024.

The Kelowna Community Music School has just over 300 families registered, which equates to students taking over 500 lessons.

Benwell estimates they will need a facility that is twice the size of the 3,700 square feet the school currently occupies.

“We’ve created a wish list, and we have a team who’s looking at what we require. So, we’re looking at either an existing building to remodel or a plot of land that we can build on.

“Ideally, we would want maybe 15 studios, two or three of those large enough for group programming and perhaps even a performance space.”

Benwell says they intend to launch a capital campaign once they have a better idea of how much money they need to raise. As a not-for-profit organization, KCMS relies heavily on funding support from grants, endowment funds, donors and sponsors.

If you want to be part of the campaign, KCMS is looking for ambassadors to join the board.