SEQUIM — Guy Cole Convention Center could get a facelift if Patsy Mattingley has her way.
Mattingley, a citizen park advisory board member who has played piccolo and flute for the Sequim City Band for 14 years, recently went before the City Council to propose upgrades to the 10,000-square-foot convention center that would make it a better concert venue during the colder months.
The city band of 50 local volunteer musicians now performs on the third Sunday from May to September at the James Center band shell, an outdoor concert stage at the city water reclamation park north of Carrie Blake Park, in which the Guy Cole center sits.
Mattingley and others with the parks board are writing up a formal plan to present to the City Council in about two weeks.
“This is all concept,” Mattingley said Monday at the center in Carrie Blake Park.
“We’re talking about it becoming a community center.”
Mattingley estimated it could cost about $250,000 to upgrade the convention center, from new stage to sound system to backstage area to seating area of more than 300 to restrooms.
Once the money is raised, the band could make the improvements, then turn the facility back over to the city, according to Mattingley.
Improving the acoustics, which Mattingley said are awful, would require removal of the ceiling and other improvements.
Sequim Valley Lions Club built Guy Cole Convention Center and other Carrie Blake Park amenities, giving the convention center to the city of Sequim in 1982.
The club also erected Carrie Blake Park’s picnic shelter in 1994 and raised $32,000 to put in a pair of softball diamonds.
The convention center, named for Cole’s Jewelers co-owner Guy Cole, a Lions Club member, is a product of Lions labor, funded by money from club events and from the city’s lodging-tax revenues.
The convention center, constructed about 30 years ago with about 5,000 volunteer hours, belongs to the city.
Mattingley said the center proposal would make it more attractive to other uses.
The hall also is used as a gathering place for family reunions, wedding receptions, dinners and meetings, and it brings about $10,000 a year to the city in rental fees.
Besides the band, Mattingley said the Port Angeles Symphony could use the facility as could other music groups and theater companies.
The building could also be used as a convention facility and for church service and schools and college classes, she said.
Aside from its kitchen and storage areas, the facility is just one big room as it is today.
Mattingley said the project would require fundraising, but she noted that it only took one anonymous donation to build the bandshell so she is confident money would materialize from music-loving donors.
“Plus, I would hope the community would come out and pitch in,” she said.
The band shell is a popular performance attraction, she said, attracting up to 400 to City Band concerts. On the Fourth of July, she said, between 800 and 900 residents show up to enjoy the musical celebration.
Although the band practices in Swisher Hall behind the band shell stage, it is tight quarters, she said.
The bigger place for the City Band to perform indoors, she said, is Sequim High School auditorium.
“What happens now is we are at the mercy of the high school,” she said, which uses the auditorium extensively, making it tough for the City Band to schedule dates there.
Mattingley said the need for a permanent performance hall for the band becomes more prevalent as time goes by.
“I’m always looking for places to play,” she said, explaining why she came up with the Guy Cole concept.
Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
