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Alpena River Center still years away

ALPENA, Mich. — Last week we showed you the Alpena Wildlife Sanctuary’s artist in residence and the sculpture she donated to the planned Thunder Bay River Center. It will be used as an educational resource on how we can protect the thunder bay river and it’s watershed.

We reached out to Judy Kalmanek to find out more about the current status of the River Center. She said COVID–19 threw a wrench in their plans and has caused a loss in funding, but now they’re getting back to the process of making the river center a reality. “It’s been kind of touch and go, but we’re picking up the pieces and picking ourselves up,” she said. “We’re planning to have some events for the community.”

Kalmanek added that at one point they did have a year they hoped to begin construction, but following the loss in funding, they really don’t know. “We were thinking that we would be able to start construction in 2022, but I don’t see that happening unless we have some small miracle now.”