Convention centre mock-up (Image Credit: Tourism Kamloops)

By James Peters

City Hall

Tourism Kamloops touts $89M convention centre plan

Mar 31, 2026 | 3:30 PM

KAMLOOPS — Tourism Kamloops is calling on city hall to get on board its push for a new convention centre in the city.

The marketing agency presented results of a feasibility study to council’s Committee of the Whole Tuesday (March 31), saying it supports the need to build a new convention centre in order to prop up the Kamloops business sector.

“The convention centre in Kamloops fixes a lot of things,” Tourism Kamloops CEO Erik Fisher told council. “It helps existing businesses be more sustainable, it helps attract new businesses and it gives entities like airlines the anchor attraction to support new air routes.”

The study estimates the cost of an ideal facility – including an 18,000-square-foot ballroom, six breakout rooms and an Indigenous gathering space – at $89 million. Fisher proposed an equal three-way funding split between city taxpayers, a public-private partnership and contributions from the two upper levels of government.

“I think the city should own the building,” he continued. “I think the city should consider partners, whether that be active partners or, at very least, sponsorship through naming rights. A third-party operator should run the facility and I think Tourism Kamloops could be considered as the sales and marketing arm.”

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The study anticipates a facility like this would run at a net operating loss of about $450,000 annually, but Fisher says the investment would pay off in support for local businesses, especially during non-peak tourism months.

“Many destinations can’t grow until their hotel rooms grow. That’s not our issue here in Kamloops,” he said. “We have approximately 50 accommodation partners here in Kamloops. Our challenge is keeping them in business and helping them to have a balanced workforce year-round.”

Several councillors expressed enthusiastic support for the vision, noting the lack of appropriate convention space in the city.

“There’s so many small conferences I’ve been to in Kamloops that are just stuffed to the rafters,” noted Councillor Nancy Bepple. “My favourite is coming up in a week-and-a-half or so – the [Kamloops Exploration Group] Conference – and it cannot be bigger than it is right now. They would take up twice as much space if they had the opportunity.”

“Things get really squishy in Kamloops when you start getting to that 200-person mark,” agreed Fisher. “Quite honestly, we have a list from here to [Columbia Street] of people interested to come here for meetings and conferences but we just simply don’t have the space to service them.”

“I’m sure everyone around this room and beyond has had people say to them, ‘How does Kamloops not have a convention centre? How is that possible?’,” added Councillor Katie Neustaeter. “The hub of the province, in the centre of so many things – with our resource sector and the number of conferences people fly away for when we should be attracting them. I think this is a significant opportunity that’s been identified and something that’s rattled around for decades.”

Fisher estimated a return on investment of more than 18-to-1, meaning $18 of economic impact would be generated for every dollar spent.

No proposed location has been singled out, though several in the room pointed to a preference of downtown.

“If it was up to me on next steps, I would love to see an industry- and city-led group come together, review the findings and understand what sort of barriers and next steps could look like – with some intention and some passion behind it,” said Fisher.