Update – Grand Forks City Hall Fire charges laid

RCMP have now released the name of the person charged in connection with the arson at Grand Forks – City Hall Thursday.

Charged: Andre Robert CONN, 31, of Grand Forks.

He has been remanded in Custody to appear in Nelson Court on Tuesday, September 24th to answer to charges of: Break and Enter, Arson, Possession of incendiary materials, Possession of break in instruments.

Update: A temporary City Hall has been set up at the Public Works Office, located at 130 Industrial Drive, Grand Forks.

City Council will hold its regular Council meeting Regional District of Kootenay Boundary located at 2140 Central Avenue in Grand Forks.

A suspicious fire that raced through the main floor of city hall in Grand Forks, seriously damaging the 101-year-old building and forcing council to scramble to find a temporary home, may have irreparably harmed the region’s historic records.

The fire was contained to the ground floor of the iconic building where reception, administrative and accounting offices are located.  Water used by firefighters cascaded down into the basement, where the archives are kept.

Maps, photographs and historical documents are stored in metal filing cabinets. The records date back to when the first settlers and prospectors arrived in the region, which was founded in the late 1800s along the U.S. border in south central BC.

Mayor Brian Taylor was in Vancouver at the UBCM convention Thursday. He says engineers will have to report on the condition of the historic building before its future is decided.