Cash injection will help women’s centre grow

Janice Lavellee grew up in a large family rife with substance abuse and domestic violence. She ran away from home at age 14.

When she found the North End Women’s Centre, it was a godsend.

“I never knew the North End Women’s Centre was there, because I never knew where to get help,” she said.

After having a child at 16, Lavellee said the centre gave her a job on the weekends. It was a stepping stone to finishing high school, and she later returned to the centre to work as a receptionist for 27 years before recently retiring.

She credits that time for helping her find her way.

Soon, new housing and expanded services at the Selkirk Avenue centre will give more women a chance to find their own paths.

“(This) was the place where I first began my healing, my healing journey,” Lavellee said. “The new building in this community will be a bigger and safer place for all women to start their healing journey, for them and their children.”

The centre just received $459,000 in additional funding from the provincial government for the planned expansion of its 5,940 square foot building into a 19,815 square foot space, creating eight new transitional housing units for women and doubling the size of its drop-in space.

“(This) was the place where I first began my healing, my healing journey.”

The expansion, seven years in the making, comes at a time of great need, said Cynthia Drebot, the centre’s executive director. Five years ago, about 70 women and gender-diverse people walked through the doors at 394 Selkirk Avenue on any given day. Now, it serves about 120 people a day, from the North End and beyond, who are looking for shelter, resources and, at times, an escape from gender-based violence.

“This block is a block where missing and murdered Indigenous women are often last seen. Actually, the corner of Selkirk (Avenue) and Salter (Street), which is right where we are,” Drebot said after the funding was announced Monday.

“The more we can have safe spaces right around this area, people will have safe spaces to be, safe spaces to be leads to safe housing, safe housing leads to overall safety for women and families.”

The existing building will remain, but it will be attached to a new building constructed in the current parking lot area.

Drebot said the $20-million project is about 75 per cent funded and the centre will kick off its final round of fundraising in September. Preparation of the construction site will start later this year.

Last year, the project was named one of the recipients of the City of Winnipeg’s housing grant program, which distributes money from the federal Housing Accelerator Fund.

Monday’s announcement brings the province’s contribution to the project up to $1.34 million, through Mino’Ayaawag Ikwewag, a $20-million provincial strategy for projects that support Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people.

Families Minister Nahanni Fontaine said the investment is part of a plan to refresh funding for long-standing non-profits that may be struggling to help the number of people they’re seeing.

“There are a lot of capital projects taking place in Manitoba because the infrastructure, as it exists right now, isn’t keeping up to the need, and so we’re doing all of that work to be able to build that infrastructure across the province,” she said.

“The more we can have safe spaces right around this area, people will have safe spaces to be, safe spaces to be leads to safe housing, safe housing leads to overall safety for women and families.”

The North End Women’s Centre was first established in 1984 — the inner city’s longest-running women’s resource organization. It operates a treatment and transitional housing program for women seeking recovery from addictions and the Up Shoppe, a thrift store that churns revenue back into programming.

Selkirk Avenue has long been a hub for housing supports, including Merchants Corner, two buildings of affordable housing on Selkirk and Pritchard Avenue that opened in 2018, but it has also been the site of unstable and unsafe housing.

In April, senior residents of the rent-geared-to-income suites at the Canadian Polish Manor on Selkirk Avenue told the Free Press they had been forced to barricade their suites due to rampant drug use and violent incidents in the building.

Brandon Thomas said he has witnessed more than one altercation on Selkirk Avenue while on his way to or from his job at a cannabis dispensary.

“I drive home around 7:30-ish every evening, and then just the amount of violence I see toward women, just driving home, is crazy,” he said Monday.

He said the North End Women’s Centre, just a few doors down from the dispensary, is a force for good in the neighbourhood.

“It’s just another piece in the puzzle that we all need. It will benefit everyone.”

“The women next door, they take care of everybody,” he said. “They’ll come out, they’ll bring water, food, they call the ambulance.”

Safe housing, especially for women, is not always easy to come by in the neighbourhood, said Selkirk Avenue resident Xavier Duncan.

He said more affordable housing means fewer people living on the street and a safer community overall.

“It’s just another piece in the puzzle that we all need. It will benefit everyone,” Duncan said.

“And I definitely do think it should be more women-focused too, because women are the more vulnerable people in this area, and usually I see women who need help more in this area, for sure.”

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca