Ontario charity turning derelict West End block into 24 affordable units By: Chris Kitching Posted: 6:55 PM CST Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2024

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This article was published 13/11/2024 (675 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Toronto-based charity plans to transform a derelict 24-unit apartment building in Winnipeg’s West End into affordable housing units for people who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless.

Raising the Roof announced the purchase of the four-storey block at 480 Young St. Wednesday during an event marking the completion of its first project outside Ontario — a three-unit building in the North End.

“Twenty-four units is a significant increase to the affordable housing supply in the city, but clearly a lot more is needed,” executive director Sheldon Pollett told the Free Press.

Raising the Roof hopes to begin renovating the Young Street building and get close to completion in 2025, he said, noting it is one of the organization’s largest projects.

The block was ordered to be vacated after a significant fire in 2022. A partial occupancy permit was issued to the previous owner following repairs.

However, the building and others, including the shuttered Adanac Apartments on Sargent Avenue, were placed into receivership and put up for sale.

Raising the Roof purchased the Young Street block for $1 million. It expects the renovation to cost less than $5 million.

The organization partners with social enterprise contractors and local organizations to renovate vacant or under-used buildings, and provide wraparound supports to residents.

Its first project in Manitoba converted a former nail salon and constituency office at 573 Mountain Ave., just east of McGregor Street, into three units at a cost of about $1 million.

Raising the Roof received federal government funding and support from private and public donors.

Siloam Mission will manage the two-storey property. Zoongizi Ode Inc., an Indigenous-led organization, will help provide supports to tenants.

Two larger multi-bedroom units will be made available to Indigenous families. A one-bedroom suite will be occupied by a young adult who is aging out of the child-welfare system.

Residents are expected to move into the subsidized units within a couple of weeks.

Renovations were carried out by Purpose Construction, a social enterprise construction company that trains Indigenous people who are at risk of becoming homeless.

Raising the Roof said 40 people were given training, jobs and support during the project.

The same approach will be taken with the Young Street building.

“It needs a lot of work, but we’ll also maximize the opportunity to work with social enterprise partners, so how much training and employment can also be generated for that project?” said Pollett.

“It’s just a smart use of money. You want to build homes for people, and we can train and employ people while doing so.”

He recently met with Manitoba government officials to discuss the project and additional opportunities to create affordable housing units.

The Young Street announcement is among a flurry of affordable housing projects or measures from governments and non-profit organizations this year.

Siloam Mission CEO Tessa Blaikie Whitecloud said Winnipeg has three social housing units for every 20 low-income people, compared with nine in Calgary and eight in Regina.

“We’re seriously behind in that stock, and that’s creating people coming into homelessness,” she said. “The answer to homelessness is housing, but that housing has to come with appropriate supports.”

Blaikie Whitecloud said 64 seniors who slept in Siloam Mission’s shelter Tuesday night are on fixed incomes and unable to afford places of their own.

Siloam Mission’s housing strategy aims to create 700 to 1,000 social housing units over the next decade.

Christina Maes Nino, executive director of the Manitoba Non-Profit Housing Association, said the province has a “major deficit” of affordable housing.

“We lose affordable housing in the market faster than we can build affordable housing out of the market,” she said.

Units are lost when buildings are sold, vacated or damaged by fire, or when monthly rents are increased, said Maes Nino.

She called for an “all-hands-on-deck” approach, involving governments, non-profit organizations and the private sector to increase housing supply.

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“We really do need substantially more funding from governments to bring on new community housing supply,” said Maes Nino.

The NDP government has pledged to end chronic homelessness in two terms. More than 1,200 Manitobans have been housed since November 2023, a spokesperson for Housing, Addictions and Homelessness Minister Bernadette Smith said.

They pointed to new projects such as Siloam Mission’s plans for 32 affordable housing units for seniors on Roblin Boulevard.

“We have so many great partners and leaders, including those at Raising the Roof, that are helping to build more housing for those in need, and we celebrate the launch of their new project today,” the spokesperson said.

chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca

Chris Kitching
Reporter

Chris Kitching is a general assignment reporter at the Free Press. He began his newspaper career in 2001, with stops in Winnipeg, Toronto and London, England, along the way. After returning to Winnipeg, he joined the Free Press in 2021, and now covers a little bit of everything for the newspaper. Read more about Chris.

Every piece of reporting Chris produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.