Medical building future lies in wait

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This article was published 23/01/2018 (2843 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The first face you’ll likely see as you stroll in from Kennedy Street is that of Dragan Lekic.

The 63-year-old has enjoyed working as a security guard at the Medical Arts Building for 19 years, and knows the names and stories of nearly every tenant.

Lekic said he is ready to retire in the next year or two. But with his workplace undergoing major renovations and the upper floors being turned into 100 apartments this year, he’s not sure where he’ll go next.

“I feel sad because I just need two more years to work. I don’t know, maybe they will give me another job here,” Lekic said. “I hope to get a job anywhere in Winnipeg.”

The Medical Arts Building is obviously ailing. On a recent visit, more offices are shuttered than open within the 16 floors at 233 Kennedy St.

Name plaques are peeled off the doors. Some hastily written paper signs advertise closures or hide mail slots. The doorway to the ninth floor is entirely blocked by an orange tarp, vents and a “danger” sign, warning asbestos was found.

Politically speaking, the Medical Arts Building was a chess piece, forfeited when the Progressive Conservatives formed government in 2016. The previous NDP government bought the building in hopes of developing it into a new Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries Corporation headquarters.

Toronto-based Timbercreek Asset Management took over last summer after the PCs scrapped the plan. They intend to convert the space into an apartment complex.

Timbercreek has not yet given clear instructions on when tenants — doctors, dentists, surgeons and other specialists — will need to leave, according to those who spoke to the Free Press.

Colleen Krempulec, Timbercreek’s executive director of marketing, said the owners tried to give tenants “as much notice as possible” about pending plans.

“We are targeting to have existing tenants relocated by spring 2018, and are working with each tenant one-on-one to support their needs through this transition,” Krempulec said in an email to the Free Press.

Crews have begun “investigative work” on one floor of the building, she said, and “strict asbestos-abatement protocols are being followed, in accordance with health and safety guidelines.”

Regardless of construction, the dozen or so doctors still practising in the building plod on. Some are crushed to leave and unsure of where they’re going or when they will have to vacate the space. Different months — April, May, August — are tossed around as suggestions, but nothing seems set in stone.

“We’re in the dark — not a clue,” one doctor’s secretary said.

“This is not fair. This has been a medical building since I came to Winnipeg. This was the centre, the most important building that brought the cream of the crop,” said one doctor, who has practised since the 1980s and asked not to be named.

Scattering specialists who formerly worked in the Medical Arts Building “is not what’s good for the patient,” the doctor said. “Sometimes, I feel like I’m going to cry. It’s like I’m in a country that was invaded. I’m leaving my home.”

Kelli Berzuk, owner of Nova Physiotherapy, renovated her office a couple years ago and now has to leave. She’s not sure where to go, calling it “the question that keeps (her) up at night.”

Dr. Andrew Gomori, a neurologist working on the 15th floor, is at a similar stalemate. He is 75, “but mentally sound,” he jokes, and wants to keep working.

“I like the view, I like the place and I’m upset about the fact that I have to leave and then move my whole practice,” Gomori said.

After the asbestos discovery, “we were secretly hoping that they would abandon the whole construction and let us stay, but I don’t know what’s going to happen,” he said. “We are being kicked out of this building against our will.”

Still, not everyone is sad to see the Medical Arts Building undergo a major surgery.

After about 30 years in the space, family doctor Larry Da Silva said he is ready to retire.

Marion Fraser, a patient who has visited doctors in the building for 60 years, was glad to hear it is being converted to residential space.

“It’s past its prime as a medical building,” Fraser said. “I’m tired of the place. The elevators here have always been the slowest in town.”

Timbercreek did not respond to follow-up questions about whether tenants will receive financial help for moving costs before deadline, nor did it say when it expects the renovated apartments to be on the market.

jessica.botelho@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @_jessbu