City councillors recommend sale of land near Kingsway Mall for $1

CBC

4 days ago

Members of Edmonton city council are recommending selling a plot of land to NiGiNan Housing Ventures for $1.
The nearly 0.3 hectares of land along 106 Street in the Spruce Avenue neighbourhood would be the site of a development called Ambrose Place II and would provide supportive housing for vulnerable people in the city.
Councillors Aaron Paquette, Tim Cartmell, Karen Principe and Keren Tang and Mayor Amarjeet Sohi voted 5-0 in favour of the motion presented to Executive Committee on Aug. 13.
This would allow NiGiNan Housing Ventures to develop the five-storey building to accommodate at least 60 housing units. The building would also include a ceremonial room, where programs like medicine picking and beading workshops could take place.
A report from city administration also recommends providing around $5.2 million in funding for the project, as a part of its Affordable Housing Investment Program grant.
The report estimated that the total cost of the project could reach $30.7 million.
Keri Cardinal, CEO of NiGiNan Housing Ventures, said the location of the new development is critical to provide supports for those who need it.
"The transit system's right there, the Royal Alex is right there, Glenrose Rehabilitation Hospital is right there. So it's just really close to those services that our folks tend to use," she said in an interview Wednesday.
The non-profit organization currently operates four other supportive housing sites across the city.
She said this new development speaks to the need for more supportive housing developments that are culturally informed.
Last September, Homeward Trust calculated that the homeless population in Edmonton hit 4,697. Nearly half of those who were surveyed identified as Indigenous.
"Unfortunately, we are still needed in the community. We also don't want to be so needed," Cardinal said.
Residents express concern
In the committee meeting, residents cited concerns over the height of the building, interference with sewage and drainage, and safety.
Residents said the neighbourhood was already dealing with high populations of vulnerable individuals, and felt that a development like this would encourage more to come.
Ellie Sasseville, CEO of Kingsway District Association, said while residents and businesses in the neighbourhood are in support of the development, it comes with some caveats.
"We need to ensure that the managing agencies who put these kinds of projects together foster good relationships with the surrounding community," she said.
"We have an increase in the vulnerable population in our neighborhood. We've had an increase in crime in our neighbourhood, so the reality is, dropping anything in this neighbourhood that doesn't provide supports or address that would be a mistake."
Sasseville said many businesses in the area already pay for their own security to deal with the increase in crime.
She said NiGiNan Housing Ventures should be responsible for clean up around the area, as well providing wraparound support for individuals to keep them off the streets.
Ward Dene coun. Paquette said that while he understands many of the concerns, the ultimate solution would be to provide housing for people to get them off the streets.
"When we see someone on the streets, we may not remember the story behind that, and we get frustrated and angry," he said.
"But for people who have been broken for generations, it's very hard. Some people do manage to break those chains, some people don't."
For Cardinal, the kind of housing and support that NiGiNan Housing Ventures provides focuses on a decolonized method of treatment.
"We really are an Indigenous-led recovery model. At the end of the day, we want people to heal. We want people to find, you know, peace in their home that they live in," she said.
"So the folks that are with us now, we are a successful solution to those that have been deemed hardest to house and can't be housed anywhere else in Edmonton."