“Nobody is better than the City of St. Thomas at being able to make a vision, make it clear, get behind it with an initial investment and then go after and bring along the province and the federal government.”
High praise indeed, and from an individual at home partnering with the city.
Jeff Neven is the CEO of Indwell, a Christian charity dedicated to providing affordable housing and community support, which now owns or operates two housing projects in St. Thomas. Railway City Lofts on Talbot Street above the transit centre and The Station, located on Queen Street.
And on Monday of this week, it was announced that a new supportive housing project is coming to St. Thomas, thanks to that partnership.
The former Balaclava Street Public School will be transformed into 78 units of supportive housing, equipped with essential supports to assist residents.
Tag Archives: supportive housing
The St. Thomas Elgin Food Bank: ‘Some days we all feel like we’re drowning’
Over one million Ontario residents last year visited a food bank. That indicator of a surging affordability crisis in the province was contained in data released this past Tuesday (Sept. 10) by Feed Ontario.
Digging further into the report, food banks in the province were visited 7.6 million times over the year, an increase of 134 per cent from 2019-20.
It marks an all-time high and the eighth straight year an increase has been recorded.
Feed Ontario unites food banks, industry partners and communities as it strives to end poverty and hunger.
“When we released record-breaking data last year, we thought that was the high-water mark,” advised Feed Ontario CEO Carolyn Stewart.
Share this:
A place to finally call home for 45 residents moving into The Station in St. Thomas
An exciting time over at The Station yesterday (Sept. 29) as Indwell officially opened their second supportive housing project on Queen Street in St. Thomas.
But it went a step further as Sylvia Jones, Deputy Premier and Minister of Health announced close to $1.2 million in operational funding.
The money will be used for rent supplements along with mental health and addiction support services at the 45-unit housing project.
In March of last year, the province provided $3 million to help build 20 supportive housing units in The Station.
That money was delivered through the Social Services Relief Fund.
Owned and operated by Indwell Community Homes, The Station provides housing and services to those 18 and older with mental health addiction issues and experiencing housing instability.
Share this:
‘If you can get people talking about you because of what you’ve done, then more people are listening.’ – St. Thomas Mayor Joe Preston
There is no denying St. Thomas Mayor Joe Preston is an upbeat kinda person, no matter the situation confronting him.
It would be a safe bet to say he could be branded Jovial Joe without a whole lot of pushback from the mayor’s corner.
For example, Preston and a city delegation, including councillors Tara McCaulley and Steve Wookey along with city manager Sandra Datars Bere attended this year’s Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO) conference earlier this week in London and we caught up with him at the culmination of the gathering and his exuberance was palpable.
According to a release prior to the conference, the city advocacy work was to “focus around resources to create new and augment existing community mental health supports, support for capital investments in affordable housing, increased support for inter-community transportation connections and initiatives, capital funding for new childcare spaces, investments in social assistance programs and administration, and support for legislative changes and funding to alleviate pressures faced by St. Thomas Police.”
Share this:
Welcome to The Station in St. Thomas where there’s hope for what the future may hold ‘when there’s the assurance of somewhere to sleep and a place to call home’
I had the pleasure Thursday of joining members of city council over the lunch hour for a tour of The Station, Indwell’s 45-unit supportive housing project on Queen Street that is in the process of welcoming tenants from the city’s by-name homeless list.
We had the opportunity to tour a couple of the apartments, one a studio-style unit and the second barrier-free.
More on the accommodation later, but first my conversation with Natasha Thuemler, Indwell’s regional manager in London.
We first met almost two years ago when touring Railway City Lofts, Indwell’s first project in St. Thomas consisting of 15 micro-apartments above the transit building on Talbot Street.
Owned by the city and operated by Indwell, the units are an example of welcoming supportive housing for individuals transitioning from homelessness and mental health challenges.
Share this:
Back-to-back announcements this week an example of ‘attacking housing from each end in St. Thomas’
It has been a significant week for housing news in St. Thomas.
A pair of announcements mid-week covered off a broad swath of the residential spectrum.
At Wednesday’s site plan control committee meeting, conditional approval was granted to Fast Forward Ventures of London for their 14-storey, 162-unit apartment building to rise on the south end of the former Timken Canada property near the intersection of First Avenue and Talbot Street.
The Timken plant closed in 2013 and was demolished and the site cleared in 2017.
The next day, the province announced $3 million in funding to develop 20 supportive housing units inside Phase 2 of the city’s social services and housing hub now under construction at 16 Queen Street.
Let’s take a closer look at both developments – which Mayor Joe Preston described as “one more step in attacking the city’s housing shortage.”
Share this:
‘A world where mental illness is seen in the same light as all other illnesses in Ontario.’
At the end of July, we wrote about Dennis Kalichuk and his retirement.
After delivering his last letter for Canada Post, he eschewed typical retirement pastimes like golf and fishing in favour of starting a movement.
As per his vision, “a movement and official petition to ask the Ontario government for immediate and sweeping changes to the way that Ontario deals with issues and problems of homelessness, mental health and addictions.”
Remember, this was at the very end of July.
Not three months later – this past Thursday (Oct. 7) to be exact – there’s Elgin-Middlesex-London MPP Jeff Yurek standing up at Queen’s Park to present Kalichuk’s petition to members.
He referred to Kalichuk “as recently retired and he’s making Ontario a better place.”
Share this:
Ceremony on a vacant lot at 16 Queen Street in St. Thomas a case of ‘standing on the ground of compassion’
Thanks to a critical partnership forged at the beginning of the year, the affordable housing inventory in St. Thomas will increase by more than 100 units in the next four years.
Teaming up with Indwell, the city can develop local solutions to homelessness.
That was the observation of Indwell CEO Jeff Neven Wednesday afternoon at the official groundbreaking of Phase 2 of the social services and housing hub evolving in the city’s west end.
Initially, it was hoped this building fronting Queen Street would begin to take shape in 2019, however, the numbers presented a soft business case and the project had to be put on hold, forcing the relocation of a childcare centre that was to be housed on-site.
As announced Wednesday, the four-storey structure expected to open in the spring of 2023 will contain 45 one-bedroom apartments and eventually a third fire hall.
