Come September, the Brock Mission men’s shelter on Murray Street will be demolished to make way for a new shelter.
The Peterborough Housing Corporation acquired the property last month and will spend $8 million to build the new facility, while the Brock Mission will continue to run services inside the shelter and have committed to raising $1 million for the project.
Brock Mission has yet to officially kick off its fundraising campaign, but on Wednesday morning the shelter received a cheque for $2,000, presented by Drew Merrett, owner of Merrett Home Hardware on Lansdowne Street West.
“You have to start somewhere,” said Merrett, a homelessness and mental health advocate who sits on the board of the local Canadian Mental Health Association chapter.
“It was a good opportunity to jump on board. Hopefully other businesses and organizations will make this more of a priority, and we can help get people off the streets and give them a chance to move into their own houses in the future.”
The shelter closed its doors last year at its old location as conditions were unsafe, but has continued to run programming at a temporary location at the St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church at the corner of Water and Murray streets.
“When we bought the building, it was the former legion, and we knew we would need to do some renovations,” said Brock Mission executive director Bill McNabb.
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But the shelter couldn’t just stop operations and tear down, so much work was happening behind the scenes, including a major feasibility study which looked at renovating the building, Ultimately they decided a demolition and rebuild was the right way to go.
McNabb says the new building will stand three storeys tall and can accommodate 40 men in the shelter, with 15 individual rooms for semi-dependent living, along with two separated shelter spaces, one geared towards harm-reduction strategies and the other helping individuals dealing with addictions.
“The need is huge,” says McNabb. “We’ve been operating at almost full capacity for a couple years now, and so we’re hoping to go from a 40-bed shelter to a 30-bed shelter by housing 15 people out of the regular group that uses us as supportive housing, but gives them their own space.”
The Brock Mission is in the process of setting up its fundraising committee and will announce some special initiatives at a kickoff celebration that will culminate with the demolition of the former shelter in late September.
As for the early donation, McNabb says he was delighted to see the support — and hopes it’s a sign of what’s to come.
“This is just a fantastic start for us, because he’s done it more or less unsolicited from us,” McNabb said.
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