Station 20 plans scaled down
Facility now two storeys; grocery store still included
Lana Haight, The StarPhoenix
Published: Friday, April 25, 2008
Saskatoon's inner city will get a full-service grocery store, but not a multimillion-dollar complex for health-care services.
"It's sort of a pragmatic thing. We don't have the $11.5 million. If we want to do something, we've got to be realistic," Paul Wilkinson, Station 20 West project manager, said in an interview Thursday.
"It's quite a different building than what we had hoped for."
The original Station 20 West Community Enterprise Centre was designed as a 31/2-storey building with 45,000 square feet of space. The building was going to be completely finished, ready for a co-operative grocery store as well as several health-care and community organizations to move in. The price tag was $11.5 million.
When the provincial government withdrew its commitment last month to provide $8 million to the project, Station 20 West organizers went back to the drawing board.
"There were tears," said Wilkinson, as community volunteers who've dreamed and planned for six years came to terms with scaling back their original design.
The new plan calls for 19,000 square feet over two floors, with the one level housing the grocery store. The second floor will have space for community organizations, but there won't be room for the many health-care services in the original plans. The organizations that do lease space will have to finish their part of the building at their own expense. The cost to build the scaled-back design is pegged at $2.6 million.
Wilkinson says the new design will not compromise on the building's environmental features.
The original plans called for the building to be heated and cooled using geothermal technology, solar panels to heat water and a system to collect rainwater to operate toilets.
"This is not an option. Our architect went to a conference in San Francisco in the fall. Everybody is building at this level in the United States. We are way behind here," he said.
"We can all afford it. If we don't, we are destroying the future and the future of our children."
At a news conference on Thursday afternoon, Station 20 West organizers announced they are now turning their sights to fundraising for the smaller building to be located on 20th Street West between avenues L and K. They hope to collect about $2 million in donations and secure a $400,000 mortgage to cover construction costs.
Already, $100,000 in cash has been donated. The Saskatchewan Union of Nurses and another organization each have pledged $100,000. And five organizations including the nurses' union have offered loan guarantees totaling $800,000, but Wilkinson hopes those loans won't have to be tapped -- that enough money will be raised.
Ev Burnett and her husband Dean Jones announced their $40,000 donation to the project at Thursday's new conference.
"We are really committed to Saskatoon, to healthy families and healthy children," said Burnett, who has worked for more than 30 years as a teacher and a school administrator in Saskatoon.
She has seen children come to school hungry, has heard of others who miss class to help their parents carry groceries home on the bus and has read studies that show unhealthy children frequently miss school.
"When they aren't at school each day, they aren't getting an education and when they're not getting an education, that has an impact for all of Saskatoon and more broadly for Saskatchewan," said Burnett.
In addition to raising funds from organizations and individuals, Station 20 West organizers will have to secure an extension from the City of Saskatoon for its construction start date. The city sold the land to organizers for $1, provided construction starts by this fall. Wilkinson doubts Station 20 West will make that deadline and will be at city council executive meeting on April 28, asking for an extension.
Many of the health-care services that were originally planned for the Station 20 West project are still available in Saskatoon's inner city. The Westside Community Clinic is looking at expanding at its present location or moving to another one so it can offer more health-care programs, including dental services to residents of the area, the clinic's administrator said earlier this month.
It's really unfortunate to see the health care facilities being disregarded as well as the geothermal heating and cooling. Hopefully this resolution will prove to be the better solution in the long run for this redevelopment...but right now it's hard to see it.
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Just be.
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