For more than a decade, Leap of Faith Together (LOFT) Community Services has operated its Bradford House out of a century-old building on Barrie Street.
This week, residents got a chance to look into the future.
LOFT held an information session April 19 about its new affordable housing development at 31 Frederick St., currently home to St. Mary’s Hall. That building, which houses the Helping Hand Food Bank and other community services, will be torn down as soon as its current users can move to the Bradford Community Hub, once it is completed on the site of the former Bradford Public School.
The new Bradford House will be a six-storey purpose-built building with 100 units, housing approximately twice the current number of residents in the Barrie Street facility.
All units are individual, private living units, with 30 set to be fully accessible. Four are to be self-contained, independent living units and the remaining will benefit from shared amenities, including a congregate dining room and common lounges and laundry facilities on each floor.
Architect Michael Gallant wanted to ensure the design of the building didn’t overtake the neighbourhood but still provided a place for LOFT residents to be proud of.
“Most of these folks will be seniors with some special needs,” he said. “Everybody likes to have pride in ownership of where they live, this design is going to have a nice welcoming lobby space, great private suites with views and large windows. Lots of natural daylight and space for people to live their best lives.”
That was one of the things Heather McDonald, CEO of LOFT Community Services, loved about the design as well.
“I think what you’ll see is an incredible effort to maximize the space well, as well as recognizing the residential neighbourhood that we are creating a home in a beautiful neighbourhood,” she said.
LOFT has been working with the Town of Bradford West Gwillimbury for the better part of three years. Since then, McDonald has been a regular fixture at town council, as the organization and the town brokered a deal that saw 31 Frederick St. donated, saving the group a substantial land purchase cost.
Most recently, she was there to formally request the town’s support in securing a grant from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s (CMHC) Rapid Housing Initiative (RHI).
If successful, the RHI money would flow through the town, giving it an extra layer of oversight on the construction at 31 Frederick St. The April 19 meeting was the first opportunity for many in the community to have their own oversight and actually see what the new building would look like once constructed.
For McDonald, her first impression of the drawings wasn’t dictated by what she saw, but rather the process to get there she witnessed.
“Inside the process was feedback that Coun. Nickolas Harper gave us about what the neighbours were thinking and wanting to see,” she explained. “We had residents provide feedback on what they wanted to see. Staff, members of our community as well as just incredible designers. So, I’m really proud of the process behind them.”
Mary Frances Turner was part of that process. She sat on the oversight committee, which was comprised of community members with connections to the LOFT. Turner’s sister is a resident of Bradford House and Turner used what she’s seen to help guide the opinions she shared as the committee looked to find the best fit for the community and the building.
“(I provided) some firsthand experience about the kind of lifestyle needs that these folks have, living in the project,” Turner said. “Looking for some units that are more independent and other units where folks would have more dependencies. Respecting the fact that this is their home, right, and they want to live and be part of the community. Thinking about how they interact with the community, where the open spaces, where the private spaces are.”
Interaction with the community was an overarching theme of the evening. The information session was designed to have a transparent dialogue with the neighbours of Bradford House, new and old, about what they can expect to rise on the corner of Mary Street and Frederick Street. That also meant those neighbours could get some answers about how an additional influx of people coming into their community will affect the established residents.
Karen Banks was one of the more than 100 people who attended the session. She came armed with questions about the residents who would be living at Bradford House and what kind of services they would be offered. In particular, she was concerned with the format of the living situation and how extensive the support offered would be.
She was happy with the answers she received.
“I have had no problem with what’s available now with LOFT; I’ve never had any issues,” Banks said. “But, going forward, I just want to know what the profile of the residents was going to be and if there was going to be a lot of traffic back and forth, but it seems like there’s going to be a lot of services provided for them.”
McDonald said she was receiving a lot of supportive messages from the community and the information session was the perfect opportunity for LOFT to be able to help ease the concerns of residents such as Banks about the development.
“The first step is that we’re being absolutely honest, and tonight is a testament to that,” McDonald said. “All members of the public can meet every member of our team tonight and have as much time as they need to answer questions. We know this is a change and we believe this is a beautiful building that will serve Bradford for the years to come.”
McDonald hopes to break ground on the new Bradford House in the fall but reiterated how important it is to ensure all current tenants of St. Mary’s Hall are moved and settled before the wrecking ball swings.
As to the exact cost and timeline of the project, a design report should be ready in the next few weeks that spells everything out, McDonald said.
If LOFT is successful in getting the RHI grant, it would have a stipulation that the project must be completed within 18 months after signing an agreement with CMHC. A decision is expected by the end of June.
