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Council supports grant to improve youth safe house BY TAMARA CUNNINGHAM THE NEWS BULLETIN
CHRIS BUSH/THE NEWS BULLETIN
Gordon Fuller, city councillor, wants to propose ideas aimed at finding ways to make the Vancouver Island Conference Centre financially self-sufficient.
Councillor seeks new uses for centre
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MAYOR CONCERNED over message it would send to hotel developer. BY TAMARA CUNNINGHAM THE NEWS BULLETIN
A Nanaimo city councillor hopes to drum up ideas on different uses for the Vancouver Island Conference Centre, including the potential to sell space. But it’s a “wee bit premature” for Mayor Bill McKay, who says the city has to be careful about the message it sends to the conference centre hotel developer, SSS Manhao. Coun. Gordon Fuller plans to call on council to seek non-binding expressions of interest for the Vancouver Island Conference Centre, including
repurposing, selling or leasing the space. According to Fuller, the hotel has failed on two fronts: its ongoing taxpayer subsidy and as an economic generator for downtown Nanaimo. The community has been “pretty adamant” it wants to see something better done with the conference centre, or different people running it, said Fuller, whose motion will include seeking expressions of interest and public input into what should be done with the facility. “The public had input of a sort in deciding to build this thing in the first place so I think the public should have input in deciding what to do with it,” said Fuller. “We’d be looking at different options that could be done with the convention centre and that may include the city keeping the portion the Shaw Auditorium is in and repur-
posing and selling or leasing the rest.” In December, politicians scrapped an independent analysis and partial update of a 2004 market feasibility study, but agreed to bring up the conference centre issue in 2015 budget talks. McKay had also said publicly that it’s time to consider making decisions about the facility, with community disappointment in its performance and concerns about ever-increasing subsidies. Since its first full year in 2009, the centre has gone over budget three times and taxpayers have paid more than $900,000 annually in operating subsidies. This year, the centre was expected to post a $102,000 deficit on top of more than a $1-million subsidy, but the final tally has not yet been released. See ‘HOTEL’ /7
Help for troubled teens is on the way at Nanaimo’s only youth safe house, thanks to a $70,000 city grant. Nanaimo city council opted to spend this year’s casino revenue to increase the number of beds and support available at Tillicum Lelum Aboriginal Friendship Centre’s emergency youth shelter. The eight-bed facility opened in 2012 on Tenth Street to cater to high demand from central Island communities, but four beds have sat empty because of a lack of funding and staff. Without adequate staffing, the organization has also been challenged to address addicted youths who arrive at the facility If we say while detoxing. According to Claudio no, we don’t Aguilera, a Tillicum know where Lelum manager, the organization helped they go. 183 clients in its 201314 year, but since last spring it has had to turn away, each month, an average of 30 youths seeking temporary refuge. The city’s one-time, $70,000 grant will go toward hiring the staff to make the full eight beds available, helping address detoxing youth and creating a new day program at the shelter. Tillicum Lelum has also applied to Island Health for funding for more beds, with an aim to bolster staffing. “It’s crucial to have support for youth because that’s when they get most entrenched in the street, prostitution, drugs ... we have a window there,” Aguilera said.
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See ‘GRANT’ /3