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Engagement session on 'Community Campus' at Willow Square announced

(Photo: President of the Golden Years Society Joan Furber after the Alberta government announced it closed a deal to purchase the Willow Square land. Nov. 21, 2014. Crystal Laderas/Morning Reporter). 

The Wood Buffalo Housing and Development Corporation (WBHD) has announced the first of what they say will be many community engagement sessions on the Willow Square land.

Public engagement for the ‘Community Campus’ as the WBHD called it in their release will take place in the Balsam Room of the Sawridge hotel from 6 p.m. – 8 p.m on Monday, Jan. 19, 2015.  The WBHD will meet with the Golden Years Society before the engagement session at 2  p.m. that day.

“We will be engaging other community groups including students, and Northern Lights Regional Health, and a myriad of others, so we can gather maximum input on what we could or should do,” said Bryan Lutes, President of the WBHD. “In order to create the proper business plans, so that we can create a project that is viable at the end of the day we are doing a senior needs and market assessment to see what shortfalls are and will be in the community.”

Lutes added that the WBHD is looking at a multi-purpose development that would include market housing, affordable housing, social housing and seniors housing, street-front retail, commercial office space and below-market office space for non-profits. The facility could bring together everyone from students to seniors and everyone in between.

“At this point we’re looking to engage the community to seek input, to see what is the best interest and best use of this lot for the community at large,” said Lutes. “There are several restrictions. The zoning and the flood plain, all of those impact what can be there, combining that with the needs assessment and the input from the community at large we will then be able to design a community, it could be a community campus encompassing a whole bunch of things.”

Because the land is in the floodplains any residential units would need to be off the main floor.

“We’re not opposed to having a seniors facility in that building, we’re expecting to have a seniors component, but its too early to tell what that will be until we finish the needs and feasibility study,” said Lutes.

Local seniors including members of the Golden Years Society have been advocating heavily for a seniors village on the site.

“It doesn’t sound like it’s what we want to hear, but I guess we’re open to listening, but from there we’re not open to having a seniors village mixed in with public housing,” said Joan Furber, President of the Fort McMurray Golden Years Society.

Dave Hodson, who sits on the RMWB Advisory Comittee on Aging echoed Furbers sentiments, “I know from a seniors perspective they’re going to be surprised at this, this is probably not what they were expecting. It’s something that none of us understand at the moment. The seniors expectation was that Willow Square was going to be an aging in place community, so this is a bit of a surprise for the seniors I’m sure and it needs to be discussed.”

The project likely won’t break ground until the spring of 2016.