New 'trauma-informed' YWCA Regina building nearly complete, but $4.5M still needed
CBC
Both a Regina building under construction and the YWCA employees inside it were bright and sunny Tuesday morning, as they took members of the media on tours through the new Kikaskihtânaw Centre for Women and Families.
The building, now in its late phase of construction, will function as a domestic violence and homeless shelter for women and children, as well as a community hub with outreach, child care and other wrap-around services at the former Victoria School site between Rae Street and Retallack Street, just south of 12th Avenue.
Work on the building began in 2022, and YWCA Regina CEO Melissa Coomber-Bendtsen said the centre will open in September.
However, that means the YWCA faces an eight-week time crunch to raise the remaining $4.5 million needed to fully complete its vision. The project was initially pegged at $54 million and, at the time of the sod-turning, was considered fully funded. However, total costs have risen to $70 million due in part to inflation.
Still, Coomber-Bendtsen was proud to show off the various rooms in the sprawling 97,000-square-foot building in Regina's Cathedral neighbourhood, which is 85 per cent built.
The facility has a healing and sweat lodge in an outdoor space at the centre of the building site, which can be viewed through large windows from the inside.
"It brings a sense of hope and healing to the people that we serve, and is also a way of education and truth telling to the community as well," she said.
Coomber-Bendtsen said the healing and sweat lodge will be stewarded by All Nations Hope Network, an Indigenous organization led by matriarchs in the community. The organization teaches Indigenous knowledge and performs ceremonies with urban Indigenous peoples.
Coomber-Bendtsen calls All Nations Hope Network's involvement and the lodge space "an act of reconciliation."
"The YWCA is a colonial institution. We've been around for over 100 years, and have certainly [been] privileged and continued to [be] from that colonial past," she said.
"And so for us, it was very important to bring back space that was stolen from Indigenous people. And this is an example of that."
The space has been handed to the All Nations Hope Network for $1 on a 99-year lease.
"[That's] to make sure that it is preserved as a healing space in our community," Coomber-Bendtsen said.
"And it has been designed by and led by Indigenous women giving their opinions to our architect team, who have learned a lot about Indigenous ways of knowing and being through that process."