Sherwood Park residents campaigning against non-profit's new youth facility
CBC
BGC Strathcona County is looking to expand and build a new state-of-the-art facility in Sherwood Park, but some who live near the proposed site are against the idea.
The non-profit, formerly known as Boys and Girls Club, caters to about 2,000 children and youth each year with their after-school programs, drop-in programs, summer camps, art and nature programs.
The organization still has 800 kids on its wait-list. To help reduce that number and centralize, the group has chosen a wooded site beside Brentwood Elementary and proposes to build a two-storey, net-zero building with a geothermal system and solar panels.
But some residents are pushing back.
"I don't want it in my front yard," said Jessica Mcneal, who lives near the proposed site. She is one of the more than 600 local residents who signed a petition against the project, earlier this year.
Traffic is already a problem most school mornings, said Mcneal and she worries this new facility will make it much worse.
"I feel like we're constantly just getting crushed out of our neighbourhood with this whole program going through."
Some residents have also raised safety concerns.
"I've seen kids come literally to the point where they bounce off the car because they're running across as the car is coming down the road," said local resident Perry Gould, who also owns several properties in the neighbourhood.
"There's just no availability for added traffic."
A GoFundMe has raised more than $7,000 in donations from across Canada to hire a lawyer to fight the project.
"My kids have been in that program. I love it. I love the staff there," said Mcneal. "It's absolutely astronomical, what they do for people in the community." If the project goes forward, both Mcneal and Gould said they would move.
But, not all residents in Sherwood Park oppose the project.
Multiple parents voiced support for the new build at a 13-hour council meeting in February, saying the club's programing had been invaluable to their children and would like to see it expanded.
A single northbound lane on the long-awaited Pattullo Bridge replacement has opened to traffic, marking the first step in a phased opening process.
The Yukon has been grappling with an extreme cold weather system that's pushing the power grid to the brink because it can't keep up with demand.
The days leading up to Christmas day can be the most stressful time of the holidays. Especially if those days are spent travelling to the post office hoping to pick up that special, last minute gift you ordered online, just in time to put it under the tree.
The Yukon's energy provider says Whitehorse is not at imminent risk of blackouts, but with very cold weather forecasted through the holidays, residents are still being asked to conserve power.
A pedestrian is dead after a vehicle crashed into a building in Toronto, said police.
RCMP in Inuvik, N.W.T., say two youth have been arrested after officers found suspected cocaine and a loaded firearm at a home in the community.
Canada and 13 other countries issued a joint statement Wednesday condemning the Israeli security cabinet's approval of 19 new settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Alberta health officials are flagging the circulation of a rare bacteria known as Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) among homeless adults living in Calgary.
The future of a prominent building in London's Old East Village (OEV), once home to the London Food Incubator, is looking uncertain following the relocation of its anchor tenant and the planned departure of another.
As Yukon continues to deal with a prolonged spell of extreme cold, emergency officials are advising people to be prepared in case of a power outage.
Police say they have found and arrested 47-year-old Douglas Yetman, a man wanted for murder.
Confirmed flu cases in northeastern Ontario are much higher now than they were at the same period last year.
The organization that represents some of America's largest spirits producers is calling for the NSLC to remove a policy that gives preferential markup to Nova Scotian spirit products.