Photo: Abby Zieverink, EverythingGP staff

By Abby Zieverink

Coordinated Care Campus

Coordinated Care Campus temporary units could last up to a year

Mar 21, 2022 | 10:31 PM

Grande Prairie city council approved a temporary development permit to allow for the temporary housing units outside the Coordinated Care Campus to stay until March 31, 2023.

This means the portable trailers set up outside the former Stonebridge Hotel, which are serving as temporary housing for residents living in the Coordinated Care Campus will be able to stay in place under the permit, until March 31 next year.

Chris Manuel the Director of Protective & Social Services with the city says this gives roughly six months of buffer room for construction to be complete.

“Our goal is to be done much sooner than that, I’m hoping within six months, is my ideal state,” he explained.

The temporary housing units have the capacity to hold 28 residents, with 26 individuals currently living in the facility.

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They all have access to support services during the entire duration of construction and beyond, which is why Manuel says they wanted to keep residents onsite, to where they are receiving support services.

“To put them in a hotel, as soon as you provide the support services that we provide for the individuals. It would then trigger a rezoning process as well as a development permit process, and they’re not quick,” added Manuel.

“What existed on this property was, it was already zoned for this use and it had an existing permanent development permit, so this was just a temporary add-on to it.”

While the facility undergoes construction, Manuel says they will not be able to add additional individuals into the supportive housing facility.

“Certainly, the community has a need for far more than 28 (individuals), however, while this construction occurs we are just going to have to hold the numbers,” explained Manuel.

He says roughly 80 people in Grande Prairie have been assessed and are waiting for a place to go such as the Coordinated Care Campus, with roughly 220 individuals living in homeless shelters in Grande Prairie.

Manuel says they are currently at an engineering phase for the facility, adding that as the design progresses, the exact scope of work they will do on the facility will be made clearer within the upcoming weeks.

He says they will return to council with anything of significance.

RELATED: Coordinated Care Campus residents move into temporary housing as “extensive renovations” occur