Inner-city Winnipeg housing complex sits vacant, up for sale only 12 years after it was built

Source: CBC Canada

Manitoba is looking to redevelop, sell or give away an inner-city Winnipeg housing complex that sits vacant only 12 years after it was built at a cost of $3.7 million. 
Centre Village, a 25-unit apartment complex originally intended to serve as housing for newcomers to Canada, is surrounded by security fencing while Manitoba Housing determines what to do with the Balmoral Street property.
The complex's whimsical design initially won three architectural awards but soon came under fire from tenants, critics and even some of its original proponents.
The multi-storey apartment layout was derided as impractical and the exterior design as unsafe in the context of the Central Park neighbourhood.
The property has been vacant since it was fenced off in January of this year. Its assessed value, according to the city, is $2.1 million.

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"While site redevelopment is a possible option, Manitoba Housing is continuing to explore long-term options for the property that may include sale/transfer to a non-profit housing provider," the province said last week in a statement, which was not attributed to any official.
Housing advocates say the vacant state of the housing complex is shameful in a city that suffers from a shortage of affordable homes.
"It's awful that this is happening when we have thousands of families waiting for subsidized housing," said Codi Guenther, the director of New Journey Housing, a non-profit organization that helps newcomers find homes.
However, "it didn't seem like it was designed with the families in mind that were going to live there," she said.
The three-storey apartment layouts prevented single parents from using the kitchen while watching their kids, Guenther said, and the open areas outside demanded a security fence.
Originally planned as co-opCentre Village was conceived as a partnership between the downtown development agency CentreVenture, Central Park's Knox United Church, Manitoba Housing and the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. The provincial and federal governments contributed $1.5 million toward the project.
It was originally intended to serve as a co-operative for observant Muslim newcomers who could not obtain mortgages without violating a faith-based proscription against paying interest.
The co-op model, however, was abandoned. Manitoba Housing assumed the title in 2015.
A British filmmaker who flew to Winnipeg that year with the intention of shooting a documentary about the award-winning complex wound up penning a scathing piece instead in U.K. newspaper The Guardian, calling the complex "badly affected by crime" and describing the apartments as "cramped and unsuitable" for families.

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Several of Centre Village's creators agreed.
"It's not the project we originally envisioned, or we saw a need for in the community," Bill Millar, then a pastor with Knox United Church, told The Guardian at the time.
"We could have done better," Ross McGowan, a former CentreVenture executive director, added.
"We all have a responsibility, as the owners, as the consulting team, as the province, as the city. Maybe that's part of the issue: [we thought] 'well, it's just affordable housing, let's not get too wound up about it.'"