Down to the wire: Community hub downtown needs $30.1 million by April

Plans for a community hub on the Sir John A. Macdonald Secondary School property are “down to the wire” after the Ministry of Education refused a request for $30.1 million to start building it.

“We’re pushing harder than ever,” said Todd White, chair of the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board. “We’re at a critical time right now.”

He is turning to the Ministry of Infrastructure to save the proposal with funding by April.

“We have this window of opportunity,” White said. “We’ve thrown everything we can at it. But the final stage requires provincial government support and funding.”

Community hubs are a provincial priority with the latest being a “one-stop shop for Indigenous people” at St. Helen’s School at 785 Britannia Ave. in the McQuesten neighbourhood.

The Biindigen Community Hub will feature many services including culturally safe health care and traditional healing led by the De Dwa Da Dehs Nye>s Aboriginal Health Centre.

The proposed school board hub will be centred on a new elementary school with roughly 600 students from junior kindergarten to Grade 8 who currently attend Hess Street and Strathcona schools.

“The vision is a one-stop shop in one of the areas most in need,” White said.

But it was a hard fight with $3.3 billion in requests from across the province looking for a share of $784 million slated for education capital projects.

“The government will continue discussions with the board on how we can work together towards achieving a new space for this community through an integrated hub,” ministry spokesperson Heather Irwin said.

But White says the clock is ticking with provincial and municipal elections this year. “It’s now or never,” he said. “We’re really coming down to the wire.”

The high school at 130 York Blvd. is set to close in June 2019.

“That eight acres is probably the most valuable piece of property currently in the City of Hamilton,” White said. “We can’t just hang on to it with no clear plan.”

The hub’s five partners are the city, Hamilton Heath Sciences, the Hamilton Community Foundation, the YMCA and Hamilton East Kiwanis Non-Profit Homes Inc.