Tucked away behind the historical St. Peter and St. Paul's Anglican Church in Esquimalt, is the memorial hall where a new project is budding with the goal of supporting and enriching the quality of life of Greater Victoria seniors.
First opening its doors in June, the Esquimalt Seniors Community Centre has seen a steady influx of participants during at their drop-in events on Wednesdays and Thursdays, though they hope to expand their services.
"We've grown gradually. We want to get it right. We want to be able to hear the community and support the community," said Doug Bowen, who helped spearhead the project. "We've got a core volunteers that are wonderful. We've got a board that's seeking membership. We're getting people that are putting posters together for us. We've got a Facebook that's being managed for us, and all this is voluntary. We want to be able to bring young and old together. We want to bring the community together."
The memorial hall was anticipated to be demolished and the land was to be used for affordable seniors housing, but after the project fell through following the COVID-19 pandemic, the building was condemned and was left in limbo, though the Anglican Diocese still had ownership of the land.
Bowen and Walter Adams, who also helped organize the project, said though the two-storey building boasts 12,000 sq.ft. of hall, classroom and office space, they can only use one room over the winter because the building's furnace was shut off, and they only recently installed a heat pump in a basement classroom.
"It's basically a shell right now without a heating system in it," said Bowen.
Despite the condition of the building, a revolving door of over a dozen seniors participate in the weekly events as volunteers continue to work to fix the building, and grow the community.
"There's a real big need for a seniors centre because Esquimalt is changing demographically, so a lot of elders are finding it hard to have a place where they can meet and sort of come together and have a voice. And so that was one of the focuses, and that's where we started," he said.
The centre offers a number of services to participants, including card making, painting, tea and coffee, health and exercise, and educational workshops. In November Esquimalt Mayor Barbara Desjardins will even be participating in a drop-in event.
"There's a lot of older people [who] need a little help with their doctor appointments and stuff like that. Not necessarily haul them, but just to help them get a doctor. [We also help with] little business things like your income tax," said Adams. "{We try to be] the kind of place where they can come and have coffee and and sit in and we help them, and try and show them the way to go with with their problems."
As the project continues to gain traction, there is always a need for volunteers and donors to continue their services.
"Now that we and our board is in place, we're going to be looking for membership, so recruiting members, recruiting people that will come and find some activities here," said Bowen. "We also are looking at expanding the number of days that we're operating, but that'll depend on volunteers. When we have volunteers in place that can support that, then we'll expand it for another day. We'll bring in some programming to be able to fill up that time."
Overall the group is optimistic the centre will continue to grow and they will continue to receive enough support to continue their work.
