Feds contribute $16M to mixed-income residential tower in downtown Winnipeg

Ottawa is putting up $16 million to help build a residential high-rise that's already under construction in downtown Winnipeg. 

Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland pledged federal support Thursday for the 21-storey tower at 308 Colony St., which will create 214 apartment units — including 84 designated as affordable housing — and two office or commercial spaces on the ground floor.

More than 20 per cent of units will be accessible for people with disabilities.

Freeland called the high-rise a prime example of a housing project done right.

There's "a design principle here that I think is so important: you can't tell when you knock on the door whether you're knocking on the door of affordable housing or market-rate housing," she said.

Some of the amenities for the building — which will be just south of Portage Avenue, and across Colony from the Winnipeg Art Gallery — include an outdoor green space, terrace, gym, and lounge. 

After touring the construction site, Freeland made the funding announcement next door at 290 Colony St., another residential complex with a mix of affordable and market-rate apartments that also received millions from the federal government's Affordable Housing Fund.

"The apartments here are more than housing. They're homes and they're about creating a true community for all the people who live here and who will live here — the people who are paying market rents and the people who are living in affordable housing," Freeland said.

"These are exactly the types of homes that Winnipeg needs more of and that Canada needs more of."

The 308 Colony project, developed by the community developer arm of the University of Winnipeg Community Renewal Corporation, is being designed as a nearly net-zero greenhouse gas emissions project. It will cost $70.5 million to construct. 

Jeremy Read, the CEO of the UWCRC, credits the federal government with ensuring the project could be built.

In addition to the grant funding announced on Thursday, the U of W organization received a favourable mortgage through the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. 

Last summer, the former Progressive Conservative government committed just over $2.7 million through tax increment financing and the City of Winnipeg pledged up to $5 million over 25 years through its own TIF program, as well as a $250,000 grant. 

"Without that support, these kinds of projects just won't happen," said Read.

"Because we get that grant support and the lower interest rates and longer amortization periods, it allows us to provide the affordable units that you wouldn't be able to do on otherwise conventional borrowing terms."

The building is expected to welcome its first tenants by December 2025.

The UWCRC and UWCRC 2.0 have spent years populating the streets around its campus with mixed-income residential units. 

The new complex at 290 Colony sits between Muse Flats and the Downtown Commons, two other residential high-rises owned by the U of W renewal corporation.