Whitehorse councillor wants '1-stop shop' for social services

Longtime Whitehorse Coun. Dave Stockdale surprised some of his fellow city election candidates by proposing that a vacant downtown building be turned into a hub for social services organizations.

Stockdale, who is seeking his 10th term on council in the Oct. 15 city election, put forward the idea of housing various agencies in the former Canadian Tire building during an all-candidates forum Thursday.

"Over the last month or so in this town, we've had the United Way looking for money. We've had the food bank looking for handouts. We have mental health week, we have homelessness week," Stockdale said at the forum.

"I have a proposal that we turn the Canadian Tire building into a social service centre — a 'one-stop shop' to deal with all these problems in our community."

Stockdale said social services agencies are scattered all over the city, so it would make sense to put them under one roof.

'Canadian Tire Social Services Centre?'

"Get the territorial government to buy into it, everybody in the community to buy into it. It's even a perfect place to put a hostel for homeless people," he said.

"It's a huge building, it's sitting there empty, it can be done. And I even have a title for it: The Canadian Tire Social Services Centre, the heart of the city."

Stockdale said the idea came to him as he drove past the building this week.

But his proposal drew a mixed response from fellow councillors.

"It's certainly an inventive idea and we could definitely use a building like that for those types of services. But that's private property," Coun. Jeanine Myhre, who is also seeking re-election, told CBC News.

"So unless he's implying the city should purchase or [the Yukon government] should purchase the Canadian Tire property, I don't think he'll get very far with his idea."

Other council candidates have spoken this week of tightening the city's belt, and not starting any new big projects.

Stockdale's proposal does have the support of first-time council candidates Michael Buurman and Ranj Pillai.

"Hey, why not? Let's take a chance and try it out," Buurman said.

Pillai said the idea of housing Whitehorse's social service agencies under one roof has been in the works for about two years.

He said Stockdale should sit down with other organizations, like Sundog Carving and Yukon College, to discuss it further.