Doomed CC had kids trading crime for wrestling

Kelvin backers say centres key for inner-city youth

Ryan Ellis used to be involved in the community, but now he said he might just watch television.

The 10-year-old volunteered to deliver flyers on three streets for Kelvin Community Centre, as part of the centre’s efforts to bolster support for new programs on offer.

He took the job because he thought it would be fun. But he also wanted to save the “nice place to play.”

The Mayor’s executive policy committee, however, recently voted 6-1 in favour of closing a facility they see as surplus and the community sees as an indispensable asset and need.

“I wanted to try saving Kelvin because it’s a great place and it keeps me out of trouble...instead of going around and hurting people it might actually help us focus on something like hockey,” Ellis said, adding that now he will likely end up watching more television.

Not long ago Ellis saw a group of boys assaulting someone near Kelvin.

Days later he saw those same people playing hockey, and that’s what made him think the centre could help keep people out of trouble.

“Instead of walking around doing nothing or hurting people they would just play hockey or something like that. They would get into activities,” the Glenelm School student said.

John King, vice-president of Concerned Elmwood Neighbours, approached Ellis for the job because he was energetic.

But he also recruited at-risk youths he did not want identified.

Two of these youths gave King their knives in return for flyers.

Others told King they wanted to take the wrestling program that was about to be offered, and agreed to King’s request that they stop stealing cars.

King also noted that since the centre has been under the control of Concerned Elmwood Neighbours there has been no graffiti or vandalism done to it.

Regardless, city council votes on the issue on Jan. 24, and even if it survives there, a city-wide study on community centres said the facility needs $1.6 million in upgrades.

But if it closes, which many fear is inevitable, others are concerned about the precedent it will set.

“They’re treating this like a test or a first case and I don’t see them doing this to any other part of the city, for the moment. But if they’re successful here, then probably it’s only a matter of time before they start closing other clubs,” Jim Maloway, MLA for Elmwood said after the meeting.

But St. Vital Coun. Gord Steeves, the City’s chair of the Standing Committee on Protection and Community Services, said the City is trying to consolidate community centres into hubs that “are more aligned with modern living,” which would require centres found to be surplus, closed.

Judging by other cities, Winnipeg is somewhat saturated with its 71 community centres. Ottawa, with a population more than 800,000 has 60, while Halifax with its 380,000 citizens has eight within the city limits, and Toronto has 80 community centres.

Transcona Coun. Russ Wyatt, who previously favoured keeping Kelvin open before he was appointed to EPC, seconded the motion to close Kelvin.

He said he voted in line with EPC to keep dialogue open, noting that with the matter now on city council’s agenda it can be debated on a larger scale.

The City of Winnipeg Recreation and Leisure Facility Policy said “we need to look at things differently. This new policy” – of consolidation – “is necessary in order to make our system more sustainable (and stronger) over the long run.”

In spite of this vision, Regan Wolfrom, president of Concerned Elmwood Neighbours, holds out hope the centre can be saved.

“I still think that it’s still up to all the city councillors and the residents of this city to say ‘you know, we don’t accept this decision’,” he said.

“And the fact is, if Kelvin goes down, and it looks like it may, then we are only one of the first and it’s going to keep happening,” to other centres, he said.