Mission Flats Manor, a former work camp-turned supportive housing, will be replaced for its residents before 2025.

(KAREN EDWARDS / iNFOnews.ca)

A Kamloops supportive housing site in one of the city's industrial neighbourhoods is set to be replaced.

Residents at Mission Flats Manor, a modular housing site run by Ask Wellness, will move into their new rooms next door in November as BC Housing brings on another 52-bed modular.

"As we know the current camp was already 12 years old coming from Mica Dam when we brought it in. It was meant to be very temporary," Ask Wellness CEO Bob Hughes told iNFOnews.ca. "It's definitely exceeded its lifespan, so this is a great opportunity for the community to acquire these buildings and for us to be involved in providing a bit more dignified housing for people."

BC Housing will spend $19.6 million on the entire site, according to a June 24 news release. Ask Wellness is so far only the operator for one of the modular buildings, according to a notice mailed out to the neighbourhood the same day.

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Mission Flats Manor was installed on a City-owned property under a five-year lease with BC Housing in November 2018. The announcement comes more than six months after the original lease ended.

In November, tenants will move into a modular housing facility that the province shipped from Vancouver. It previously housed people on Cambie Street under the name Larwill Place. The replacement is a welcome addition to the area as some of the residents were beginning to "wonder about their value" as the former work camp building got older and its future remained unclear.

The Mission Flats replacement was announced on June 24 along side roughly 400 other new homes the province is funding over the next two years.

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Hughes said the Mission Flats site, just to the west of downtown, benefits some of its residents by avoiding some of the street activity found elsewhere.

"For those that feel like stepping out onto the street makes them anxious and at risk for some predatory behaviour, I think it does create a sense of safety and privacy," Hughes said. "I originally thought it was kind of like banishing the outcast to the hinterland, but when we started to get rolling, people really felt safe and had a breath of relief."

The downside is that the site isn't connected on the city's transit routes, so Ask Wellness offers its own shuttle service for the residents. It's also not easily accessible by pedestrians or cyclists.

He said the new modulars will eventually be paired with some nicer landscaping and some privacy for its residents. The current site is a simple property with the repurposed work camp on a gravel lot.

The second property is expected to open in 2025, bringing a total 98-units to the property together once completed. BC Housing's new lease with the City will last 20 years.

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