Raising the Roof purchased an abandoned nail salon on Mountain Avenue in Winnipeg’s North End and has converted it into three units of affordable housing. Two of the units are large three and four bedroom apartments and are being tenanted by Indigenous families that are at risk of separation without safe, stable housing. The basement unit is a one bedroom apartment, made available to a youth aging out of care and other Indigenous people in need of safe, affordable, supportive housing.

Local organizations, Siloam Mission and Zoongizi Ode Inc. provide ongoing wraparound supports for the tenants. Five Stones Property Management provides ongoing property management services.

Purpose Construction, a Winnipeg based social enterprise contractor, used the renovations on this project to train and employ 40 people who are at risk of homelessness, all of whom were Indigenous and had been involved in the criminal justice system.

Raising the Roof intends this to be the first of many projects in Winnipeg, with the next at a much larger scale. Even beyond the specific impact of this particular project on Mountain Avenue, our goal is for this project to be a prototype of how to solve complex social issues in a holistic manner, that not only attacks the symptoms, but the root cause.