Retirement home for queer seniors makes crucial progress

An affordable housing project led by the Edmonton Pride Seniors Group and Right at Home Housing Society now has land and nearly $9 million in provincial funding to build a safe, inclusive development in The Quarters.

"In a perfect world, it would come out of the ground sometime next summer," said Marisa Redmond, executive director of Right at Home. "But we're still early enough in the phases of this project that it's hard to tell. We're at the phase now where we can check that box and say this is probably very much going to be a reality. A year ago, we may have still been sitting on the precipice of, 'Is this ever going to happen?'"

While Redmond describes this chapter as an early one, the seniors group has been dreaming of a development since 2013. The current plan is to build around 64 units with a mix of market- and non-market price points. The City of Edmonton provided the land at 95 Street north of Rowland Road for $1 in late 2025, while the provincial government approved $8.69 million in May.

Right at Home has enlisted Global Philanthropic for a capital campaign to help raise $5 million towards an estimated total project cost of $27 million; public funders and loans are expected to make up the balance. Though the momentum is happening about 13 years into the project, Redmond said there's never a straight path between idea and execution in this realm.

"My personal opinion is that there is no normal timeline when it comes to building affordable housing," Redmond told Taproot. "There are so many different components that can play into it — the finding of the land, the finding of partners, if you need them, the funding environment. Right now, we're in an amazing funding environment, but in 2014 or 2013, those funds probably wouldn't have been available."

Part of Redmond's positivity for the funding environment is related to the federal Housing Accelerator Fund, of which the City of Edmonton stewards nearly $200 million. However, it's an indirect boon.

"I think the impact of the Housing Accelerator Fund is not targeted to make specific projects move forward," she said. "It's more targeted at changing that environment that makes projects move forward, such as approaches to zoning … it's kind of changing those things that makes all housing move forward more quickly, whether it's affordable, whether it's market, small infill, big infill."

The project is important because 2SLGBTQ+ seniors don't always feel welcome at existing housing options for their retirement years, said Michael Phair, chair of the Edmonton Pride Seniors Group.

"(Myself and) a couple of gay and lesbian friends of mine who also had gotten older realized that we didn't see very much, looking ahead, that addressed persons who were part of our community," Phair told Taproot. "That kind of drove us. After we started looking at that notion and finding out what organizations were already doing … there was basically very little."

Indeed, Edmonton lost the one seniors' facility that was specifically welcoming to queer residents when The Ashbourne closed in 2023. The Garneau United Assisted Living Place sold the building to an unnamed party that had originally offered to keep it as a residence, then changed their mind. A receptionist for the Garneau Hall Seniors Community told Taproot that some residents of The Ashbourne migrated to its residence.

The existing options leave "quite a bit to be desired," said Phair, who in 1992 became the first openly gay politician elected in Alberta after years of activism dating back to the Pisces bathhouse raid.

"There certainly is quite a significant number (of people) that would like to be in a residence that they knew was built specifically and run by persons who were part of our community and gave a sense of a building that was more than just a home," he said, "a community where people could live openly, authentically themselves. They could feel safe all the time, and don't need to worry that they might be put down or bullied, and at the same time, would enjoy living with other people who were similar and could become friends, or were friends already."

This is a "self-contained" project that differs from assisted living by emphasizing neighbour-led supports based on relationships rather than staff-driven community initiatives, Phair said.

"You're encouraging folks that live there to take part in different things that will help ensure it is a friendly place, and people will get to know each other and assist each other," he said. "We think that there'll be a number of persons there who will find ways to assist other people a bit. It might be just visiting with folks, it might be that they help them to move furniture, and those kinds of things that can be easily done with some other members who are residents."

Phair hopes to leverage his deep connections within Edmonton's queer community to activate the so-far unnamed housing development with gatherings such as film screenings. And anyone who lives there or visits will know that safety and belonging are paramount.

"It will be clear in the written information for anyone that's coming that there's no fooling about," Phair said. "This place is safe, there's no discrimination allowed. From Day 1, people will understand that, and if there are issues, there will be a way to deal with them."

The capital campaign is getting underway, and there's more organizing to do in the coming months. One more piece is Phair's expectations that the feds step up to chip in.

"Certainly, we expect money from the federal government as well," he said. "There's no doubt in my mind that we will be asking for probably $8.5 million, just like the province gave, and I would hope that we will get most of that, if not all of it."