Pacific Institute | Community organization looking for roommates

It’s not just downtown Montreal towers that have to contend with hybrid work and labor shortages. At the Institut Pacifique, a community organization in northern Montreal, newly renovated premises are looking for takers.

“We are aware that we have an exceptional place, so the goal would be to offer it to other organizations so that they can also benefit from it,” explains Isabelle Boissé, Director General of the Pacific Institute. “These are quality premises for young people, and there are few of them in Ahuntsic or Montreal North,” she adds.

The Pacific Institute is located on Gouin Boulevard, in the north of the island of Montreal, next to the Île-de-la-Visitation nature park. A place at the junction of the boroughs of Ahuntsic-Cartierville and Montreal-North.

In 2016, the organization, whose mission is to promote peaceful conflict resolution among young people, launched a major fundraising campaign to renovate and expand the heritage building where it has been located since 1976.

The work was unavoidable, the building no longer met certain standards and no longer met the organization’s mission. The fundraising campaign was a resounding success, and the organization managed to raise $4.5 million. Work began in 2018. The new building was inaugurated in November 2019, a few months before the start of the pandemic.

The before-and-after photos of these renovations show the premises to be small and dark, compared to a now bright and airy building.

Three years later, the Pacific Institute put its building up for sale, for nearly $5 million.

The great upheaval

The organization had not anticipated the upheavals that COVID-19 would cause, says Geneviève Dumais, director of communications. “Just in terms of employees, we went from 40 to 25,” she illustrates.

The pandemic first triggered a reflection within the team, which decided to tighten its activities around its primary mission of supporting young people.

Then the labor shortage, glaring in the community, was added. Teleworking has finished emptying the offices.

Result: vast spaces, decorated to the taste of the day, but deserted. Hence the decision to try to sell or rent the building. “We asked ourselves: is our objective to build a heritage or to put money into our mission? “, underlines M.^me Corn.

“We see that there is a movement taking place for many organizations, there are some who were staying in certain buildings and who have to move. We are trying to see – if an owner bought it – maybe we could stay as tenants by cohabiting with others. There are really plenty of possibilities, because this space is magnificent, but we only inhabit it in a small proportion at the moment. »

Not to mention the stress that comes with being a homeowner. “We are a small, reduced team, with a profile of people from the social sciences. We are not building managers”, sums up M^me Corn.

The major donors of the initial project have all been notified of the proposed sale, assures M^me Dumais, and they reacted well to the announcement.

A modern mission

With the outbreak of gun violence in the metropolis, the mission of the Pacific Institute has never been so relevant, believes Mr.^me Corn.

Every afternoon, the premises welcome dozens of children from the neighborhood who come to have fun under the watchful eye of educators, whose mission is to teach social skills and resolve conflicts through play.

On the way from The Press, one afternoon in late March, several children are playing dodgeball in a bright gymnasium. Others draw or play table football. Wilby Descartes, an educator at the Institute for 17 years, knows them all by name.

Educators from the Institut Pacifique also travel to schoolyards and parks in the two neighborhoods to lead games with the children. With the new waves of migration, workshops are given in reception classes for young people newly arrived in Quebec, explains Ms.^me Corn.

The Institute’s flagship project is Towards the Pacific, a conflict resolution and mediation teaching program for schools in Quebec.

With premises made to measure in this way, the Pacific Institute does not wish to move. The dream is rather to share costs such as facilities. In other words, as M.^me Dumais: “To live together with missions compatible with ours. »