Over the years it has been heartbreaking to witness so many people struggling with addictions and living in poverty on our streets. It’s one of the reasons my wife and I were drawn to work and volunteer at the therapeutic community of Woodwynn Farms in central Saanich BC.
We spent over four years creating a Peace Garden and labyrinth filled with hundreds of edible plants and sculptures. We tried to create something that would be beautiful and also an inspiration to the participants in the program. We received a lot of joy witnessing the transformation as people gained confidence, hope and new skills to tackle their world.
Elizabeth and I now want to open a facility in New Brunswick Canada. We want to emphasize the arts, broaden the opportunities for the participants and involve the local community as much as possible.
We have found an amazing lodge set on 86 acres with everything we could have dreamed of to house and provide for up to 48 participants. It has room for summer music camps, volunteers, workshops, a one hundred seat restaurant and industrial kitchen and a large building with an indoor swimming pool, which we would actually convert into a farmers market. It has everything the therapeutic community would need and also room for future expansion ideas.
The lodge costs $1.6 million dollars and we have had a private funder step forward who has indicated that he would be interested in purchasing the lodge for our purpose. Our goal right now is to seek some government funding with the day to day operating costs, which are still substantial. We can save the provincial government $2.5 – $5million dollars + over a six year period. Our business plan shows that we could become largely self sustaining after five years.
We have made great progress in getting this far, but everything depends on the government seizing the opportunity to save millions by committing support to help carry the day to day expenses. Our model is largely based on the same model as the facility in San Patrignano in Italy, which has one of the highest success rates in the world for helping people with addictions and homelessness.
We have presented the following proposal to the NB government.
MiramichiProposal_NB_May18_Small
The PeaceGarden Skills Development Therapeutic Community will operate as a charitable organization. We’d love to talk to you if you are interested in supporting this project. And we are looking for anyone who would like to volunteer (building, gardening, etc.) from time to time. (We would have a few extra cabins for volunteers.)
e mail us at derykhouston@shaw.ca