The dream of Snug Cove House, a supported living residence for Bowen’s seniors, has been twenty years in the making. Now, following a name change, a successful fundraising effort, the purchasing and subdividing of land, and attempts to cooperate with various on-island parties, the organization has decided to sell the land along the bottom half of its property in order to fund the construction of the residence.
“We started twenty years ago because something had to be done to stop the export of seniors from Bowen Island,” says Graham Ritchie, the chair of the Snug Cove House board. “From the standpoint of the health authorities, the body of water between Bowen and the mainland is irrelevant, so there is no funding aimed directly at our community. But for the one-hundred and seventy or more people living here that are more than 75 years of age, that body of water will force, at some point, a decision to move away from this community. We keep having to say goodbye to our seniors, and it is heartbreaking.”
In 2004, following a successful fundraising campaign, the board of what was then known as Abbyfield purchased the lands below Bowen Court Seniors Housing Co-op from Metro Parks for $150 thousand dollars.
The organization applied for funds from an organization called Independent Living B.C. to help fund the costs of constructing a facility, but monies which, until that time, were devoted to helping seniors were redirected to help the homeless.
“We were forced to look at other options,” says Ritchie, explaining that the organization tried to form various partnerships, but ultimately decided they needed to find someway to move forward independently. “The plan that ultimately made the most sense was to subdivide and sell-off the lower half of our property, in order to raise the funds we needed.”
In 2008, the Municipality awarded Snug Cove House the requested rezoning of their land, allowing the construction of fifteen housing units that would be considered “affordable” on the basis that
