The Jackson Building at Bank and Slater Streets is the favoured location for the Ottawa parole office, currently located at 191 Gilmour St.
The controversial search for a new location for the Gilmour Street parole office appears to be finally over.
At a public meeting Thursday, Correctional Service of Canada unveiled three new potential sites in downtown Ottawa that seemed to satisfy community concerns.
The three sites are at 340 Laurier Ave., 360 Laurier Ave. and the Jackson Building at Bank and Slater Streets. The federally-owned Jackson Building is the “primary focus,” said June Blackburn, CSC director for greater Ontario and Nunavut.
“Public works brought the site to our attention,” said Blackburn, “It’s easier to deal with a government building.”
City Council asked the CSC to find sites within the downtown core: between Kent and Elgin Streets and north of Gloucester Street. All three of the proposed sites fit the location criteria.
“The politicians are sorting it out,” said Albert Galpin, who has lobbied extensively for the parole office to be moved from its current location. “[The CSC] is finally starting to listen.”
Unlike the April public meeting regarding 1010 Somerset Street, another potential location that was ultimately rejected because of public objections, the mood of the meeting was cordial. The panel of CSC officials who were there to answer questions and members of the public thanked each other multiple times for coming to an apparent solution.
“Downtown is probably the ideal location to put it,” said Daniel Hayes, who lives near the propsed site and said he came to the meeting to better understand what the parole office involves.
“There’s a stigma associated with a parole office,” he said.
A citizen asked Blackburn if the office would still be moved by September as planned.
“We are committed to the Minister’s commitment to move by September,” she replied, referring to Peter van Loan, the minister of public safety.
The CSC has been looking for a new site for the Ottawa parole office, currently located at 191 Gilmour Street, since July 2007. The location is controversial because of its proximity to Elgin Street Public School and Minto Park, the site of a memorial to murdered women, and has been the subject of intense public lobbying to move it.
A previous proposal to move the office to 1010 Somerset Street was withdrawn after close to 200 people showed up at a similar public meeting to express their opposition. The office houses 16 parole officers and deals with over 150 parolees.