Victoria Silver Threads, a 68-year-old non-profit known for providing services and activities for seniors, is warning it might be forced to close the doors of its Victoria offices if it can’t work out a new funding deal with the city.
Silver Threads, one of 11 organizations that act as seniors’ community centres and service providers, says it has been operating its Victoria location at a deficit of about $51,000 for the past year, and is in the final year of a five-year lease for its Quadra Street offices.
Tracy Ryan, executive director of the organization, which also operates a Saanich office on Hampton Road, said the situation cannot continue and it is hoping to work with the city on a financially sustainable model.
It is the only one of the 11 organizations that is not located in a city-owned space.
Ryan, who made a presentation to Victoria council las week, said the coming year’s deficit is expected to grow if things don’t change. The organization pays $122,389 to lease its location, is responsible for $22,388 in property taxes and $28,670 in operating costs, and has only a $122,389 annual grant from the City of Victoria.
Ryan proposed three options, including the city taking over the lease of the Quadra location and the associated costs and cancelling the annual grant.
Another option is that the city provide an additional grant of $55,000 to cover the annual shortfall, while a third “radical” option is to turn the former Romeo’s restaurant at the corner of Fisgard and Blanshard streets — bought this year by the city to transform into a park — into a new permanent centre for Silver Threads.
Ryan said the organization has been struggling with funding for a decade and has been working with 2014 grant levels to pay modern-day expenses. That year, Silver Threads signed a deal with the city for an annual grant plus one-time funding of $200,000 to help with costs associated with its forced move from city-owned property on Douglas Street to private leased space.
That deal required a letter from Silver Threads acknowledging it absolved the city of further financial commitment related to another forced move in 2003.
Silver Threads was forced into temporary city-leased storefronts on Douglas Street after the city sold its building in 2003 to make way for the Capital Regional District’s Fisgard Street headquarters.
Silver Threads then moved to Richmond Road in 2014, and when costs there started to increase, it was invited to be part of a redeveloped Crystal Pool project. When that project didn’t materialize, Silver Threads moved into its current Quadra Street location in 2020.
In an interview, Mayor Marianne Alto said Silver Threads will definitely be part of city budget discussions when they start next month. She, too, said she is perplexed that the annual grant has not increased since 2014. She said the city’s hands are tied on tax relief for the organization, as Silver Threads does not own its building.
“The question that I heard them put the other night was, is there anything that can be done to, at the very least, index their payments so that there’d be some automatic inflationary help and perhaps a lump sum to make up some of the difference,” Alto said.
As the city goes into the budgeting process, “This will be part of the larger conversation about where does an organization like Silver Threads fit in the quilt of all of the different organizations that provide really important community services to different neighbourhoods and for different groups of people.”
What will happen is anyone’s guess, as the city is facing “a fairly grim situation around budgeting generally,” she said.
Alto held out the possibility there could be space for Silver Threads in a city-owned facility, but she acknowledged she has not looked into what might be possible. “I suspect that’s also going to be part of the conversation.”
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