Barrie's Navy League Youth Program seeks new home

As Barrie continues revitalizing its waterfront, a staple along the lakeshore for almost 80 years, the Navy League youth program seeks a new home.

"We're finally getting to the point where this small piece of land would be better used for the city for a public area. Obviously, it's right downtown, and we would like to be on the non-motorized side of the bay," explained Diane Chislett, president of the Navy League's Barrie Branch.

The current building is located beside the Spirit Catcher in downtown Barrie and doesn't have plumbing or running water.

The league said a primary concern is finding a safe location for kids to operate their two-person sailboats. They also hope to find a site with the potential to become a multi-use facility for other clubs and cadet programs.

"For the air cadets, it would benefit our program greatly. We are out of the Barrie Armoury building right now, and we're sitting at a cadet attendance roll of about 140 cadets, so we're bursting at the seams," said Erin Richea-Teas, 102 Air Cadets Squadron Sponsoring Committee treasurer and vice chair.

"We've never been able to have a facility where we can do training, we can do teaching, we can have meetings, we can do video review," added Kathleen Doherty of Dragon Boat Barrie.

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The Navy League currently has a petition going to show the city council the support it has from the community, adding the program's value is demonstrated in the thousands of youth it has hosted from across Central Ontario.

"For families, no matter what your income level, it gives the kids an opportunity to have someplace to go every week for free. It teaches them leadership, community service, citizenship, teamwork," said Richea-Teas.

The leading proposed site for such a facility would neighbour the Southshore Centre and Military Heritage Park.

"We've been asking for a new building for about 30 years now," said Chislett.

"We do need to make sure that we provide the safe spaces for young people to train, to be part of the cadet corps, to be part of the Navy League and certainly to hone in their skills as they look to stake out their careers going forward in life," said Barrie Mayor Alex Nuttall, adding the city is evaluating potential new sites and what to do with the current home of the Navy League.

Chislett said while she would love to see shovels in the ground for a new building tomorrow, the Navy League would be thrilled if it could make progress towards a new waterfront home in the next three to five years.