Kitchener facility offers housing, food, medical assistance to people experiencing homelessness
Posted Sep 25, 2025 06:48:24 AM.
Last Updated Sep 25, 2025 10:42:40 AM.
More support is on the way for those experiencing homelessness in Kitchener as “Making Home,” a facility at 97 Victoria St. N., prepares to open its doors.
Operated by The Working Centre, the Kitchener facility offers 44 units of housing to vulnerable populations on the same lot as St. John’s Kitchen and a medical clinic offering addiction support.
The facility is located across the road from one of the largest encampments in Waterloo Region, the Victoria Street encampment.
“It’s nicer than living in a shelter, it’s really quite beautiful living, but at the same time, some people will want to move on, but others are going to say ‘Wow, this is really great, I can live in a space like this,'” said Joe Mancini, director of The Working Centre.
Mancini noted that this type of transitional housing, somewhere between a shelter and permanent housing, is the kind of housing that should be focused on to tackle housing insecurity in Waterloo Region.
The plans for “Making Home” began in 2019, as The Working Centre offered supportive housing to the growing number of people who attended St. John’s Kitchen.
The site was changed in a number of ways since construction began, including the addition of a third floor to expand the amount of housing they can offer on site, a renovation on the main floor to provide 3,000 sq. ft. for the on-site medical clinic and counselling space, the addition of public washrooms, showers and laundry, a new building for St. John’s Kitchen, and a landscaped courtyard.
According to Mancini, work done with the City of Kitchener and the Rapid Housing Initiative from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation helped the project come together at a fast pace.
“There hasn’t been delays, and when there were delays, we were able to get over them, we’ve gotten over all kinds of hurdles,” said Mancini. “Everything is pretty well built now.”
The Working Centre is hosting a trio of open houses to celebrate the facility’s completion, to thank donors, and to give the public an inside look into what they’ve created. The general public are invited to join the open house on Saturday starting at 10 a.m.
