Eagle House group home closing

Black Diamond: Care society focusing on Rowan House

A Black Diamond group home will be closing down at the end of April.

The board running the Region 3 Family Based Care Society notified provincial child and family officials at the end of January they no longer want to operate the Eagle House group home in Black Diamond.

The local care society also operates the Rowan House Women’s Shelter, but the Rowan House is moving from Black Diamond to a new house currently under construction in High River.

The society’s executive director Sherri Botten said it was a difficult decision for the board to close Eagle House, but ultimately financial reasons and local needs came first.

“We can’t sustain the expense of the building,” said Botten. “Its an aging well-used building.”

Region 3 Family Based Care Society was operating the group home through a contract with the Province for 12 years.

The group home operates on the upper level of the house with a capacity for six youths and has room for six people in the women’s shelter in the basement.

However, Botten said if they expanded the group home to the whole house the funding wouldn’t cover the cost to heat and take care of the other utilities in the home.

“The money that comes through the contract would not cover the cost to run the expenses,” she said.

Botten said another consideration was how to best serve the local community.

“In general the group home does not support local area youth,” she said. “The majority of kids don’t come from our immediate area.”

The women’s shelter mainly serves families from the foothills with a service area stretching from Claresholm to the northern border of Calgary, east to Vulcan and west to Banff.

“The board really believes the biggest benefit in the community is the domestic violence and Rowan House work,” Botten said.

Calgary Family and Child Ministry officials will relocate the four youth currently living at Eagle House.

Gloria Visser-Niven, communications manager for Calgary and area child and family services, said they could be moved into other group homes or placed in a foster care home.

“None of the youth there will be adversely affected by this,” Visser-Niven said.

She said the ministry takes a regional approach for youths in their care.

There are two other foster homes in the foothills including the Stampede Ranch, and one in Okotoks serving the Stoney Nation. There are also foster families in the foothills.

“We have a very strong foster care network in the area, she said.

No decision has been made about opening another group home to replace Eagle House.

Visser-Niven said the decision to close Eagle House was a business decision and said it is understandable private foundations who have contracts with the Province have to consider their bottom line.