Saigon Centre residents fear loss of Vietnamese cultural space after Manitoba Housing takeover

Longtime tenants of a social housing project built in Winnipeg for Vietnamese refugees nearly 40 years ago fear its takeover by Manitoba Housing will ruin their main-floor cultural centre.

Saigon Centre at 458 Balmoral St., which was run by the Vietnamese Non-Profit Housing Corp. since opening in 1989, was put up for sale in March because it was $3 million in arrears on its mortgage.

Manitoba Housing and Renewal Corp. took over the 54-unit building and the government department is working on integrating it into the provincial housing portfolio, a spokesperson confirmed recently.

While rent levels are protected under a caveat that was enacted when the building opened, residents say they’re about to lose access to their cultural centre. The large room on the main floor is used for community gatherings, health and wellness activities for seniors, festivals, language-learning classes and other events over the last four decades.

Tenants told the Free Press the space has long been a connection point for Vietnamese newcomers, including those who fled at the end of the Vietnam War in 1975, part of a humanitarian crisis in which hundreds of thousands escaped the country by cramming into fishing boats. They became known as “boat people.”

Quanhai Tonthat, a retired social worker and medical language interpreter who came to Winnipeg from Vietnam in 1983, said the Saigon Centre is akin to an “ancestral house” — a Vietnamese traditional place of worship where record of a family’s lineage is kept — in part because some did not have a home to return to.

“Because of this place, I feel at home in Winnipeg, and I feel proud of that. And if this place is erased, it’s a part of my identity being erased,” Tonthat told the Free Press. “This is why I feel the urgency to come here, just to say something to keep it.”

Kim Le has lived in Saigon Centre for decades and founded the Vietnamese Women’s Association that’s based in the building. She said tenants have no issue with the Manitoba Housing takeover, but worry it will erase their community traditions.

“We want to keep our tradition, the culture, alive, so why (would) the government, Manitoba Housing, destroy this place, so we don’t have anywhere to maintain the culture?” she said. “That’s a big thing for us.”

A spokesperson for Manitoba Housing confirmed the transfer of ownership, but refused to comment on the future of the community gathering space.

However, in a letter to Vince Bueti, lawyer for the Vietnamese Non-Profit Housing Corp., during the takeover process last year, deputy housing minister Charlene Paquin said the room will be turned into a space that can be booked “for occasional use.”

“While exclusive use of the main floor hall will not be permitted, community groups, including VNPHC, will be able to book the space for occasional use through the future property manager,” the letter reads.

Bueti said he has spent more than a year since the foreclosure was announced trying to reach provincial officials in hopes that Manitoba Housing would be directed to “look after and provide the services in that hall to the tenants and also to the various community groups that use that hall.”

Kelsey Vuong, 20, who has lived in the building her entire life, said Saigon Centre was created for Manitoba’s small, close-knit Vietnamese community.

Opening up the main floor would force them to hold events elsewhere and cut off access to residents who are seniors, don’t speak English and aren’t able to travel.

She said the takeover could rob her of her wish to live in the building as she gets old.

“I feel like I’m going to lose a part of my identity because I want to be able to share with my children and my children’s children as well, so that they can continue the tradition and keep the folks that built this place alive,” she said.

The original $4.4-million capital cost was paid by the provincial government, while the Winnipeg Core Area Initiative contributed $60,000 for the cultural centre.

Statistics Canada data from 2021 found more than 4,300 Vietnamese people live in Winnipeg.

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca