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a south riverdale institution isin danger of extinction. The Ralph Thornton Centre at 786 Queen East, which has housed the Queen-Saulter Library and a range of community outreach services for 20 years, has been declared surplus by the federal government, which owns the building. If the city doesn’t step in to buy the property, the community centre could close its doors in November. The centre’s executive director, Terry Lee, has appealed to a number of politicians including Dennis Mills, the federal MP for the area. Last February Mills’s special assistant, Michael Quinsey, apparently informed a community meeting that the building was “saved.”
But further correspondence between Lee and federal Public Works Minister Alfonso Gagliano reveals that the building was not removed from the surplus list. Quinsey did not return NOW’s calls.
City councillor Jack Layton says it would be “a disaster” for Riverdale to lose the centre and he is “counting on” Mills to get Gagliano onside.
