KDO’s request for proposals for final design and costing of an 8-unit apartment complex for downtown Dawson City garnered several competitive proposals. The highest scoring proponent was Oro Enterprises of Dawson City, who were awarded the contract.

Oro has already met with the KDO board to discuss concepts and floor plans, and is working on a draft design that is oriented to our lean budget and will complement the heritage nature of the town’s core.

We look forward to sharing the design once completed!

Klondike Development Organization has issued a request for proposals for Phase 1 (the Design & Costing) of a Design Build process for an 8-unit Community Based Housing Project.
KDO RFP Notice- Design & Costing
The project is to be funded in part through Yukon Housing’s Municipal Matching Program, with the remainder of financing achieved with a commercial mortgage. If all goes well, construction of a compact 2-storey apartment complex in the downtown core could commence as early as the summer of 2016.

There is a significant shortage of rental housing in Dawson City, and yet all studies have shown that construction costs prohibit the development of a new for-profit rental development.

KDO is moving forward with final testing of a not-for-profit model that would utilize existing programs through Yukon Housing Corporation, tax incentives offered by the City of Dawson, and a commercial mortgage to make the project work.

Based on our 2014 feasibility study, our concept for a Dawson City housing solution is an apartment complex of 8 compact, energy efficient homes that would be suitable for single individuals, couples, or small families. Thanks to a CMHC project development loan, KDO is progressing with pre-construction work, and will be issuing RFPs for a design-build partner to complete final design and construction costing, geotechnical site assessments, and other activities over the course of the next few months. The project will only go ahead if final project cost estimates & other details satisfy both the KDO and our proposed financial partners that the project is solid and can be built within the allocated budget.

Our complete, updated project business plan can be viewed at: https://www.klondikedevelopment.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/KDO-CBH-Business-Plan-20151.pdf

Klondike Development Organization no longer delivers ongoing business and economic development services. Regional Economic Development initiatives are now lead by the North Yukon Regional Economic Action Development Initiative (READI). This is administered by Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in with co-funding from Government of Yukon and City of Dawson. Please contact those governments directly for further information.

We are now focused on facilitating the development in 2016 of a new 8-unit community-owned rental housing complex in Dawson City, to overcome a critical barrier to our growth and well-being.

We have archived our research and details of our past events here so they remain accessible for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately we can no longer maintain many of the site functions such as our popular property search tool, and these have been removed.

Thank you for visiting our site and to all of you that have used and supported our services in the past. We look forward to announcements on the housing project soon.

As of the end of May, KDO is now able to offer baseline services:

1- Enterprise facilitation service. So, if you need assistance starting a community project or business, feel free to give us a shout.

2- We’ll be getting our online resources back up to date in the coming weeks, including our Dawson City properties map.

AND…

We are very pleased to be working on a rental housing project proposal aimed at accessing Yukon Housing’s new municipal matching funding.  Stay tuned for details. For further information about this program, visit:

http://www.housing.yk.ca/pdf/municipal_matching_rental_construction_program.pdf

Klondike Development Organization invites you to join us for a renewable energy forum, right here in Dawson City:
Time: 7:00 to 9:00 PM
Location: Downtown Hotel Conference Room
Guest presenters: Energy Solutions Centre, Sow’s Ear Renewable Energy, and possibly other surprise guests as well.

The forum will include presentations from sector experts from government and private sector, as well as public discussion. We’ll find out more about useful government programs (Micro Generation, Good Energy Residential Incentives, Rural Electrification) and their potential locally, plus discuss practical solar, wind and other projects and their results in a Yukon Context.

Objectives:

Provide information about:

•  opportunities to offset their electrical consumption and/or sell excess energy they produce through renewable technologies to the grid.

•  opportunities to offset costs of constructing super-insulated structures and/or costs of renovating to higher energy standards.

•  ways to facilitate the extension of electrical services to rural residential, small load commercial and other non-industrial property outside incorporated communities

• taking steps towards:
– Reducing the long-term consumer costs of power generation
– Increasing the amount of money staying in the local economy
– Increasing self-sufficiency of the community & local economy
– Contributing to growing electrical needs of the territory

KDO partnership forums aim to gather different perspectives on a subject in one room to:

• communicate accurate information
• foster new/better understanding
• spark ideas, partnerships, action

Klondike Development invites you to attend a public forum about ‘placemaking’, Wednesday, December 10 from 6:30 to 8:30 PM at Alchemy Cafe.

In planning terms, placemaking refers to the shaping of an environment to facilitate social interaction, create high-quality public space, and improve a community’s quality of life. In the forum, we’ll be using a broader definition, in which placemaking simply means creating great places- towns and cities that attract people to come to live, work, play and learn.

We’ll look at research done by the Knight Foundation’s Soul of the Community project, which set out to see if there was any connection between people’s general feelings of satisfaction about where they lived and the overall productivity and economic health of a community. The study ended up drawing clear parallels between community attachment and the growth of a local economy.

Through discussions and brainstorming, we’ll take a look at how Dawson measures up in terms of things like aesthetics, social offerings and openness, and generate ideas about ways we can do placemaking and improve our already fabulous community.