Community restaurant to close doors

BY ANDY BLATCHFORD

andy.blatchford@transcontinental.ca

When Nérina Lafrance opened a community restaurant in eastern Pierrefonds, her goal was to feed hungry kids.

Before retiring in 1999, Lafrance built Resto-Vie Pierrefonds into a pillar of support that sold below-cost, multiple-course meals in the low-income neighbourhood. She also established local school, day-care and seniors’ meal programs out of Resto-Vie’s kitchen.

But the restaurant’s 22-year run will come to an end tomorrow when it closes its doors for what could be the last time. “We thought we could re-establish it,” said former Ste. Geneviève mayor Jacques Cardinal, who came in as chairman of Resto-Vie’s board of directors last September.

The closure comes on the heels of a tumultuous period for Resto-Vie, which saw its entire board of directors quit last summer amidst a swirl of financial mismanagement accusations.

Cardinal said the current board took over in September and discovered that Resto-Vie was running an $80,000 deficit.

He said the board learned later last fall that West Island Community Shares (WICS), a local fundraising organization, was planning to take away its $39,000 grant. “We were surprised to learn that a few months later our subsidies were going to be cut,” Cardinal said. “We only found that out afterwards.”

He received official notice that the funding was pulled on Monday morning, but was given no reason for the cut. “It’s very unfortunate, but we tried to do the impossible,” Cardinal said.

WICS interim executive director Heather Holmes said the decision to remove Resto-Vie from its funding list was not taken lightly.

Holmes said a WICS committee found “obvious risks” under three main categories: management style, financial status and structure. “We understand the need for the services that this group offers. We understand the direct link that this group has with children who are in need of food,” Holmes said Monday. “There are just certain parts of the file that are deemed too risky.”

Holmes said the WICS decision does not mean ties are forever severed with Resto-Vie, and if it re-opens the group can re-apply next year.

Over the past five years, WICS gave $164,000 to Resto-Vie, according to a WICS spokesman.

The group is scheduled to announce its funding recipients for its 2006-’07 fiscal year at a news conference today.

Until last week, Cardinal said Resto-Vie served 220 hot meals daily to local school and day care children for $3.75 each. It also dished out another 66 meals per day for 50 cents, and sometimes free of charge to kids who couldn’t afford to pay.