The group behind a proposed Scarborough healing lodge for Indigenous women in conflict with the law is delaying its application for a month to speak with people opposing the project.

“We need to talk to people who were scared, the naysayers,” said Patti Pettigrew, an Algonquin and president of the Toronto-based Thunder Woman Healing Lodge Society. “Maybe I shouldn’t be doing this, but I really want the community to feel they were heard.”

Hundreds of people attended a community meeting last Wednesday to discuss the proposed healing lodge, a six-storey transitional home for 24 women on bail, parole or probation, that is slated to be built on Kingston Rd. and Cliffside Dr.

Thunder Woman was scheduled to go to Scarborough’s committee of adjustment on June 27, seeking approval on minor variances, but on Friday, City Councillor Gary Crawford announced he and Pettigrew jointly agreed to defer the application.

Pettigrew said she would work with her team and community members to organize sessions for smaller groups of residents, perhaps 15 or 20 each time, with concerns about the lodge.

The next committee meeting is on July 25.

Crawford said the society approached him 18 months ago, but he learned about the application only at the end of May.

Residents “still have unanswered questions,” and “didn’t feel their voices were heard,” he added later, saying he also wanted to learn more about the lodge and how it would operate.

“People bring up safety, and it’s a legitimate concern,” he said.

Crawford has long supported the Birchmount Residence, a transitional home for homeless men, on Kingston Rd. in Birch Cliff, which moved to a new location recently in Scarborough Village.

The councillor recalled that residents opposed that residence when it opened but, years later, were sad to see it go.

By then, they saw the home as part of the community, Crawford said. “It took time.”

At last week’s meeting, a man who said he lives close to the proposed lodge site, accused the Thunder Woman Healing Lodge Society of trying to welcome “inmates” like Terri-Lynne McClintic, who is serving a life sentence for the 2009 murder of 8-year-old Tori Stafford.

“You’re inviting the most dangerous criminals into our community,” he said.

But Pettigrew responded that the proposed lodge is completely different than the one in Saskatchewan run by Corrections Canada, where McClintic spent a brief period last fall. She was returned to secure custody after a public outcry.

“That was the absolute cruelest thing Corrections Canada could have done to Tori’s parents. They knew it was a cruel decision,” Pettigrew said

Critics of the decision, “lumped us all in one. We are not the same, and I want you to hear that,” said Pettigrew.

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The proposed lodge will have eight beds reserved for women on federal parole or provincial probation. The remaining four beds are slated for women on bail and awaiting trial.

When the women have completed their parole and probation and are ready for more independent living, they will be able to move into one of 12 affordable apartments on the upper three floors of the building.

Supporters — and there were many at Wednesday’s meeting — said the proposed lodge will help Indigenous women reclaim their identities and lives through daily teaching and ceremonies.

“It’s our responsibility to heal ourselves, and we’re doing it,” said Clayton Shirt, an Anishinaabe elder. “We want to do it with our way of life, and we were denied it for so long.”

Some area residents thanked Thunder Woman for choosing their community.

Anna Dewar Gully called the lodge an opportunity to be part of reconciliation with First Nations, and she pledged to be its biggest advocate and ally.

Still, she believes discriminatory comments online represent a small minority of local residents.

People asking why Thunder Woman selected Cliffside were told Scarborough is home to Toronto’s largest Indigenous population, one growing by 20 per cent every five years, according to Kenn Richard, executive director of Native Child and Family Services of Toronto.

Hector Catre, head of Scarborough Bluffs Community Association, said residents still need information to calm their fears. “I come to you ignorant and afraid,” he told the meeting.

Indigenous women get a “raw deal” in Canada, but they’ll come to the lodge with a history of problems, which may bring trouble to the community, he suggested. “As a resident and parent, knowing the ways of crime, I’m afraid.”

With files from Laurie Monsebraaten