A target range is opening across the street from Regent Park, a spot the local city councillor has called “quite a poor choice of location,” given the community’s past struggles with violence.

STRYKE Target Range, which already has a location in Brampton, will hold a grand opening Thursday for its new range on Dundas St. E., just east of River St. A Facebook event invites attendees to “Try Axe Throwing, Knife Throwing, Archery and Air Guns!”

Councillor Pam McConnell, whose ward encompasses Regent Park, told the Star she thinks the company should have consulted with the local community, particularly parties involved in the neighbourhood’s revitalization, before setting up shop.

“It’s a community in transition. It’s recovering from decades of violence and anti-social activities and is really coming into its own as a healthy community,” McConnell said.

“I understand that it isn’t a business that necessarily promotes violence or any of those things . . . but it’s not very good way to come into a neighbourhood without at least talking to some of the neighbours.”

Regent Park, a roughly square downtown neighbourhood bounded by Gerrard St. E. to the north, Parliament St. to the west, Shuter St. to the south and River St. to the east, is home to several social housing buildings and housing co-ops. Once solely a public housing development, it gained notoriety as a hotspot for gun and gang violence, but a revitalization effort kicked off in 2005 has gradually transformed the area into a mixed-use, mixed-income community with gleaming glass condos, a new community recreation centre and rebuilt community housing units. These efforts have helped Regent Park shake its old image for a more positive, hopeful one.

The revitalization is one reason STRYKE chose this location, co-owners Mark Richardson and Kevin Huether told the Star on Monday.

“We were looking for an area that had some street exposure and wasn’t tucked away in some dodgy industrial section,” Richardson said. “So we were looking for a while and this popped up, and we loved the area and what’s going in this area. It’s up-and-coming and it’s easily accessible for most of the city.”

The range is not for conventional firearms but for less dangerous pastimes like airsoft guns, which propel nonlethal, non-metallic pellets. All of the activities are purely for entertainment, Richardson said, explaining that each group that comes in will have a coach assigned to it, to ensure safety.

“(Regent Park’s) definitely had a bad name from the past,” Huether said, “but I’d rather people come here and try the air guns instead of going out and grabbing a real pistol and firing at the wall or someone else, right?”

But just because the landscape has changed doesn’t mean newcomers don’t have to be sensitive to the past, McConnell said.

“I get (that axe-throwing or airsoft gun shooting is) also a sport — like darts. I get all of that, but for example, in Regent Park if there’s a film shoot, we don’t have any guns going off,” she said.

“We have to remember that these traumas don’t leave communities really quickly, and I don’t think that this is something that will enhance the reduction of trauma. It may not traumatize at all, it may have no impact, but it was a very poor choice and it was a very poor process for making that choice.”

Oak Street Housing Co-operative is just north of STRYKE. Manager Brynne Teall, who has lived in the area for the past 32 years, said she hadn’t heard complaints about the range but wondered why STRYKE chose the location.

“So much work has gone into working with the youth and trying to say, “Guns, etc., are not good, knives aren’t good,” and then, here’s something where, ‘Here, come and …’ You know?” she said. “Although a lot of people are probably not going to be able to afford to use it, at the same time it’s still ‘Come build up your skills and abilities,’ and they’re making it sound like it’s fun.”

Co-op staff learned the target range was coming recently through a mail notification, she said.

Toronto STRYKE manager Justin Adam acknowledged the issues Regent Park has faced but said “every area of the city (has) had a problem or had some issues that were filtered out or worked out.”

“It hasn’t been too much of an issue lately, but we just make sure we want to channel it right, if anything,” he said, adding that he eventually hopes to give back to the community.

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“We’re still working with wood every day, building new targets and stuff, so down the road, eventually when we open and get more established, I can try and reach out to the community more and see if there’s anyone who wants more co-op programs in high schools,” said Adam, a carpenter.

“Yes, we are dealing with knives . . . and air guns and bows and arrows, (we) just make sure we channel it positively . . . at our Brampton location, we’ve proven (we can keep) the establishment thriving in a positive way.”

McConnell remains skeptical.

“I don’t think he knows anything about the community or the revitalization or the 10 years that we’ve put into it, so, you know, it’s a bit presumptive of him to suggest that he has something to offer before he knows where the community is at and where the revitalization is at,” she said.

“Certainly, (it) was never indicated to me in the process that there was ever a need for this kind of activity.”

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