The second annual Genesis House Ride for Refuge saw over 70 people come out to Morden Park last weekend to support the survivors of domestic violence.
Participants walked or biked several kilometres around town to raise funds for the shelter’s transitional housing complex going up in Winkler to provide women and their children a safe space to rebuild their lives after escaping their abusers.
“I’m excited to announce officially today that in 10 days, October 14th, we will be breaking ground for our transitional housing project,” Sophie Gerbrandt, resource and community coordinator for Genesis House, shared with participants Saturday morning. “For those of you who were at our event last year, we didn’t have a date. This was still in some ways a dream, and we are so excited that today we can say this is a reality and this is going to be happening.”
The 25-unit apartment complex is slated to open sometime in 2027. In addition to offering safe, affordable housing, it will also include a common area where support programming can be provided to women to help them rebuild their lives after fleeing domestic violence.
“We will have a life skills kitchen where we can do cooking classes and have different financial institutions come in and teach about financial freedom and work with the ladies that are coming in. Also child minding,” said the project’s Kari Kauenhofen. “I could go on and on, but this transitional housing project program, our building project, is incredible to have in rural Manitoba, even in Canada. We are so incredibly fortunate.
“We have got $14.5 million in funding,” she continued. “However, we still need $2.5 million, so we will continue fundraising for that.”
At press time, the online donation tracker put fundraising for Ride for Refuge 2025 at $19,870—just a hair shy of the $20,000 goal.
