Phase 1 of the Demolition Process: April 2026 Update

This update about demolition of buildings at the Huronia Regional Centre will also share some ideas about commemorating the site and honouring the people harmed there. Remember Every Name is a key stakeholder in this process, working with a high-level team – OPP managers in charge of Training and Recruitment, Business Management, and Indigenous Policing; the Ministry of Infrastructure’s Director of Realty Policy and the Ministry of the Solicitor General’s Acting Director of Facilities and Capital Planning. All those involved came to the process aware of our issues, having already watched the documentary Unloved; Huronia’s Forgotten Children, and have accommodated and listened respectfully to survivors.



Phase 1 began in January 2026. We can now report that two service buildings, Coral Cove campground cabins, the Admissions/Isolation building, the old Infirmary, the Multi-sensory House (which the OPP vacated ahead of schedule) and the long row of one-storey buildings that was once the Medical Unit have been demolished. With each demolition, OPP staff have informed REN members and brought survivors living in Orillia to watch. Next the McGhie Pavilion/Apartments (the Pav) and another service building will come down. At that point, all of the land on the south side of the south access road will be bare, 

All of the older, larger buildings still stand but the pre-demolition abatement process has begun in Cottage D and the Nurses Residence (2 of the 3 buildings along Memorial Avenue), in the former superintendent’s house (one-time outpatients department) and in other former staff houses that later served as group homes. 

The OPP has confirmed that the Main Admin. Building (including Cottages A and K) will be demolished but because they occupy it, no date has been set. We have explained that it is a crime scene and have seen how dilapidated it has become and we understand that the OPP is looking for another location, so that it can be torn down sooner. Remember Every Name plans to have a ceremony to celebrate and film that event. Once we know when the main building will come down, we will issue an invitation.

A Remember Every Name leader, a historian and documentary film-maker have filmed inside buildings that were safe to enter. We identified artifacts which the OPP promised to remove for preservation. Unless they are deemed to be contaminated, the OPP has notified us and preserved artifacts Bird Construction has found during abatement and demolition. In “Larry’s Room” in the Pav, they are preserving whole wall panels and doors which a resident covered with his art. During demolition, they will protect the historical plaque that was required in the HRC class action settlement – to replace later for public viewing.

All of the artifacts claimed in 2014 after the class action settlement are in a storage room at Wilfrid Laurier University in Brantford. We shared photos of them with the OPP. Other artifacts remain in the OPP-occupied Trades Building at HRC. OPP said their archivists would help us recover HRC artifacts that may be in the Simcoe County or Orillia museums.

A future respectfully-curated memorial museum on the grounds of HRC is being discussed. In our meetings and communications, we keep telling OPP and government administrators that this is our goal. We want to create a stand-alone building, on the cemetery side of Memorial Avenue – large enough for group tours.

Some of us have toured the Woodlands Cultural Centre in Brantford, where the former Mohawk Institute residential school has been renovated to display and document living conditions, punishments, staff perpetrators, survivor stories and art, etc. We would encourage allies to tour there and envision how HRC stories can be told despite the demolition of its buildings. 

Survivor stories and digital documentation will animate the artifacts displayed at the future HRC Memorial Museum. Survivors have always said “history must not repeat itself” and we must learn from our mistakes from the past.