July 8, 2010

Manitoba Public Insurance officially opens new service centre - donates King Street facility to Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre

WINNIPEG ─ With a focus on providing even greater service to our customers today and for decades to come, Manitoba Public Insurance officially opened the doors to its newest service centre.

The new service centre ─ located at 1284 Main Street in Winnipeg ─ has been built to LEED silver status and is the first new facility Manitoba Public Insurance has built in Winnipeg in 25 years. It’s also the first of four, new full-service centres which will serve Manitobans in Winnipeg and Selkirk.

This new service centre replaces the old claim centre located at 445 King Street. This property will be donated to Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre (Ma Mawi), which will continue to provide community-service programs for residents within the neighbourhood and Winnipeg.

"This donation is another positive step in strengthening our communities," Attorney General Andrew Swan, minister responsible for Manitoba Public Insurance, announced today. "Community programming, family gathering, sharing of ideas and heightening aboriginal cultures will all flourish as the result of this building donation."

Manitoba Public Insurance's CEO/President Marilyn McLaren explained the building donation was achieved through strong community consultation and a common goal of helping people.

As a result of exploration by the Community Lead Organizations United Together (CLOUT) coalition to identify the best community need option for the King Street Claims Centre, it was determined that Ma Mawi Centre would work with MPI on acquiring the building.

"Ma Mawi is a community-based, grass-roots organization which will make full use of our former building on King Street," said McLaren.

"The King Street facility was our first claim centre and has been a fixture in the community for 40 years. The donation of this facility will now ensure that a legacy has been left for this community now and well into the future."

“Ma Mawi works in close collaboration with the community to develop and maintain preventative services for Aboriginal children and families,” said McLaren.

"Manitoba Public Insurance’s founding principle is that of giving back to our community and this donation will make a positive contribution to this community and therefore to all Manitobans. This donation will have no effect on our basic Autopac ratepayers."

Additional Business Hours

The new Main Street service centre’s business hours are Monday through Friday, 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., and Saturday from 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

'Customers today, tomorrow and for decades to come will benefit from this new service centre," Marilyn McLaren, CEO and president of Manitoba Public Insurance said today. "Easy and convenient access to our services remains a key priority in ensuring that we provide the best customer service possible."

In addition to offering even greater convenience for its customers, the corporation’s commitment to environmental sustainability has been accomplished through construction methods which meet international environmental standards.

"Manitoba Public Insurance is committed to developing all its future construction projects to Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) silver status, and retro-fitting existing buildings."

Bison Drive and Gateway Road Service Centres

The other two Winnipeg service centres are located on Bison Drive and Barnes Street, and Gateway and Springfield Roads. They are expected to start serving customers by end of the summer. Selkirk’s new service center is expected to become operational by 2011.

Thanks to ever-changing 'green friendly' technology, these new service centres have been specifically constructed for maximum energy efficiency, using technology such as geothermal heat recovery systems and motion sensors that adjust lighting as people move throughout the buildings. The corporation will continue to improve energy consumption, recycling and emissions in all existing facilities.

Population trends were used to determine the location of the new service centres, explained McLaren. The city’s south and northeast quadrants are among the fastest-growing areas of Winnipeg and opening service centres within those locations will provide motorists living or working in those areas with more convenient access to services.

"In the last 20 years, communities in south Winnipeg have grown by more than 26,000 residents, and neighbourhoods in the northeast part of the city have grown by nearly 18,000," said McLaren.

As the populations of these areas have increased, so too have the number of vehicles and the number of claims filed, she explained. In 2001, 107,600 claims were filed at Winnipeg’s five claims centres. By 2009, that number had increased by 10.7 per cent to about 119,100. The corporation found that 63 per cent of these claimants lived in the north or south parts of the city.

The new service centres follow the lead of the geothermal-heated claim centres that were recently built in Beausejour and Winkler. As well the older St. Mary’s Road claim centre became the first building in Manitoba to receive top-tier Go Green Plus status from the international Building Owners Management Association (BOMA).

"These new service centres will serve Manitobans efficiently today and for decades to come," said McLaren.

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