The Last Five Years...
by Emmy Stuebing, CEO of the Zebra Centre
February 2021: I was spoiled by the Zebra Centre Board of Directors who gifted this wonderful basket to welcome me to my new role.
Five years ago this month, I joined the Zebra Centre as their new CEO. When I started, we were still navigating the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic, which meant wearing masks, responding to changing health and safety requirements and doing all we could to keep the Zebra Centre safe and operational.
It was quite the unusual time to be meeting a whole new team! During that first year, in 2021, the Zebra Centre multi-disciplinary team had about 45 people working together, with 12 people on my team. That year, the Zebra Centre supported a record number of children and youth totalling 3,844 kids!
When I think back to that time, it truly was a blur with everyone scrambling to do their best to provide important trauma-informed, child-centric supports during a global pandemic! As implications of the pandemic started to diminish and I had found my footing with my new team, my focus shifted to an even bigger goal – find a new “forever home” for the Zebra Centre.
(Oh – and during this time from 2022 – 2023, we also celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Zebra Centre, welcomed new Buddy Dogs, celebrated the retirement of our beloved DWW Fletcher and even navigated the impacts of a fire which caused significant smoke and water damage!)
When the Zebra Centre opened as the very first child advocacy centre in Canada in 2002, it was designed to support about 1,500 kids each year. For several years, it had been operating at capacity and when I joined the herd, it was truly bursting at the seams.
Workstations had been added to every possible space – instead of maintaining the board room, six workstations were built in the room. Family meeting rooms were booked solid and if a family showed up early for their appointment, we had nowhere to host them which meant we would have to ask them to leave (maybe go for a coffee) and come back for their scheduled appointment time. Child Forensic Interview Rooms were booked solid too and there were months when we had to open for extended hours to accommodate the influx of interviews. While we were able to sustain our services and supports, it was far from ideal! The need for a new Zebra Centre was urgent.
April 4, 2024: Announcing the new “Forever Home of the Zebra Centre”
Many of you watched (and even joined in) our incredible journey over the past few years. We found a “perfect” building and location in 2023 along with a community champion whose “outside of the box” thinking and big heart made the project a reality. (Thanks Bill!)
We conducted an RFP and found the dedicated team at Keller Construction who enthusiastically took on our big project and ambitious timelines. Designs were complete by December 2023, permits were secured and then demolition began in early 2024.
We announced the project to the community in April 2024 and construction, managed by the wonderful Keller team, continued through the summer. With a tremendous amount of hard work (and some good luck), we were able to open the doors and begin supporting kiddos in our wonderful new building on October 7, 2024.
All the while, we were working hard to raise over $6 million needed to cover the building and moving costs! Our community really stepped up and helped with that!
We settled into our new home during the autumn of 2024 (while supporting ever increasing numbers of children and youth) and celebrated the official grand opening in April 2025.
Today, in addition to operating our fantastic new Zebra Centre, I am very proud to share that thanks to community and government support, we have been able to double the size of my wonderful team to 25 permanent staff members who have continued to support and work with our multi-disciplinary partners. Our army of volunteers has grown from 65 people in 2020 to almost 100 today, including an incredible Board of Directors who contributed countless hours to help bring the new Zebra Centre to life. Even our team of Buddy Dogs has grown to 3 “pawsome” members. Together, we are supporting over 4,400 kiddos every year!
April 4, 2025: the giant ribbon in place for the big ribbon cutting to celebrate the official grand opening of the Zebra Centre.
I am often asked if working at the Zebra Centre is depressing. The trauma that children and youth (and their safe caregivers) who come to the Zebra Centre have experienced is heartbreaking. But I know that when they come through our Zebra Centre doors, they are truly surrounded by an incredible, caring herd of grown ups wrapping every kiddo in care.
Today, we have a strong team working together in a terrific space to deliver our essential services and supports for kiddos who have experienced abuse of any kind - physical, sexual, emotional, online exploitation and even witness to crime. It has truly been an incredible journey to take the Zebra Centre from our “humble beginnings” to a fully functioning, free-standing, fantastic Child & Youth Advocacy Centre.
I will admit, I have been very happy to have a moment to catch my breath over the past few months, enjoying and showing off what we have created over the past five years. I am truly filled with gratitude – the Zebra Centre wouldn’t be thriving and helping in the way that it is without countless team members, partners and supporters. It truly takes a herd, and it has been my greatest honour to play a leadership role in bringing the Zebra Centre to its next chapter!
Our dedicated board of directors is now building a new strategic plan, to guide us through the next five years. Time will tell what new initiatives and opportunities may emerge over that time, but I know that in everything we do, kids will be at the heart of it.
Thank you for being a part of the Zebra Centre story… and I hope you will join us as we embark on the next chapter for the Zebra Centre. Together, we are making a very real difference in thousands of young lives every year, and the need for Zebra is ever growing!