Hours before the City of Peterborough’s new tourism strategy will be considered by city council, the city has announced that its new visitor centre will be located at the Peterborough Lift Lock, one of the city’s most iconic locations.

The new visitor centre will open year round as of Friday, June 26, serving as an information hub where both visitors and locals can find information about attractions, experiences, and local businesses in Peterborough.

Before the city assumed responsibility for tourism services from the now-defunct Peterborough & The Kawarthas Economic Development (PKED) in 2025, the visitor centre was located at PKED’s office at the Venture North building in downtown Peterborough. It was then moved to its current location at the box office inside the Peterborough Memorial Centre.

At its new location at 353 Hunter Street East in East City, at the base of the Lift Lock, the visitor centre will be able to welcome visitors arriving by boat, car, bike, or on foot. According to a media release from the city, the space has been designed with flexibility and accessibility in mind. It will be operated by Peterborough Tourism, the city’s tourism services and destination marketing program.

“This new Visitor Centre at the Lift Lock represents an exciting step forward in how we welcome people to Peterborough,” said Mayor Jeff Leal in the media release. “The Peterborough Lift Lock is one of our most iconic attractions and a celebrated National Historic Site of Canada. As the largest urban centre along the waterway, our connection to the water is central to both our community identity and visitor experience. This new space strengthens that connection and invites exploration year-round.”

The new location represents a collaboration between the city and Parks Canada, which operated the Peterborough Lift Lock Visitor Centre at the same location until it was closed in early 2020 due to the pandemic and never reopened.

“The Visitor Centre at the Lift Lock will once again be a welcoming, accessible hub where visitors and community members can come together, explore, and experience all that our vibrant region has to offer,” said Peterborough MPP Emma Harrison.

“By reopening the doors to more inclusive and engaging ways to discover the Trent-Severn Waterway, this initiative helps bring people closer to the stories, culture, and connections that make Peterborough so special. It’s also great to see the centre being run by people who know it best, bringing local knowledge and passion to the experience.”

In the release, the city states that programming will be developed in the coming months for the visitor centre “that celebrates the area’s culture, heritage, and natural environment, including Indigenous perspectives, with opportunities to amplify diverse voices and stories.”

Meanwhile, city council will be considering the city’s new tourism strategy at its general committee meeting on Monday night (June 8). The strategy, entitled “Discover Peterborough: Tourism Growth Strategy,” is intended to guide the city’s tourism service delivery and activities through to 2030.

The 56-page strategy was developed by Bannikin Travel & Tourism, following city council’s approval on February 3, 2025 of a $100,000 capital budget for a tourism strategic plan, using funds that were previously allocated to PKED.

While the tourism strategy was being developed, the city has proceeded with the implementation of tourism services under the banner of Peterborough Tourism. Activities to date include the development and launch of the Elevate Peterborough pilot project that supports local festivals and events, support for a variety of tourism-related festivals, events, and tournaments, creation and distribution of print materials and advertising campaigns, travel media hosting and major media promotion, a new website, and more.

After arresting a 29-year-old Peterborough man for smashing a front window at La Mesita Restaurante in downtown Peterborough early Sunday morning (June 7), police are addressing community concerns about their response time to the incident.

Martin and Kelly Carbajal, owners of the Mexican restaurant at 247 George Street North just north of Sherbrooke, posted a photo of the smashed window on social media on Sunday morning, promoting hundreds of reactions and comments ranging from support to frustration to outrage.

Some of the comments criticized the response time of Peterborough police to the incident, given the size of the police budget, with the Carbajals noting that police did not arrive at the restaurant until later that morning.

On Monday morning, police issued a media release stating they had received calls about the smashed window at around 2:35 a.m. on Sunday. After beginning their investigation later that morning, they identified a suspect with the assistance of video evidence, including police CCTV cameras.

Their investigation determined that the suspect had been removed from a nearby establishment prior to breaking the window. Although police did not identify the establishment, both Riley’s and The Junction are located immediately to the north of the restaurant.

While walking past the restaurant, police say the suspect smashed the restaurant window with his fist and continued walking.

At around 5 p.m. on Sunday, the suspect — who was aware officers were looking for him — turned himself into the police, at which time he was arrested and charged with mischief under $5,000. He was released on an undertaking and promise to appear in court, with a hearing scheduled for September 1.

Peterborough police chief Stuart Betts issued a statement regarding the incident, including the police response.

“The incident has received significant attention in local and social media, and it is very unfortunate and disappointing that this happened as the impact on the restaurant owner is very real,” Chief Betts said.

“As chief of police, I would like to address the comments about the police response and acknowledge there can be frustration when officers aren’t immediately available to respond to a call, therefore, I would like to take the unusual step of sharing with the community what our officers were engaged with at the time the call came in for the broken window.”

According to the police chief, police were dealing with 12 other calls when they received calls about the smashed window.

The other calls included a mental health call in which a person was on a bridge threatening self-harm and was apprehended and taken to Peterborough Regional Health Centre for their safety, an intimate partner violence call resulting in an arrest and a man being transported to the police station, and a disturbing-the-peace call for an intoxicated man creating problems downtown, who was arrested and transported to the police station.

“In addition to the above calls, there were an additional nine calls in the queue,” Chief Betts said. “Considering the calls in progress and those others outstanding, our communicators notified the restaurant owner that officers would be unavailable to attend until the dayshift as the response at that point was an investigative one.”

“I recognize that incidents like these are frustrating and can garner a lot of heated discourse, often made in the heat of the moment without a full awareness of what is taking place throughout the entirety of the city, and while it may not feel like it, the men and women of your police service continue to perform an outstanding job,” Chief Betts added.

He also asked residents to “consider the numbers below,” providing a list of the increasing number of arrests and charges in the first six months of each of the past four years, “and where things would be without the investment (city) council has made in public safety.” For example, there were 1,252 arrests and 2,025 charges from January 1 to June 8 in 2023, with those numbers increasing to 1,978 arrests and 3,185 charges in the same period this year.

“I am grateful for their support and incredibly proud of the work of our entire team,” Betts concluded. “Our members are your neighbours, they shop where you shop, their kids go to school and play sports with your kids, and they are equally frustrated and invested in this city and work hard to be responsive and keep it safe for you and for their families.”

A social media post from a downtown Peterborough business whose front window was smashed over the weekend is getting reactions ranging from support to frustration to outrage.

On Sunday (June 7), La Mesita Restaurante at 247 George Street North just north of Sherbrooke posted a photo of the smashed window, which was vandalized sometime before 4 a.m. that morning.

“Wonder why this happens to many small business(es) in downtown Peterborough,” reads the Facebook post, noting the cost to replace the window will be around $2,000. “Don’t even know what to rant about.”

Chef Martin Carbajal and his wife Kelly opened La Mesita in 2017 to share the dishes he was raised on while growing up in Mexico City, and it has since become a popular destination for authentic Mexican cuisine, serving up street-style and home-cooked tacos, quesadillas, tortas, fajitas, and other bites, available for dine-in or take-out.

In addition to appearing regularly at local farmers’ markets, La Mesita expanded in May to run a food truck called La Mesita Mexican Grill at the Buckhorn Garage at 3192 Buckhorn Road, south of Buckhorn.

By Sunday afternoon, the post about the smashed window had 785 reactions and 260 comments. Many of the comments offered support for the Carbajals while others lamented the state of downtown or criticized the police who, according to the Carbajals, were unable to show up until later Sunday morning.

While some commenters noted that insurance should cover the damage, others responded that the deductible or the impact on premiums might make an insurance claim inadvisable, while some noted that the small business still has to come up with the funds to replace the window even if they are later reimbursed by insurance.

In a message to kawarthaNOW, Kelly said she and Martin don’t know how much it will actually cost to replace the window, as they were only given “a very rough estimate,” but they will not be making an insurance claim.

“I spoke to our insurance agent today and she told me it’s not worth putting through as a claim, because of what it will do to our insurance rates and possible future insurability,” Kelly said.

Several people have suggested launching a GoFundMe, while others encouraged people to patronize the business.

“I am so humbled by the outpouring of the community,” Kelly said of the reaction to the Facebook post.

Those who want to help out the Carbajals with the window replacement can send an etransfer to info@lamesita.ca.

The original version of this story has been updated with a message from Kelly Carbajal.

The closure of Peterborough’s Consumption and Treatment Site (CTS) has led to local health and community leaders speaking out about impacts on non-consumption based services.

“If there are people that have only been accessing care through the CTS, we do worry about them,” Danielle Howson, executive director and nurse practitioner lead at the Peterborough 360 Degree Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic, told kawarthaNOW. “Where are they going to go? How are they going to access care?”

A response to the opioid crisis, the Peterborough CTS opened in June 2022 inside the renovated former bus terminal at 220 Simcoe Street in downtown Peterborough to provide a safe and medically supported space for people to consume pre-obtained illicit substances under the supervision of health professionals.

CTS offered walk-in access to primary care services through a registered nurse

The Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic had been providing a full-scope registered nurse (RN) to the CTS, who offered primary care services such as wound care, antibiotic prescriptions, and systems navigation support. Howson explained that RN services were offered on a walk-in basis to allow the CTS clinic to support unattached and often unhoused patients.

The loss of this on-site and accessible service is worrying for Howson, as many individuals accessing the CTS clinic do not receive care elsewhere nor have a regular primary care provider such as a family doctor.

“We know that the population of people that attend the CTS are a cohort that doesn’t necessarily have regular primary care interactions,” Howson said.

She added the scope of the RN position enabled them to provide routine primary care services as well as specialized care for the distinct needs of the unhoused and substance-using populations.

“Somebody that’s living rough is exposed to the elements, which leads to some complex wounds,” she explained. “Also anybody who uses injectable substances has a higher risk for wounds.”

There are some other organizations within Peterborough that offer services that overlap with the care the RN was providing at the CTS, including Peterborough Street Medicine, a physician-led organization that provides care to unhoused and precariously housed individuals.

Through an alternate funding model that pays physicians hourly rather than by fee-for-service, Peterborough Street Medicine offers services at locations such as Brock Mission, Cameron House, the YES Shelter, and the modular housing community on Wolfe Street, without requiring patients to enrol with a physician.

However, for Howson, the CTS provided a valuable centralized location that offered low-barrier access to healthcare that cannot be replicated by other outreach and homelessness services.

“It’s just one more barrier to people that are already facing barriers, and one more valuable resource that is being taken away from that community,” said Howson.

CTS closure may increase pressure on weekly clinic at Trinity Community Centre

Trinity Community Centre, operated by One City Peterborough, is another low-barrier space for unhoused and precariously housed people to access services such as healthcare and systems navigation support.

In a recent interview with kawarthaNOW, Donna Rogers, executive director of Four Counties Addiction Services Team (Fourcast), said the CTS closure would impact Trinity due in large part to an overlap of client population as well as the proximity of Trinity to the downtown core.

Trinity houses an on-site clinic consisting of two exam rooms operated one afternoon a week in partnership with the Peterborough Community Health Centre and Peterborough Street Medicine.

“They could be here seven days a week … there are enough health issues,” said One City outreach programs director Auden Palmer of the healthcare professionals who provide services at the clinic.

Palmer said, whle One City and Trinity are sometimes seen as an alternative to the CTS for providing primary care to unhoused and precariously housed people, this is a oversimplification and does not recognise the unique services the CTS offered.

Palmer pointed out that One City’s focus at Trinity is to offer a drop-in day program and an overnight shelter, not healthcare services.

“We’re not a health organization we have no plans to become a health organization,” Palmer said.

One City sees its role in serving the overlapping population of users of the CTS and Trinity as providing housing stabilization infrastructure while partnering with healthcare organizations.

Loss of primary care outreach at CTS may have downstream impacts on healthcare system

Healthcare professionals like Howson and public health specialists have said that the loss of primary care outreach at the CTS will have detrimental impacts on the healthcare system at large.

In particular, the CTS closure may result in increased emergency medical situations that could have been prevented by consistent care or early treatment provided by the RN at the CTS.

“There’s a really big importance placed on getting people that care when they need it and not waiting until it’s bad enough for tertiary care,” Howson said.

Ashley Safar, executive director of the Peterborough Community Health Centre, spoke about the impacts of the CTS closure in an earlier interview with kawarthaNOW, noting it was a space where some individuals were accessing both mental health and primary care services.

“I am concerned about what the impact will look like on the larger healthcare system,” Safar said.

Local collaborations will continue to provide services to unattached patients

Howson told kawarthaNOW that, despite the CTS closure, the Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic will continue to collaborate closely with CTS partners Fourcast and Peterborough Community Paramedics to provide services to unattached patients, calling it “phenomenal collaboration.”

However, she noted that future collaborations would be dependent on funding.

Going forward, Howsen said the Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic would retain the RN position that was at the CTS within their team but for a different function.

On a broader level, with $688,000 in new funding recently announced by the Ontario government, the Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic will work alongside the Peterborough Family Health Team and their Connect Clinic to attach patients currently without a permanent primary care provider.

The Connect Clinic provides transitional care to currently unattached patients, using the Health Care Connect waitlist to work with family health team physicians and nurse practitioners, as well as community partners such as the Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic and the Peterborough Community Health, Centre to find long-term attachment for patients.