'Where will they go?' Kitchener encampment residents react to region's plan to move them from current site
Residents are worried about being moved too far away from city's core
For Aaron Price, living in the downtown Kitchener encampment is more than just about shelter.
It's about being surrounded by chosen family and friends. It's been his community for more than four years.
"[We] have each other's back no matter what, and if you use [drugs], there's always someone that comes in and checks on you," Price said.
Residents of the encampment at the corner of Victoria Street and Weber Street were surprised to see several dumpsters arrive on the site on April 16, accompanied by a notice of a proposed bylaw to clear the tents and make room to build a new transit hub. Regional councillors passed that bylaw at their meeting on April 23.
Three of the dumpsters that arrived last month are located right next to Price's tent. He says it feels dehumanizing. But if he moves his tent within the encampment area, he says he has been told he will be fined by regional staff. The only other option is to move out of the area entirely.
Peter Sweeney, the region's commissioner of community services, has previously told CBC News that regional staff will work with people at the encampment on a "case-by-case basis to find alternative and safer housing accommodations before that location no longer becomes a viable opportunity for people to stay at."
Price says that's not a good enough solution.
"If we use a hotel room, then the staff don't check up on us at all. They could overdose and die," he said.
"I'm staying here [at the encampment] unless they forcefully move me, and then I'm going to camp on [Region of Waterloo Chair] Karen Redman's front lawn."
What are they gonna do... with 70 people and all their stuff? Where will they go? Am I coming to your house?- James Mackenzie, encampment resident
Residents with disabilities
Lonny Morris has lived in the encampment for over two years and he says being moved to a temporary shelter away from the downtown area could hurt his long-term wellbeing.
"[The motel] is pretty far out there and there's no hospitals or any grocery stores or anything nearby. It's a long walk for someone like me with a bad hip," Morris said, adding that he's lived many years with disabilities that require him to use a cane to walk.
"I have to go to doctor's appointments for my hip. I got a bad ear infection. I gotta go see a specialist on Belmont. I need [a doctor's visit] pretty much two or three times a week — or a couple times a month for sure."
Morris is hoping to be able to keep living in downtown Kitchener, preferably in one of the apartments being developed across the road from the encampment by The Working Centre, a non-profit that helps people who are in need of housing.
The new building is expected to have 38 affordable units when completed. Morris says he is on the waiting list and hopeful about getting a chance to live there.
David Alton is a member of the Lived Expertise Working Group at the Social Development Centre of Waterloo Region and works closely with the members of the encampment.
They said a majority of residents are living with some kind of disability and, like Morris, they are also worried about being moved farther away from the downtown core, where a number of essential services are located.
Encampment is a 'family'
Alton says residents of the encampment feel connected to each other.
"The number one thing we heard is that people part of the [encampment] see it as a family, as a community," they said, adding residents are concerned about becoming displaced again and again.
"People are very used to being shuffled around, very used to being kicked out of sites and very used to options being very temporary," said Alton.
"When we told them about the motels ... people were like, 'What happens after? What happens if I don't meet the cut? What happens if my friend gets banned? Where are we all going to go? We're going to go back on the street. And now we're not going to have this place that was a safe place to go.'"
Alton said without a long-term solution, many of the residents are likely to end up moving back on the street and onto public spaces behind residential homes, businesses and on street corners.
Encampment resident James Mackenzie says he's already feeling displaced with the dumpsters everywhere and the region's threat to evict.
"At one time we were prospering and now it's like a total war zone in here," Mackenzie said, adding that he's lived in the encampment for about four months so far.
"What are they gonna do... with 70 people and all their stuff? Where will they go? Am I coming to your house?"
Past attempt to evict residents
The first time the region tried to evict the residents was in late 2022, about a year after they had first set up the tents. But in January 2023, a Kitchener judge ruled the region could not evict people from the site until they had shelter spaces for everyone to move into.
The region tried to argue the encampment went against a bylaw on public conduct on regionally owned properties.
Justice M.J. Valente cited the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and said the region's plans to move people off the site at the time went against the person's rights to life, liberty and security of the person. That's because, Valente said in his ruling, the region lacked enough shelter space for everyone who was homeless.
Valente said if the region could show it was meeting the needs of people who were experiencing homelessness, he would reconsider.
Residents surveyed
Alton says after the Social Development Centre of Waterloo Region found out about the region's proposed bylaw to evict encampment residents, they decided to begin formally interviewing residents to document their thoughts and feelings on the proposed eviction.
In a preliminary report given to CBC News, the centre detailed some of its findings after interviewing 27 residents of the encampment.
The report says people living at the encampment said there was a lack of information given to them from the region about the proposed bylaw.
"All the residents we spoke to had seen the appearance of the dumpsters and security trailer but were unsure about their purpose," the preliminary report reads.
"More than half of them had heard nothing about the bylaw itself and were first informed by us during the interviews."
Residents told centre staff they tried to tidy up the appearance of the encampment in hopes that it would convince the region to let them stay. The report says the interviewees didn't seem to be aware of the region's intentions to build a transit hub in the area.
"The timeline for rolling out by bylaw was also unclear," the preliminary report went on to say.
"Some people believed the site would be closed by the end of the spring, following the CTS and warming center closures, while others believed they had until the end of 2025."
Residents told the centre the presence of dumpsters in their living space made them feel like "human trash" and they are "already planning on setting up tents in the backyards of houses and businesses," the report says.
The Social Development Centre of Waterloo Region's full report is expected to be released at the end of May.
LISTEN | Kitchener encampment residents speak out about region's plan to clear site:
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