'The community is very concerned': city, social organizations collaborate on homelessness in Thunder Bay

The City of Thunder Bay and a growing group of social service organizations are continuing to work toward a formal protocol to support people experiencing homelessness in the city.

In a memo tabled by Thunder Bay Mayor Bill Mauro on Monday's council meeting — which was discussed by councillors for about an hour — Mauro said so far, nearly 20 organizations have signed on to be part of the process of developing the protocol, which would outline the roles and responsibilities of each agency to assist in responding to homeless encampments in Thunder Bay.

"The memo comes from work that started about six weeks ago," Mauro said. "You know, I went with [Coun. Albert Aiello] to the location at County Fair Plaza in the north ward."

Mauro said the County Fair Plaza encampment, which saw people experiencing homelessness sheltering under the canopy of a former gas bar, led members of the public to question what the city can do, and is doing, to address the issue.

"There's great concern," Mauro said. "There are issues that they witness, and it's not just about the one location."

"This is occurring in many parts of the city," he said. "It's unfortunately occurring in probably all cities, if not all, then most cities right across the country. And so there's concerns with some of what they're witnessing, safety issues, public health issues and the list goes on."

Safety concerns were highlighted recently when a truck was driven through a tent at the County Fair Plaza encampment. Nobody was in the tent at the time, and the driver of the truck was charged.

The solution is a complicated matter, however, one that would involve input and support from not only the municipality and the many organizations in the city that have been working on homelessness and related issues, but also the provincial and federal governments.

Judith Monteith-Farrell, NDP MPP for Thunder Bay-Atikokan, said the province needs to do more to address homelessness.

"The encampment situation is horrible," she said. "What I do often is I go out, and I talk to people who are on the streets to get their perspective because sometimes that's the missing piece. And they, often, say things would be different if they could afford a place to live."

"And then we're dealing with ... the crisis we have in addictions and the lack of resources around that, which makes it difficult to house some people," Monteith-Farrell said.

She added that the province stopped homeless counts in 2018, which makes it difficult to gauge the severity of the situation in places like Thunder Bay.

"We guess at it," she said. "We have the informal count. But people come and go from this region."

"We have people passing through Thunder Bay," Monteith-Farrell said. "And then we have people who are under-housed ... where people describe where they're living as being so substandard, but no money to fix them up and also no ability to move anywhere else because there are just isn't any place that they can afford."

In some cases, Monteith-Farrell said people come to her office after being evicted because they can't pay their rent and are unable to find anywhere else to live, so they "end up on the street."

And, she added, it won't be long before cold weather arrives in Thunder Bay.

"We have to remember that we lost people on our streets last year," Monteith-Farrell said. "People died on our streets of Thunder Bay because they didn't have a home."

"People are doing valiant efforts in shelters and additional shelter beds, but that's not the long-term answer," she said. "The long-term answer is finding people a home."

Bill Bradica, CAO of the District of Thunder Bay Social Services Administration Board, said the issue is not a new one, and is, primarily, a health care matter, with many people experiencing homelessness also struggling with mental or physical health issues.

Transitional housing needed

There are several known homeless encampments in Thunder Bay, he said, adding that a lack of transitional housing in the city is a major obstacle.

"The waitlist for community housing has actually decreased in the last three years," he said. "We've had a concerted effort to reach out to people with outreach workers when they go into shelters, and food banks, to those people who are at higher risk of either being homeless or at risk of homelessness and get them signed up on our waitlist for community housing."

"And every third vacancy is then offered to somebody on that waitlist," Bradica said. "The key there is to have the supports from support agencies follow quickly behind to help them with their tenancy."

However, there are people who need more support than that, and they would benefit from living in transitional housing first.

Bradica also noted the federal government's Rapid Housing Initiative, which was launched about a year ago, has not led to any funding for Thunder Bay housing projects; Bradica said at least two organizations in the district applied for funding under the initiative.

"No organization in the District of Thunder Bay received funding," he said. "And one of the eligible uses of that funding is to develop transitional housing."

There is a second phase of Rapid Housing Initiative funding, and Bradica was hopeful a Thunder Bay project would get selected.

Complicating things, though, is the fact that an organization can't apply for phase two funding unless they also applied for phase one funding, Bradica said.

In addition, a certain amount of the money is going directly to selected Canadian municipalities for use in developing housing projects. Thunder Bay was not one of the municipalities selected, Bradica said.

Bradica said the issue has been going on for decades.

"There are organizations that have been doing outreach," he said."Some of them for a number of years. But if you don't have the proper structure to place the individual, we're not going to be able to resolve this."

Mauro said the city has made some efforts on its own, such as providing Shelter House with $400,000 a year in funding.

"Most municipalities, I can tell you, if not all, do not provide municipal tax dollars to shelters," he said. "It just doesn't happen as a general rule. And so it's an example of where we are already involved in this issue, probably in a greater way than, as I've mentioned, most municipalities."

He said the matter has, especially recently, become a topic of conversation in the community, which is a good thing.

"We're aware of their concerns," he said. "We're trying to see what's possible."