If the city of Thunder Bay, Ont., moves forward with a temporary village for homeless residents, Erland Messeweis says, it will finally feel safe.
The City Council approved a new 10-step plan earlier this week to respond to the growing number of people in the camps, which peaked at about 200 this summer.
Part of the plan includes the possibility of creating a temporary village, a concept that has been successful in other Canadian communities. Under Thunder Bay's plan, there may be up to 100 units where people can access on-site hygiene and support facilities.
Missewace, who has been without a permanent home for three years, is a member of the Eabametoong First Nation and grew up in Thunder Bay. He used to live in a camp and now sleeps in a night shelter.
During the day, he goes to People Advocating for Change Through Empowerment (PACE), which runs a drop-in center on the city's south side.
“The cost of living is crazy,” Misiwas said. At Ontario Works, we only get $400 for rent and a one-bedroom apartment costs over $1,000.” “He's crazy.”
Approval of the plan comes the same week that mayors of major Ontario cities, including Thunder Bay's Ken Bushkoff, called for more action from the provincial and federal governments. Address homelessness, mental health and addiction.
Thunder Bay is considering two potential sites for a temporary village, both on the south end: 114 Miles St. E. and Kam River Heritage Park. The goal is to set construction and infrastructure costs at $5 million for the project and operating costs at $1.5 million annually.
“I think it will be enough to have a place to stay, or just have a place to call home,” Misiwas said of the temporary village. “This seems like a great idea.”
Give people stability and support on site
Last year there were at least 1,400 homeless encampments across the province, according to the Association of Ontario Municipalities (AMO).
Campsites include people sleeping in tents. The temporary village provides a more structured environment with wraparound services, giving people a permanent direction, said Riley Willianen, anti-drug strategist for the city of Thunder Bay.
Other communities in Ontario have had success with this model, including… Best tent city in Kitchener. and Model Home Community in Peterborough. In Vancouver, there is also a similar concept known as modular supportive housing.
Temporary modular housing plays an important role in addressing homelessness in Vancouver. But what happens when it is torn down to make way for development? Caroline Chan learned more about the benefits and challenges of making temporary modular housing permanent.
Thunder Bay is considering a sleeper cabin model. While the City Council has supported the village concept with a 10-step plan, it is still awaiting final approval.
“The village is really meant to be a stopgap between getting off the streets and into a more stable housing option, to put people in a place where they can settle down and be successful,” Willianen said.
The city's goal is to have the village up and running by the end of April, when people transition from indoor winter shelters to sleeping outdoors.
“It's very difficult to attract people once they're already established with their setup — they've created their outdoor living room,” he said.
Willanen admits the timeline is “tight,” but emphasized that the community's homeless population needs a temporary solution while more long-term transitional housing units are built.
The public is encouraged to do so. Complete the surveyavailable until October 31, where they believe the temporary village should be built.
“We're not just looking at this from the angle of what's best for homeless people; We’re also looking at it from the angle of what’s best for the people who live in the area, the people who work in the area,” Wilianen said.
“They're just in survival mode.”
Another feature of Thunder Bay's 10-step plan is the creation of a committee of people with lived experience or homelessness to inform the city's strategy going forward.
“We know that these people who live in tents on the streets have more experience when it comes to things that will help them improve their lives,” Willianen said.
CBC News I spoke to many people in PACE who have experienced homelessness. To hear your opinions on the temporary village.
“I think this is a great thing and I think it should have been done sooner,” said Lori Lynn Walker, PACE membership coordinator.
Walker was homeless for eight months while suffering from active addiction. She has now been in recovery for seven years and uses her role in PACE to help others connect to community resources.
In their opinion, the temporary village should be run by peer support workers who can provide on-site assistance.
Bradley Prince, who resides in a night shelter in Thunder Bay, has been sober for three months. He said PACE staff, all of whom have lived experience of the challenges his clients face, helped him stay on track toward his goals. This week he started a new job.
“I think the main thing we all need is people like Lori to help me and people who come from the past, but who come out of that past with a lot of knowledge to support the people around them,” Prince said.
Robert Denhardt, a former homeless PACE client, said the village is a great idea and he remembers it. Small housing projects he saw on the East Coast.
For her part, Hazel Krebs, who left her apartment because of an incident that made her feel unsafe, said she would rather the city convert vacant buildings into housing units than spend money on temporary shelters.
Everyone at PACE agreed that any approach to homelessness must be approached with compassion.
“Our customers are harmless,” Walker said. “The people who live in the tents are harmless, they are just in survival mode.”
“If council members take the time to come talk to them and listen to their stories, and not just assume they are homeless or drug addicts, they won't know what happened to them the night before.”
Sleeping Cabins vs. Tiny Houses
Carrie Ann Marshall is an Associate Professor at the School of Occupational Therapy at Western University, London, and Director of Social Justice at the Mental Health Research Laboratory.
He has researched the rise of tiny house and cabin communities in North America and said it's important to distinguish between the two.
“To me, a tiny house is a self-contained unit that includes all the amenities we would normally expect in a regular house,” Marshall said. “It's smaller.” “To me, sleeping cabins are typically 8-by-10-foot structures that don't have the amenities of a normal home.”
While tiny homes have been shown to give people a sense of security and belonging, “we don't have any evidence to compare sleeping cabin communities to shelter spaces to see if one is better than the other.
“I think if community advocates are trying to find solutions in the absence of other resources and want to help people stay warm, I think that's a good strategy to help people in the short term,” Marshall said of the temporary village. concept.
“What I am increasingly concerned about is whether we are using public funds that could be allocated to increasing shelter capacity or permanent supportive housing programs” for “a temporary system that has little evidence to support it.”
In the case of Thunder Bay, Willianen said, the city is paying attention to what other communities are doing to address homelessness in the most effective and thoughtful way, taking into account people who are “experiencing homelessness” and community in general.
“It's about giving them the tools and skills to transition to something that will support them throughout their lives and not just in this moment of crisis.”
