New guidelines imposed as Chatham-Kent faces mounting challenge to serve homeless

Chatham-Kent will need to find a new emergency shelter by May 2025, but the process to find a location now has specific guidelines including more public consultation.

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South Kent Coun. Anthony Ceccacci brought a lengthy motion during a housing and homelessness progress report presented to Chatham-Kent council during Monday’s meeting.

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Ceccacci’s motion, which passed, calls for the location of a future emergency shelter not to be adjacent to elementary schools, in or near parks, splash pads and wading pools or licensed childcare centers. It also calls for shelters not to be located within a “residential neighbor interior.”

The motion also calls for considerable public input to be part of the process.

Prior to Ceccacci’s motion, council heard from Clark Schultz, representing the Tecumseh Park Neighborhood Association (TPNA), which quickly formed when it was learned the current Victoria Park Place emergency shelter on Murray Street in Chatham was opening in 2022.

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The shelter will close in May 2025 when the current lease expires.

The neighborhood association requested council delay the decision to relocate the shelter to the Tecumseh Park neighborhood to “allow for meaningful public consultation,” he said.

But, the concerns of residents were brushed aside “in the municipality’s haste to relocate the shelter,” Schultz said.

He noted the TPNA was advised to communicate ongoing concerns to law enforcement and council.

“Since that time, we have diligently done so to little or no avail,” he said

Schultz informed council the TPNA wants any future emergency shelter to be located in a non-residential area and prior public consultation must take place before a shelter is established to address the “real concerns residents and business owners face when they live and work near an emergency shelter.”

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Ceccacci said the concept of his motion is to recognize “we’re never going to have a perfect location for a shelter or anything that services our less vulnerable.”

The councilor added the goal is “we’re going to task administration to do the absolute best that they can to find a location that follows the needs of the people who are experiencing the most challenging times of their life.”

Choosing a location brings significant challenges to the neighborhood, he said.

Josh Myers, director of housing services, told council he believes it is only fair that administration uses the location requirements as a guideline.

He added should there be a situation where they can’t find a property that meets all the criteria “then it’s on administration to come back and explain those reasons with the parcel that we do think is feasible as the best worst case.”

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He added the guidelines proposed by Ceccacci’s motion are in line with what administration is using and he is hopeful that “we’ll continue to make progress.”

The housing and homelessness progress report outlined the challenges of trying to serve a growing homeless population in Chatham-Kent.

Housing has become too expensive, the report notes, citing the fact prior to 2017 there were short-term stays available at motels for $400 to $700 months to help people get back on their feet. Then they could work with social services to find rentals for less than $700.

The least expensive one-bedroom unit that could be found in Chatham-Kent was $1,100 plus utilities, stated the report.

It was pointed out that, of the $733 monthly payment a single person on Ontario Works receives, $390 is allocated for shelter. Of the little more than $1,300 a single person on Ontario Disability Support Program receives month, $556 is for shelter.

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Chatham Coun. Marjorie Crew said at budget time, “We need to look at making sure that we do better with this, because this isn’t going away, this is increasing.”

However, she also made a motion to send a letter to Premier Doug Ford and the Minister of Community, Children and Social Services to increase the accommodation rate payment portion for those on Ontario Works and ODSP to the local average market rent.

“I think the province needs to step up more,” Crew said.

She said this isn’t going to be the answer to this problem, but it will help those “living in legislated poverty to at least have a chance.”

It also looks like the municipality will continue not only to operate the shelter, but run it. The report noted not a single bid was received for a request for proposals to run Victoria Park Place.

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According to the report, housing services is exploring a tiny homes plan that Waterloo has undertaken, which cost an estimated $1.7 million to build 50 cabins along with a common area for showers and washrooms.

Myers said the current services in place are simply not enough to meet the need.

He said 295 people went through the shelter from January to end of October with 15 of them being older than 65 and 18 unaccompanied youth.

“Without that service, they would have nowhere to go,” Myers said. “On any given night, there are 60-plus people in Chatham-Kent that don’t have anywhere to go and they are sleeping in encampments across the municipality.”

Loree Bailey, general manager of Chatham Hope Haven, shared her perspective on the growing homelessness situation with council on Monday.

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Hope Haven, which provides a place for homeless and precariously housed people to access warmth or cooling along with food, showers, laundry and Internet during the day, struggles to serve the need, Bailey said.

She said number of visits to Hope Haven have grown from just more than 12,000 in 2021 to being on track to reach nearly 25,000 by the end of this year.

“To say that we are at our capacity is a serious understatement,” Bailey said.

She said approximately 30 per cent of people who come to Hope Haven actually have housing.

“They come to access hot water, food, laundry services, Internet services and community.”

While there is talk of homeless people coming to Chatham-Kent for services, Bailey said, “Every member of our team can tell at least one story of someone that they grew up with, worked with (or) lived beside in Chatham-Kent that has come through the Haven doors.”

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She said the homeless are “your neighbors, people you went to school with, your friend’s children, maybe your own children. This is our problem.

“Until higher levels of government come to the plate and provide real support for the needs of this population, it must fall on local taxpayers to ensure that there is somewhere for every member of the community to go,” Bailey said.

Ceccacci pointed out during the last four years, the municipality has taken nearly $10 million from reserves to provide shelter for the homeless in Chatham-Kent.

If those reserves were not available, Ceccacci said the cumulative impact is estimated to have been nearly a six per cent tax increase by the end of this year.

Ceccacci asked Chatham-Kent’s chief financial officer Gord Quinton if he sees serving the homeless as being a “tax ask” moving forward.

Quinton noted there is enough in reserves to operate the Victoria Park Place shelter until it the lease runs out in May 2025.

While council has options, including looking at other reserves, Quinton said if this is an ongoing, permanent cost, the municipality should look at funding it through taxes at some point.

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