Phil Tank: Saskatoon shelters restricted as homeless crisis deepens

Saskatoon council effectively prevented a provincial shelter from opening, but also heard a dire account of how homelessness is increasing.

Author of the article:

Phil Tank • Saskatoon StarPhoenix

Published Mar 02, 2024 • Last updated 13 hours ago • 3 minute read

The former fire station at 421 Central Avenue, was supposed to be converted into a 30-bed emergency shelter to be operated by The Mustard Seed, an Alberta-based charity. Photo by Michelle Berg /Saskatoon StarPhoenix

Retiring Saskatoon fire Chief Morgan Hackl related a stark example this week about the peril of homelessness in Saskatoon.

Hackl told city council Wednesday that a surgeon he knows told him one homeless person in the city had eight toes amputated this winter as a result of frostbite. Another had numerous fingers removed.

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And homelessness is getting worse.

Hackl further explained that 143 people spent Tuesday night, when temperatures plunged to dangerously low levels, at the warming centre in St. Mary’s Parish in the Pleasant Hill neighbourhood.

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An average of 130 people stay each night at St. Mary’s in a space meant to accommodate 80, Hackl added. On Monday night, another 30 people stayed overnight in the emergency room waiting area at nearby St. Paul’s Hospital.

“We see it as becoming more complex, more of a concern,” Hackl said of homelessness.

And a tsunami could be coming as the warming centre is set to close at the end of March, according to a review of contacts with homeless people by fire department officials dating back to 2021.

Hackl said contact with homeless individuals in January and February has tripled compared to the same two months last year when there was no warming location. These numbers fail to take into consideration homeless people who are “coach surfing” during the winter months.

Hackl relayed that information at the same meeting where council spent hours discussing homeless shelters and decided to impose a 250-metre buffer zone — more than the length of two CFL fields — between shelters and schools.

That decision effectively derailed plans for a 30-bed provincially-funded shelter at a former fire hall in the Sutherland neighbourhood due to the proximity of Bishop Filevich Ukrainian Bilingual School.

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Meanwhile, the provincially-funded shelter run by the Saskatoon Tribal Council adjacent to the Fairhaven neighbourhood, which has 106 beds, remains in place, along with the dire issues it has created in that neighbourhood.

Several councillors noted that city hall had no input into the Fairhaven location, which was purchased by the provincial Saskatchewan Housing Corporation in 2022 with the province providing the funding for the tribal council to run its emergency wellness centre.

Council also asked for a report on crime statistics in the Fairhaven neighbourhood, comparing the period before the shelter opened in late 2022 to the situation since.

Robert Pearce, the pastor of Fairmont Baptist Church located near the shelter and a Fairhaven resident, appeared before council to complain about the lack of consultations prior to its opening. Pearce has asked the province to close the shelter.

He also claimed that police statistics may not be capturing all the crimes.

Regardless, police statistics do show a rise in crime in Fairhaven in 2023 compared to 2022 that exceeds the overall increase in the city. Total Fairhaven crime jumped from 326 to 481, with crimes against the person increasing from 69 to 101. Assaults increased from 40 to 58.

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Police say these statistics reflect reports they receive whether charges were laid or not.

But in the adjacent Confederation Suburban Centre, a mostly commercial district with fewer than 1,000 residents where the wellness centre is located, crime skyrocketed in 2023 compared to 2022. Crimes more than doubled from 1,072 to 2,175, with crimes against the person rising from 98 to 221.

The extent to which the increase in crime can be linked to the wellness centre requires a more detailed analysis and, ideally, police will provide that.

But the perception of a 106-bed shelter on the west side of Saskatoon remaining, despite the complaints of residents, while a 30-bed shelter on the east side is prevented from opening will resonate for many who feel the city’s traditional geographic divide.

Yet the closure of the Fairhaven shelter — as opposed to finding ways to mitigate its impact — would only exacerbate the growing issue of homelessness in Saskatoon.

Finding locations for shelters is proving to be an excruciating task, but the alternative is tent cities spreading throughout the city. That’s a far more expensive option, given the high cost of paying police and firefighters.

Nobody wants to pay higher taxes, but Fairhaven’s experience has many fearing a shelter could ruin their neighbourhood.

Phil Tank is the digital opinion editor at the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.

ptank@postmedia.com

twitter.com/thinktankSK

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