By Cecilia Nasmith/Today’s Northumberland
The idea was floated at Wednesday’s meeting of Northumberland County council’s Social Services committee that operating as a low-barrier shelter may not be the best way for Transition House to serve the population who need it.
This idea popped up a couple of times, as seven speakers took turns addressing the committee on the homeless shelter at 310 Division St. in Cobourg, first from Cathy Jewett.
“I would like to see it switch back to a high-barrier facility and look for a new location away from downtown as a low-barrier facility,” Jewett said.
Jenni Frenke, who has worked and volunteered in a variety of shelters, also mentioned it, saying she has come a long way from believing one shelter can serve everyone effectively.
Even so, Frenke urged the county to do everything possible to keep 310 Division St. open. The alternative would be another encampment – without the ready-made space that the vacated Brookside Youth Centre offered.
That said, she continued, the lack of an overdose-prevention site means users use in public. And the no-drugs policy at 310 Division St. puts them on the street to do their using.
Deputy Mayor Olena Hankivsky agreed that Transition House is structured on “all the various needs to be dealt with under one roof. The reality is that there are very different needs and different populations that are vulnerable.”
Cobourg Mayor Lucas Cleveland (not a committee member but permitted to attend and to debate) voiced his support of returning Transition House to high-barrier status and obtaining a site for a separate low-barrier shelter outside of Cobourg – though, to be fair, it could not possibly be in Cobourg as the town’s Emergency Care Establishment bylaw limits to two the number of shelters that can be licensed at any one time, and Transition House and the Cornerstone Family Violence Treatment Centre hold the two licenses.
Cleveland also urged that any site be out of the downtown or other areas of whatever municipality in which it is located where life is busy and families congregate.
Jordan Stevenson of the Integrated Homelessness and Addiction Response group said that the low-barrier nature of 310 Division St. actually fails its high-needs clients, such as those in active addiction.
“Ninety per cent of them do not want to remain in active addiction,” Stevenson stated.
“Given the option, they would love to be out of it and they would love long-term solutions.
“Every single person you have sent me has relapsed at least once.”
His belief is that things are worse now since the encampment was closed.
“Kids as young as 16 are actively using fentanyl because we have failed them,” he stated.
“Any implication that this shelter is doing anything it’s supposed to or the management is caring, loving and restricted by the ECE bylaws is totally incorrect.”
Asked by Cleveland for his opinion on the province’s push to institute “basically forced involuntary care,” Stevenson responded positively.
“Many, many of them would willingly go if it meant long-term success.”
