"Heartbreaking": temperatures drop to -30 C and dozens still sleeping outside

Thunder Bay - Temperatures dropped to -33 degrees Celsius Monday morning, and people are still often living in homeless encampments or in their vehicles.

"It's heartbreaking. It's all heartbreaking," said Holly Gauvin, executive director of Elevate NWO.

Gauvin said the cold temperatures have driven many people living in encampments indoors for safety, but she knows at least 30 people are still living outside despite the dangerous conditions.

"That's a pretty significant number," Gauvin said.

Gauvin said sometimes people are able to find short-term shelter on their own.

"They'll spend some nights in stairwells, hallways, and buildings they can get into. We know some people go into abandoned buildings for the night, and some nights they'll go into shelters for the night."

"Sometimes people think a (camp) site has been abandoned because no one has been there for a few days, but it could be that their family let them stay on the couch because it's too cold outside today," Gauvin said.

"But as soon as it warms up a little, they need to get back to their tents, so they don't want to lose those things. So continuing to support people can be a bit difficult."

Elevate NWO goes into the encampments weekly.

"Our staff go out every Friday to check on everyone in the camps and make sure they have what they need for the weekend, because weekends are tough. A lot of services are closed and resources are scarce," Gauvin said.

The number of people still sleeping outside could be even higher. Gauvin said Elevate has been able to put 22 people up in hotel rooms thanks to federal funding they didn't anticipate this year.

The funding allows them to take people in starting in December and keep them until the end of March, but she said if they don't get housing by then, those people will return to the camps.

"We're anxiously pushing people through the process as quickly as possible so that by the March deadline they're in a better position and have better solutions, because seeing so many people return to the camps last year was truly heartbreaking," Gauvin said.

Several initiatives have been proposed, but she said until the community finds real housing solutions, alternatives are needed, with a particular focus on supporting those who use drugs but don't necessarily meet the criteria for certain transitional units and shelters.

"We need to find other alternative spaces for them that meet their needs and help them leave the homeless encampments," Gauvin said.

Gauvin added that the provincial government also needs to be part of the conversation about how to best support the local DSSAB in providing more permanent, affordable housing.

"Sitting with us today are also some of my friends who have been in the camps for seven months, spending every night outside through the winter, sleeping out in the cold," Gauvin said.

"It shouldn't take this long... so let's get moving, get people housed, and let's focus on how we support getting people housed."

Meanwhile, she said the organization is working on a pilot project to help prevent more people from ending up on the streets.

"We're trying to intervene early, before people's situations become untenable, and help them become tenants that landlords are willing to work with, so yes, we're eager to roll that out as soon as possible and see what we can do to change some of the numbers we're seeing," Gauvin said.

She said in five years, the numbers have never gone down, but have continued to rise into the hundreds.

This year, Gauvin said they've already seen more than 200 people camping, "which is an incredible number for a city of our size."

Source: https://www.tbnewswatch.com/local-news/people-still-living-in-encampments-as-temperatures-hit-30-c-10102980