The united front of Northern Ontario’s mayors have pledged to advocate for the region's needs in Queen’s Park and Ottawa, with funding to tackle homelessness and addiction at the forefront.
“The supportive housing part is key,” Greater Sudbury Mayor Paul Lefebvre said, adding that transitional housing is a proven “model of success.”
This, he clarified, is why the city is continuing to advocate for operational funding from the province for the transitional housing complex.
Although on pause due to the general contractor filing for bankruptcy, the city has stated they are still dedicated to opening the 40-unit transitional housing complex on-schedule next year.
Lefebvre spoke to Sudbury.com at Tom Davies Square on Nov. 6, during a break in the meeting with fellow Northern Ontario mayors as part of the Northern Ontario Large Urban Mayors group.
It was the second meeting of the current incarnation of the group, following a prior get-together in Sault Ste. Marie in April. The previous incarnation stopped meeting when the pandemic hit.
Joining Lefebvre was Timmins Mayor Michelle Boileau, North Bay Mayor Peter Chirico and Sault Ste. Marie Mayor Matthew Shoemaker.
There are many parallels between the Northern Ontario municipalities, Boileau told Sudbury.com, citing supervised consumption sites as an important example.
The City of Greater Sudbury opened The Spot, the city’s only sanctioned supervised consumption site, last year, with the city’s elected officials agreeing to fund its operations on a temporary basis despite it falling under provincial jurisdiction. The goal was to fund it until the province stepped up to the plate, but they have neglected to do so.
With the province putting all funding applications on hold, The Spot appears likely to close by the end of the year.
Timmins is in the exact same position, Boileau said, noting that their supervised consumption site is also slated to close due to a lack of provincial funding.
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“This is a health equity issue,” she said. “Residents in Northern Ontario suffer from substance use disorder just as residents in southern Ontario do, but yet again, this is one more service that they don’t have access to in Northern Ontario.”
This, she added, despite there being “multitude sites” available in southern Ontario.
“Recovery is a long path, and it’s a long journey, and it starts with treatment, but it also starts with a doorway to treatment,” she said. “We see the safe consumption sites as being that open door to treatment for those who are willing and able to access it.”
Boileau added that governments should also keep the “cultural appropriateness” of supports and services in mind with everything they do.
As for Greater Sudbury’s transitional housing complex, whose operations remain unfunded by the province despite its clinical supports falling under their umbrella, Lefebvre pledged continued advocacy alongside city council and Northern Ontario’s mayors for funding toward this shared priority.
His message to the province is to “take a hard look,” at transitional housing.
“We’ve seen a lot of successful housing of those individuals who are chronically homeless,” Lefebvre said. “This actually works, there’s proof, and we have to continue down that path by doing more.”
The transitional housing complex will include 16 hours of clinical supports daily for the city’s most chronically homeless people to help them ease into permanent community housing.
A smaller version of the Assertive Community Treatment Team has already been working at a temporary site alongside various other programming, which come together under a Housing First model to put a roof over people’s heads, and services and supports in place to ensure they remain housed.
Between these various programs, 308 people experiencing homelessness have been housed since July 2021, of whom approximately 10 per cent return to homelessness.
This, according to city children and social services director Tyler Campbell in a recent report to city council.
Northern Ontario mayors were joined by city officials for this week’s meeting, with other topics including:
- Advocating to the provincial government to declare intimate partner violence an epidemic in Northern Ontario. A motion at the Nov. 7 city council meeting is expected to raise this issue.
- A desire to make the Northern Immigration Pilot program permanent when it ends in February.
- The need for funding toward affordable housing.
- Funding options for the Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM) University to ensure its ongoing viability.
- For the federal government to investigate unintended consequences associated with air passenger protection regulations, which the mayors caution might impair economic development efforts and the sustainability of small regional airports.
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.
