Victoria’s mayor is challenging the city’s neighbouring municipalities to “start doing your part” to shelter the region’s homeless.
On Thursday, Victoria city council heard from staff that some other municipalities in the region have been putting homeless people in taxis and sending them to the city to access extreme weather shelters.
“We were provided with receipts from cab drivers who were conveying individuals who were clearly vulnerable and in need of some support in emergency situations into the city from other jurisdictions,” Victoria Mayor Marianne Alto said, adding the city paid the fares so as not to “stiff the cab drivers.”
Council responded by passing a motion to have Alto write to the Capital Regional District asking for more regionwide shelter spaces and to write directly to neighbouring Saanich to ask it to do more.
Alto said Saanich was singled out because it is both geographically larger and more populous than Victoria, but is home to just 25 full-time shelter spaces, while Victoria hosts 350. Victoria is home to at least 80 per cent of the shelter spaces regionwide.
“We understand that we are the core city, we understand that we house a significant amount of the services that are important for vulnerable folks, and because of that, we understand we also get a significant number of people,” Alto told Global News.
“Our argument is that an awful lot of those people are not actually from Victoria — and it isn’t that they are from far away, they are actually from very nearby and if they had the opportunity to receive those services, emergency and non-emergency, they would rather stay home.”
Saanich Mayor Dean Murdock said he was glad Victoria was initiating the conversation, but wouldn’t commit to directly adding new shelter spaces in his city.
Murdock said Saanich is happy to partner on solutions, but that action on homelessness must be at the regional level.
“What is clear is that we no longer have sufficient numbers of spaces to meet the need, and we have to approach this as a region. We all have a role to play in creating these spaces,” he said.
Murdock suggested work to expand shelter spaces throughout the region be spearheaded through the Capital Regional Housing Corporation, which he said had the mandate and resources to do the work.
“That’s the place we have the conversation so we are not tripping over each other, we are not duplicating efforts, we are not all going to senior governments to say, ‘We need resource support for this,'” he said. “This has to be a coordinated response.”
He added that many local governments don’t have the staffing or the expertise to deliver new shelter spaces.
Victoria, however, is calling on its neighbours to take immediate action, particularly with winter coming.
“Every municipality has a space where they could look at temporarily providing shelter and some support for even a dozen people,” Alto said.
“You’d take a significant strain off the city. And more importantly, you’d be able to support and shelter your own people who want to be home. ”
Victoria’s emergency program coordinator says no other municipalities in the Capital Regional District currently have plans to open warming centres this winter.