Ward 2 Coun. Cameron Kroetsch and his team hit the street Wednesday delivering flyers to residents in Hamilton’s north, soon to be introduced to a temporary tiny homes pilot project that is hoping to transition people living in tents to more stable housing.
Kroetsch and leadership from the Hamilton Alliance for Tiny Shelters (HATS) will attempt to answer questions during a neighbourhood meeting Saturday afternoon at the Bennetto Elementary gymnasium just a week after the city greenlit a revised encampment strategy.
The city’s housing division recommended building at a site on Strachan Street West, between James and Hughson Street North, during a committee meeting last week.
Spearheaded by the Hamilton Alliance for Tiny Shelters (HATS), the temporary housing will be adjacent to a residential community, Bennetto Elementary, Bennetto Recreation Centre and the LiUNA station event centre.
North end resident and journalist Kathy Renwald says people she talked to in the neighbourhood only found out about the location last week and had less than a day to speak at another meeting to learn more about it.
“It seemed to come out of nowhere,” she said. “People were not consulted in the north end and they had very little time to prepare statements about it.”
Renwald says she’s put questions to the city about zoning she insists would need to be changed to permit the build, as well as the status of an appeal from Canadian National (CN) in January that stalled a mixed-income housing development near the rail tracks.
Laborers’ International Union of North America (LiUNA) spokesperson Victoria Mancinelli told Global News her agency is wondering why a “quick fix” is being built without consultation from locals residing in the area.
The union expressed their “dismay” over a “lack of transparency” in a letter to mayor Andrea Horwath on Wednesday urging reconsideration of the decision.
Mancinelli says her group was under the impression the site was not “favorable or desirable” after failing to show up on a list following a city-wide consultation.
“Of course, we are very sensitive to the complexities of the current housing crisis … but I don’t think throwing this as a quick fix … without consulting with the neighborhood and with (the) business community … is a strategic solution to addressing the encampments and homelessness issue,” said Mancinelli.
Tom Cooper of Hamilton’s Roundtable for Poverty Reduction told Global in August that December is the likely timeframe for half of the temporary residences to be made available.
“We may do it in a phased approach, so maybe start with 10 or 12 and then move up to 25 over a period of months,” Cooper explained.
In Hamilton, roughly 1,700 people are homeless and about 10 per cent are living outside, according to the city.
The first incarnation of the HATS project was first pitched to council in early 2022 with close to $300,000 raised through the help of individuals, businesses, and foundations.
Initially earmarked for a portion of the field at the Sir John A. Macdonald Secondary School on York Boulevard, the project would seek another venue after lack of political support, neighbourhood resistance and planned demolition of the site.
HATS would be sent back to the drawing board again in early 2023 after council rejected alternate sites at Cathedral Park, the old Dominion Glass site near Gage and Barton as well as Stuart Street near the CN Railyard.