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Housing: So what happens now?

City of Maple Ridge needs new site for the homeless
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The province is in the process of acquiring the Quality Inn for use as long-term supportive housing.

BC Housing’s change in plans – not to convert the Quality Inn into housing for the homeless – leaves the city facing two pressing questions.

First, what to do with 30 people who are in the temporary homeless shelter being run by RainCity Housing; where is their next stop as they try to take their lives off the streets?

Second, where is an acceptable site to build a supportive housing facility?

“We are looking forward to hearing from BC Housing what their plan will be for those 30 people in the shelter,” said Mayor Nicole Read.

BC Housing told the City on Feb. 29 it would make an offer to purchase the Quality Inn on Lougheed Highway as well as fund an operating agreement with RainCity Housing to provide management and services. The proposal was to replace the temporary shelter beds at the former Sleep Shop location, which had been scheduled to close on March 31.

The mayor said there is a clear need for more supportive housing. If spaces were available elsewhere in the region, some of the residents at the temporary shelter would already be there. About 20 of them are from the Cliff Avenue camp, she said, and are considered “hard to house.”

Read said the city and province made commitments to the homeless people camping on Cliff Avenue, that they would move from the shelter into low-barrier supportive housing after six months. Those people thought a private room at a modified Quality Inn, with clinical supports, would be their next step.

“I think they had hope, and now that is gone,” said Read.

The temporary shelter was intended to close on March 31, but it has been extended another three months.

“I don’t think the answer is to keep extending,” said Read.

“If there was a solution, I feel like people would be there.”

She was critical of MLA Doug Bing for opposing the Quality Inn, while not offering an alternative site. She called his position “a misalignment in the provincial government.

“And at the end of the day, when you oppose something, where is your Plan B?” asked Read.

She said the city will investigate the options for housing regionally, and BC Housing knows that situation better than the city.

However, a lot of the people are from Maple Ridge, consider it home, and have family or a social network here.

“It would be better in town – there will be a better chance that they won’t fall out of housing and end up on the street,” said Read.

Housing Minister Rich Coleman has committed $15 million to construct a purpose built supportive housing facility in Maple Ridge, and the city would miss out on those funds if it does not find a site, said Read. She said the city would move forward on a new site with “robust public engagement.

Some Quality Inn opponents said residents in supportive housing should be clean first, and that is an issue the city must clarify with the public, said Read. The alternative is that low barrier housing allows them to continue to use drugs, while being connected to people and agencies that will help them.

“Some of these people have been street entrenched for a long time, and they need support, and they need time,” said Read.

Coun. Bob Masse said he was surprised by BC Housing’s sudden reversal on the Quality Inn site.

“It’s okay, in the sense that it’s democracy in action – they listened to public feedback, and that was appropriate,” he said. Masse said council wasn’t ignoring the outcry from the community. Public engagement was built into the process of developing the site, and council would have listened to the community before committing to proceed with the project – they just hadn’t got there yet, said Masse.

“There was some kind of assumption that this was a done deal,” he said.

Nor was he surprised by the reaction from businesses and other neighbours, calling it “an upsetting, emotional issue.”

“I really understand the level of anxiety that generated,” said Masse, whose chiropractic business is one of the nearest neighbours to the temporary shelter being run by Rain City.

He was not critical of the shelter operators, speaking as a neighbour.

“I think they do the best they can, with the model they operate under.”

Masse said shelter residents must move on through a housing “continuum,” until their connection to social supports leads them to rehabilitation.

He said it will be a challenge for council to find a place to locate low barrier supportive housing.

“Is there a perfect place where there will be no impacts? It doesn’t exist,” he said. “But how to you minimize impacts – that’s the question.”

Businesses in Maple Ridge appear to be sensitive to the issue.

Andrea Madden, Chamber of Commerce executive-director, sent out a poll to the chamber membership – more than 1,500 businesses and contacts who receive the Chamber newsletter. Her poll asked whether the respondent was in favour of the Quality Inn conversion to supportive housing; if no, whether they would like the Chamber to advocate on behalf of the membership; and for additional comments. There were 223 responses from chamber members, and 166 of them said no.

Madden found less than a dozen positive comments, and they were typically “that is as good a place as any.”

“Concerns were that it would have a negative impact on neighbouring businesses – people had customers say that if this happened, they wouldn’t be back (to their business).

Would the Chamber membership get behind a supportive housing facility anywhere near the business area?

“It’s going to be a challenge to find an appropriate location where everyone will be pleased,” said Madden

 

 



Neil Corbett

About the Author: Neil Corbett

I have been a journalist for more than 30 years, the past decade with the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows News.
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