Agenda Index City of Vancouver

ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT

TO:

Vancouver City Council

FROM:

Director of the Housing Centre and Director of Current Planning, in consultation with the Director of Development Services

SUBJECT:

Emergency Temporary Winter Shelters- 1321 Richards and the Hastings Corridor

 

RECOMMENDATION

GENERAL MANAGER'S COMMENTS

COUNCIL POLICY

On January 5, 1999 City Council joined other Canadian municipalities in declaring homelessness a national disaster.

On September 18, 2001, Council approved the guiding principles of the Regional Homelessness Plan for Greater Vancouver and endorsed this Regional Plan as a workingdocument. The Plan recognizes the need for emergency temporary winter shelters in Vancouver.

BACKGROUND

Both the City and the Regional Homeless Plan recognize that emergency shelters are an interim but necessary response to homelessness. While the City has emphasized social housing as a significant part of the solution to homelessness, there is also a role for shelters as part of the continuum of housing and support.

The City participates in a regional cold wet weather strategy, developed by governments and service providers, to increase shelter capacity during the winter. Regionally about 200 additional beds are provided from November through March/April. Last year about 150 of these were located in Vancouver. The Regional Homeless Plan recommends an increase throughout the region, particularly in those underserved areas, outside Vancouver. Within Vancouver, emergency winter shelter capacity has been developed in South Vancouver, East Vancouver, Downtown, and the Downtown Eastside.

DISCUSSION

As winter is near, an emergency situation exists that requires immediate resolution, in that arrangements for two temporary winter shelters have not finalized. The emergency requires abridgement of normal development application review procedures including public participation. Fortunately, Federal and/or Provincial funding has been secured for the two temporary emergency winter shelters to operate from November to March 31 or April 30, 2002. One of these shelters has identified a site and the other is looking for a location, and both will require City permits. If the normal review process for Social Service Centres were followed, it might take until February for the permits to be issued. However, an expedited permitting process could be followed, reflecting several basic principles:

· ensure the permits are truly temporary and not renewable without new applications and full public review process;
· ensure basic provisions for health and safety; and
· ensure basic provisions for community contact during start-up and for on-going support for the community to deal with any emerging problem as fast as possible.

Accordingly, the following is proposed.

1321 Richards Street

St. James Community Services Society plans 16 shelter beds for women to provide a dry, safe place during the winter months. The shelter will be staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days aweek by workers who will provide support, information and referrals to the women using the shelter. Participants will not be required to leave the building during the day. Food and access to laundry facilities and telephone will be provided to assist the women to move on to more stable accommodation.

St. James has explored many other locations, all of them outside the Downtown Eastside, but found them to be unavailable or inappropriate. These include a site on Kingsway, Taylor Manor, the VGH Nurses Residence, several houses in South and Central Vancouver, and buildings on the Musqueam land. The building on Clark Drive, which they used last year for this emergency winter shelter, is not available. In the end only the City-owned building on Richards Street would work.

The site at 1321 Richards in Downtown South was purchased by the City in 1997 for social housing. MCC Housing Society and WINGS have received a conditional allocation from BC Housing as sponsors. The project is currently under development review. Construction is scheduled to begin in the summer. The temporary use of the site will not adversely affect the social housing project.

The site has a two-storey building in which Coast Foundation operated a drop-in centre and had a development permit as a Social Service Centre. This service has now moved to 1221 Seymour Street, and the building is vacant. Real Estate Services will lease the building on a short-term basis, at market value, to St. James. An initial site review has indicated requirements to ensure basic fire and life safety, and these upgrades can be completed quickly.

St. James has received funding from both the provincial Ministry of Human Resources and the federal SCPI program. The funding ends April 30, 2002.

St. James has a 26-year history of providing shelter and support services for women with two shelter and second stage housing projects in the Downtown Eastside. They are also currently developing St. Elizabeth, a permanent shelter and transitional housing project for women on East 16th Avenue.

Hastings Corridor

The Salvation Army recently operated the Crosswalk for three years at 141 West Hastings, providing drop-in and overnight mats on the floor. For fifteen years prior to that, they had operated out of 44 East Cordova in Gastown. The Salvation Army left the West Hastings location last year because the building is in bad condition, and they have been looking for an alternative ever since. The shelter they wish to provide is the most basic part of the regional cold-wet weather strategy, with overnight mats on the floor, people leaving the building in the morning, and a minimum of two staff on duty during opening hours. Theshelter would serve people who are the most marginalised, who frequent the pubs west of Main, and who otherwise would sleep in doorways in Gastown and the Downtown Eastside.

The Salvation Army has been looking at various sites to provide service to people west of Main Street and east of Cambie, and they had identified part of the ground floor of a privately-owned SRO building at 9 West Hastings as a location. However, the location just west of Pigeon Park proved to be too much of a concern, and the Salvation Army is looking again at alternate sites in the Hastings Corridor.

Funding has been committed by the Ministry of Human Resources for provision of the shelter service at least until March 31, 2002. If a suitable site can be found, it is recommended that staff be instructed to expedite the review process for the temporary permits required.

The Salvation Army is also looking for a permanent location for the shelter, which may or may not be the same as its temporary location. Any permanent location would require a new development permit and would be subject to the City's normal neighbourhood process.

The Salvation Army has long been established in Gastown and the Downtown Eastside, operating not only the Crosswalk at its previous location, but also Harbour Light on Cordova Street. The organization has shown its ability to maintain cordial relations with their residential and business neighbours.

Development Permit Requirements

In zoning terms, both these shelters are classified as Social Service Centres which is a permitted use within their respective district schedules. The normal development review for such Centres would involve a detailed review by relevant City departments and neighbourhood notification by mail. This process, along with the building permit process, usually takes about 14 weeks.

Given that the shelters need to be operational as soon as possible, staff suggest that an expedited development and building review be undertaken. In this emergency situation, this report would represent a basic public notification for the applications. To establish meaningful neighbourhood liaison, it is proposed that the agencies personally contact key neighbours. It is further proposed that only temporary development permits be considered, with conditions that anticipate and address possible neighbourhood concerns. For each permit, the conditions would include:

· specific hours of the operation and the nature of the program;
· responsibility for providing appropriate supervision and staffing to ensure a safe and secure operation;
· the permit is not renewable;
· a requirement to maintain the premises, particularly the front of the building, in a tidy condition;
· provision of the name of an on-site person, whom neighbours can contact with any issues and concerns; and
· commitment to address and resolve issues as reasonably possible

In addition a staff liaison would be identified, to whom neighbours can address any concerns during the start-up and operations so that they can be dealt with immediately.

CONCLUSION

The normal City permitting process would not allow these two emergency winter shelters to open in a timely way, and it is recommended that an expedited process be followed in reviewing the permits. The decisions on whether or not to issue the permits rest with the Director of Planning and the Chief Building Official. The two shelters are not new services in the City, but have been part of the regional cold wet weather strategy. Staff and/or the agencies will contact neighbours and deal immediately with any concerns that are raised.

For future years, it is recommended that staff will report back on how temporary emergency winter shelters can be accommodated without putting the City's permit approval process under extraordinary pressure.

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