Letter: Lots of homeless resources but answers elusive

Editor's note: Mr. Lebrun writes in response to the BayToday   City bills property owner for Main Street encampment cleanup

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To the editor:

A lot is in the media about the City of North Bay issuing an order under its clean yards by-law last week pertaining to "Squatters" at the Midas Shop at the corner of Main Street East and Fisher Street.

It shows that although there is a copious amount of resources aimed at this problem; mental health, addiction, homelessness, outreach...and more than one such service just a few blocks away from Midas.

In addition, there is also the "unsheltered table" — a group of stakeholder organizations that play roles in the community's approach to homelessness and encampments as a resource. Enforcement was the resolution used, or maybe, the only one despite all we truly have available.

And we know, at best, it provided a very temporary fix for some, and just moved the problem elsewhere. Also, what some may not be aware of, is this constant. shuffling of encampments and squatters with no other option happens all the time.

If everyone who faced addictions, mental health issues, or were homeless sought help, it would be the same as if just one person was seeking help. All equally might very well be met with these keywords more often than not, which often destroys their chances of recovery or help in our city. Much of it was discussed and acknowledged by community stakeholders at the Ican lead panel.

No, not enough beds/room, 48hours, 72 hours, not available, no more funding is available for that program, we filled up an hour before we opened, we changed that, etc...

Dr. Brian Rush recommended that we compare our services to those outside our district. Perhaps it's time to "Unshelf" that and see specifically how some others accomplished incredible results, with a lot less funding, and originally had a much bigger problem.

There are a lot of new faces this year in addition to the same ones we see year after year. When using a community PIT (Point in time) count, it warns that it is not designed to be accurate alone, it is simply a tool to be utilized with other tools.

Let's hope the right people, are behind the right amount of funding.

Jeff LeBrun

North Bay