The County of Simcoe gave an overview of its homelessness prevention plans to city politicians recently, including the possibility of a portable, temporary shelter in the city — similar to the one operating on Rose Street in Barrie.
During a presentation on the county’s homelessness prevention strategy, Coun. Jay Fallis asked about the possibility of the temporary shelter, which county officials mentioned during 2023 budget deliberations.
“I think you alluded to it briefly … this Rose Street modular home concept in Orillia, and it certainly got me very excited, and I know other council members (were), as well,” Fallis said.
The Rose Street shelter, composed of several modular units, opened in Barrie last winter to serve as a temporary overflow shelter during the cold months, with services on site to assist its residents to find permanent housing.
The county will know how many additional modular units it can purchase in the coming weeks, with hopes to set up temporary shelters in Orillia and Collingwood, said Mina Fayez-Bahgat, the county’s general manager of social and community services.
He said “flexibility is key” to the temporary shelter in Barrie, which operates differently depending on need throughout the year.
“In the winter cold months, you want emergency use for that overflow from shelters, and in the warmer months, when there’s less pressure, we want to focus on rapid rehousing, enhancing shelter beds that are chronically used, to capture some efficiency in the system and also some really good outcomes for people experiencing homelessness,” he said.
With the county’s rapid rehousing efforts, Fayez-Bahgat said, services are provided to help ensure participants’ success in transitioning from homelessness.
“We don’t just put the person in the unit and say, ‘Congrats.’ We continue a 180-day program after on life skill development, life stabilization development, health-care services, to ensure that the person acclimates to their housing,” he said.
The county is “excited” about the program, he said, noting it should help with the need in Orillia. He pointed to the recent removal of a homeless encampment in the city, where residents declined to be relocated to shelters with open space elsewhere in the county.
“I think it will definitely address a need here at the City of Orillia,” he said. “When we did some encampment work recently, we learned that other people turn down our shelter beds because they’re outside of the City of Orillia, so that led us to (thinking) we need local options for people experiencing homelessness.”
During its presentation to council, the county outlined its 10-point homelessness prevention strategy, which is part of broader work it is doing to increase affordable housing and decrease homelessness.
That work includes a new, 10-year affordable housing and homelessness prevention strategy, Housing ASAP (attainable supply action plan), and a new Simcoe County Housing Corporation master plan.
The county’s 10-point homelessness prevention strategy includes the following initiatives:
- Making affordable housing more attainable through deep rent subsidies ($600 to 800) provided by housing first and outreach programs;
- Creating new supportive housing programs by converting existing community housing into supportive housing programs;
- Creating peace of mind through offering storage units to store belongings while accessing services;
- Enhancing mobile outreach services to improve safety and well-being;
- Increasing housing availability by increasing affordable and supportive housing stock, and lifting a funding freeze on the domiciliary care program;
- Creating a centralized intake system to make accessing services easier;
- Increasing funding to community shelters and the temporary Rose Street shelter through the winter;
- Increasing eviction prevention services and access to housing for families by doubling grant limits for families through housing retention funding;
- Improving existing shelter across the housing continuum through the retrofits and upgrades program, at up to $50,000 per grant; and
- Looking for new capital and operating funding opportunities to increase housing.
Fayez-Bahgat said action has been taken on the majority of these initiatives, and he also discussed a new website that captures real-time data on homelessness throughout the county, including information on shelter use, the number of people experiencing homelessness, and more.
“You’ll see two dashboards — one gives you a nightly usage by location and service manager … (and) you’ll see how many people are experiencing homelessness each night,” he said.
The county also plans to create an outreach dashboard to document the ways people have been connected with social services, how they are using available services, and individual outcomes for people using services.
“We’re going to start doing some individual outcomes to show cost avoidance impacts. So, for every person that’s saved a night in a shelter bed by having permanent housing, what was that cost avoidance in the system?” he said.
“Then you can start quantifying the efficiency of the system. More to come on that, but … we want to be data-driven so that we’re better informed to make the best decisions and be flexible in our approach.”
During the meeting, officials also discussed funding for various local initiatives, including The Lighthouse, the overnight warming centre, and more.
The full presentation may be found in Wednesday’s council meeting video.
