Homeless shelters now the only option for those involved in damage to Bel-Air motel

Most, if not all of the Social Services clients who recently trashed 38 motel rooms are being put up in local shelters, District of Sault Ste. Marie Social Services Administration Board learned Thursday night. 

DSSMSSAB administrators acknowledge that's far from optimal, but a homeless shelter is a last resort.

The only other option available to those turned away from a shelter is the street.

 At the time of writing this article earlier Friday, that was 19 degrees below zero in the Sault.

"I'm kinda sick to my stomach, seeing so much money being wasted," lamented Prince Township Mayor Ken Lamming, a member of the DSSMSSAB board.

Lamming had just been told repair bills from the three affected motels are still coming in, currently estimated at $165,000. 

He demanded DSSMSSAB lobby for additional provincial cash to pay for supports needed by the clients who had been staying at the Bel-Air, many dealing with both COVID and mental health and/or addictions issues.

"If we don't do anything now, we're just going to spend money on top of money every year on this, and not get anything done," Lamming said. 

Absence of health supports

Responding to tough questioning from Ward 4 Coun. Marchy Bruni, DSSMSSAB chief executive officer Mike Nadeau confirmed that "most, if not all" of the people connected to the trashed rooms are now "located within our shelter system."

"In the absence of adequate health supports, people are falling through the safety net and onto us. And we are the bottom," Nadeau said.

"It is not a housing issue. It's a public health issue. Housing is a piece of that wheel. It needs to be there."

"But without a strong health lens, people will not get better and we can't just keep supporting the same kind of behaviour."

"It's going to require the community to solve this, but it is a health issue and it's fallen onto a housing and shelter provider to try to make up for that health deficiency," Nadeau said.

Only alternative to shelters is the street

"If not the Social Services shelter system, where would these people be otherwise?" Nadeau was asked by Ward 2 Coun. Luke Dufour, the DSSMSSAB chair.

"On the street," Nadeau replied, adding: "It is very frustrating."

"We are desperately trying to make sure that people have adequate shelter, but it is a challenging, challenging situation." 

"The individuals responsible for the repairs have also tenant charges against them with Sault Ste. Marie Housing Corp. So the ability for them to get into the housing corporation and receive social housing or subsidized housing in the future... is very, very slim unless there's a significant improvement in mental health and addiction," Nadeau told his board.

Is there any chance of recovering the cost of room repairs from those responsible?

Not really, Nadeau says.

Homeless people just don't have financial resources worth going after, he says.

Why don't we just build little homes for them?

One question Nadeau hears a lot is: why don't we just build tiny homes, or find some other way to put roofs over the heads of the homeless population?

The Bel Air trashing, he says, is a perfect example of why that won't work. 

"That's exactly why we put the pictures in this report. It is not to bash the people of ill health and suffering from addiction. It is to demonstrate to the community: It is a much deeper issue and complex issue than merely a housing deficiency. Without that other support, people will ultimately fail."

"These are sick individuals. But without that care, we know what's going to happen."

"Right now, the best that we can offer is a safe environment in the shelter facility."

"We do need supportive housing in this community. We desperately need it."

"Our shelter staff are doing remarkable work.... But to move people from shelter into transition house and independent living, we do not have the resources in the community at this time to fulfil that."

A mini perfect storm

DSSMSSAB officials insist the motel fiasco is unlikely to happen again.

"When staff negotiated with the protest organizers to move the [Civic Centre tent] encampment up to the Bel Air, it was with the understanding that people that attached to the protest would remain on-site to offer supports until the Verdi [Hall low-barrier shelter] could get operational," Nadeau says.

"We had this mini perfect storm where we had an encampment and there was a surge of homeless people who were identified. Then we also had COVID and the shelter was closed down.... Just because of some of the health concerns, the volunteer supports exited the facility and [DSSMSSAB] remained with the existing staff that we had. This was not a planned activity. This was a response to something that had happened beyond the planning or control of the [DSSMSSAB] or the city. So we hired security to work independently."

"The individuals that were affiliated there, there were some rooms that had little damage, but they all were damaged. But there's a high degree of mental health and/or addictions affiliated with those individuals."

"What we've done is we've relocated people to shelter. However, if there's a need for people to go self-isolate, we'll not be putting people in a room with that unless there's a guarantee of some kind of health support. We just know what's going to happen." 

Problems when motels are used as shelters

Jeff Barban, DSSMSSAB's director of housing talked about the difficulties that arise when hospitality businesses are hired to house the homeless. 

"The hotel is a totally different situation. There were individual rooms," Barban said.

"There was no ability for staff to be able to enter at any given time and to deal easily with what was going on. It was not all the individuals themselves that were causing the damage, but their guests that arrived and came also caused damage. Or others from other units damaged while they were visiting." 

"It wasn't an easy line of who damaged what easily to lay a charge, who was at fault. In the shelter, it's one large space. So individuals don't have the opportunities behind closed doors to do any particular damage."

"However, anti-social behaviour does occur and there are some very basic rules that need to be followed that may be broken. At that point residents are requested to leave. In most instances the police respond and remove the individual. But we do have a challenge when its minus 26 out, where the individual's going to go. The shelter is the last space," Barban said.

Well-intentioned volunteers

"We've also realized that here's some hard-working and very well-intentioned volunteers in the community who are also very concerned with the crisis that we're in. This crisis can't be solved through volunteer work. We need strong commitments.... It needs to be a formal system and not an ad-hoc system that's working off a volunteer base. Volunteers could work in certain spaces, but for this core need in supportive housing, it needs to be a structured system where people can depend on that support," Nadeau said.

Jeff Barban, DSSMSSAB's director of housing, says the damaged Bel Air and Satelite motels are expected to be restored to their state of original occupancy "sometime by the end of this week."

"We're probably looking at another three weeks before we receive all the final costs. There's various contractors that have been contributing to that work. Invoicing is still flowing through as we speak."

Nadeau added that drug use is not tolerated in shelters, or threatening behaviour aimed at staff or others.

Protective equipment may be mandatory during COVID situations.

"It's unfortunate that we may have to ask a guest to leave, however, whenever that situation arises, we try to make it a 24-hour leave. We don't go to a 30-, 60- or a 90-day," Nadeau said.

"We have to be on the case of the higher levels of government to get this funding in place so we have adequate places for these people," said DSSMSSAB member Dave Edgar.

"2021, again, was another year when we found senior management getting sucked right into the daily operations," said Nadeau.

"For the last three months, Jeff and the management team at housing have probably worked an average of 16 hours a day."

"We're hoping that moving in to 2022, we can start to have that strategic focus again, and try to get this ship back and operate at more a strategic level than just a daily operational level."