A new study proposing ways to reduce the growth in Toronto’s shelter system, along with the similar trends in violence and reported drug overdoses, is set to go before a city committee this week.
The City of Toronto partnered with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) to look into safety in the city’s shelter system and make recommendations for areas of improvement.
The city’s economic and community development committee is set to consider the new report on Tuesday.
“Violence and service restrictions are serious issues in Toronto’s shelter system on which more action is needed,” the report said.
“Improving safety in the shelter system will be a challenging task that requires nuanced and balanced approaches.”
It added that these issues interact with other critical social issues, including the rise in unsheltered homelessness, the affordable housing crisis, a worsening toxic drug market and an insufficient supply of mental health services and housing-based supports.
The report found that about 36 per cent of shelter staff feel very or somewhat unsafe in the workplace. Roughly 43 per cent of Black and Indigenous shelter staff reported experiencing daily verbal abuse involving racism.
Report proposes 22 recommendations
The study examined the factors that contribute to physical and psychological safety in shelters for both staff and service users, it said, which included the causes and consequences of shelter-based violence and service restrictions.
Service restrictions mean that if an individual breaks the shelter rules and they are kicked out, the shelter service becomes unavailable or restricted to them.
The report says there are opportunities to make change by addressing “key needs,” such as using a prevention lens to strengthen the availability of mental health supports and ensuring continuity of support for service users through community partnerships.
It proposes a total of 22 recommendations for advancing safety in the shelter system for staff and people experiencing homelessness. Some of those recommendations include implementing more intensive, team-based mental health supports in the shelter system, prioritizing the reduction of crowding in shelters and establishing more consistent service restriction processes and decisions within and between shelter organizations.
Earlier this month, the city released data showing that the number of tents set up by unhoused people in encampments has more than doubled in Toronto in the past year. According to the city, people are taking shelters in parks that haven’t seen encampments before.
In the last three months, there were 10,833 “actively” homeless people in Toronto, according to city data. The number of people who used the city’s shelter system was 9,510 on April 17, while the average number of people unable to secure a shelter bed nightly was 178 in March.