End Homelessness St. John’s running province’s new transitional housing facility
Former Comfort Inn will offer residents of the facility three meals a day, health care, social services, sense of community
The provincial government and End Homelessness St. John’s (EHSJ) are partnering to run the new transitional housing initiative at the former Comfort Inn Hotel at 106 Airport Road.
EHSJ executive director Doug Pawson and his team will run the facility day-to-day alongside the facilities security, Newfoundland and Labrador Health Services (NLHS), and community partners such as Thrive and Stella’s Circle.
‘TITLE SAYS IT ALL’
Housing Minister Fred Hutton said Pawson and others identified the need for more transitional supportive housing within the province’s housing system.
“It’s not just, ‘OK, this person needs somewhere to stay tonight.’ They don’t need just somewhere to stay tonight. They need that, obviously, a warm, safe place to stay, but they also need help to get them to the next level in the housing continuum,” Hutton said.
The next level in the housing continuum is where clients can sign a lease with the landlord, return to work, and receive help with any issues they might be experiencing.
As a result, the facility is designed to create a bridge for those who are homeless, to move from unstable living arrangements to a place of their own.
“This is called transitional supportive housing. The title says it all. It’s a transition. This is not where someone is going to come and live forever,” Hutton said.
HEALTH CARE AND COMMUNITY
The transitional housing initiative will prioritize wraparound support services.
Some hotel rooms have been converted into private doctors’ offices on the facilities’ main floor.
The ballroom will also be converted. Hutton said it will become an emergency room type of environment that will use curtains to separate patients receiving care.
On transportation, Pawson said EHSJ is working with Metrobus to discuss expanding bus routes.
This will help get people who choose to live at the facility back and forth from downtown, where most social-service hubs are located.
Hutton said the facility’s location is not meant to remove people from the downtown area, but it will offer a sense of community.
For example, the facility will have common rooms where people can get together to watch a movie.
TENANT-LED
The provincial government said the facility is tenant-led.
Those eligible to stay at the facility will sign a lease agreement, but it is not bound by time.
“This is a three-year project, so we have a three-year runway to help support folks get stabilized and find housing,” Pawson said.
EHSJ is currently hiring to staff the facility. Pawson said they are taking an intentional phase approach to staffing to ensure people have the support they need.
Thirteen people are living in the facility as transition plans are finalized. They lived in the hotel before the province’s full possession.
In total, the facility has 140 rooms.
Hutton said the Comfort Inn was chosen because of the timeline for offering assistance.
“Instead of say four, five, or six months and having this up and running, it would be years before we would be able to have a facility like this,” he said.
“It’s perfect for it. It’s a hotel. There’s beds, people can sleep there. There’s a bathroom in each room,” he said.
In early March, Marc Budgell, director of communications for NLHC, said the phased intake process will start before the end of March for those who will move into the facility under the new initiative.