City urged to use hotels, offices to house homeless

As the first winter of the COVID-19 pandemic looms, a draft strategy obtained by the Star suggests that Toronto’s Shelter, Support and Housing Administration will recommend the city develop an acquisition strategy for hotels, rooming houses and even office spaces for housing the homeless.

The mid-July draft of a shelter recovery strategy, expected to be released in September, was obtained by the Star from a source involved in the document’s development.

Since COVID-19 hit, “the consequences of our system failures are evident and immediate,” and demand change, the draft notes. “Toronto has a decades-long history of creating temporary emergency responses to homelessness crises that become part of our permanent infrastructure. We need to adopt approaches that will work during COVID-19 and not compound our challenges afterward.”

The city confirmed via email that the report received by the Star was a draft of the shelter interim recovery strategy, but cautioned that the version was “incomplete.”

Staff would be available to speak about the report when it was released publicly next month, staff said.

“When complete, the strategy will guide City and partner agency response to homelessness over the next 12-month interim recovery period, (next three months), medium term (six-12 months) and long-term actions, to ensure effective service delivery and continued protection of vulnerable clients during COVID-19,” City spokesperson Deborah Blackstone wrote in an email.

The draft warns about winter, noting that shelter challenges were “on course to be intensified in the absence of immediate, significant interventions.”

Victoria Gibson is a Toronto-based reporter for the Star covering affordable housing. Her reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.