COVID-19 impact on city's homeless population unclear, officials say more data needed

Tent encampments have sprung up around the city during the COVID-19 pandemic, but officials say without an annual survey that takes stock of homelessness numbers, there's no real way of knowing how many people are living on the street right now. 

One of the main methods the city uses to track the number of homeless people, the point-in-time survey, was cancelled this spring amid pandemic concerns. The last one took place in 2018, and this year's has now been postponed to spring of 2021.

"It is difficult to quantify any changes to overall homelessness as a result of the pandemic at this stage," said Edward John, director of housing services for the city.

In the past few months, a number of homeless encampments have emerged throughout the city, prompting questions of a spike in homelessness as a result of the pandemic — which has caused evictions and job losses.

Addressing the encampments has been controversial as advocates for the homeless have challenged city attempts to close them down.

Paul Johnson, general manager of Hamilton's healthy and safe communities department, recently told CBC News that outreach workers have reported new faces at the encampments.

Johnson said the encampments were "getting very large" and it appeared the city's homeless population had grown "quite a large amount" — but officials weren't sure why.

The lead physician at Hamilton's Shelter Health Network says that while encampments may make it seem like numbers are quickly rising, that probably isn't the case — although she does believe the population has slightly increased.

"Now that encampments are public, if you will, we're seeing a whole lot of people who may well have been living rough out there before, but we didn't know they were there," said Dr. Kerry Beal.

Communities gathered

Encampments have grown in certain areas around the city because of a lack of access to basic resources, according to Beal and Wesley Urban Ministries executive director, Don Seymour. 

The lockdown that began in March shuttered access to public spaces and bathrooms, as well as government offices that provide social assistance. As a result, homeless communities concentrated together more, Seymour said. 

"Encampments have always been part of the community, but COVID has made people band together in larger numbers," he said, "because every service they used shut down during the pandemic."

An encampment on Ferguson Avenue North likely emerged because Wesley's Day Centre is nearby — where those who identify as homeless can access showers, food and public health services, according to Seymour. 

At the end of last month, a group of doctors, lawyers and harm reduction advocates won a 10-day injunction that barred the city from forcing homeless people living in encampments to vacate their tents. 

That injunction was then extended by a Superior Court judge until September. 

Point-in-time count postponed

The city keeps track of the number of homeless people with two main methods: a centralized list of individuals and families who seek support from homeless services, and the point-in-time survey.

Point-in-time surveys are a collaborative effort between the city, Indigenous planning partners and other community agencies, which provide "another perspective on the local experience of homelessness" and document "people who may never have accessed community services or supports," according to John.

Outreach workers go out into the community to identify how many people are homeless at a given time and the current factors they're experiencing — but it is not an exhaustive count. 

The last point-in-time survey that took place in 2018 saw a slight decline in homelessness. The postponement of this year's survey may make it harder to evaluate whether the pandemic has caused a spike in people who identify as homeless.

John hopes that the next point-in-time count will provide a more detailed look into how Hamilton's homeless population has been affected by COVID-19, and how supports may be adapted to fit their changing needs. 

"In our current context, it may also allow for us to better assess some of the impacts of COVID-19 on people experiencing homelessness locally and to develop more of an intersectional understanding of who has been impacted, how they've been impacted, and the ways in which we may adapt services or supports moving forward," he said. "COVID has made people band together."

'Not everyone is easy to house'

In the meantime and in the past months, the city has been working to move those in encampments to shelters, hotels and affordable housing units. 

John said the city "will continue to do individual outreach" so people living rough are aware of their options to "find safe shelter and/or permanent housing alternatives on a voluntary basis, dependent on individual circumstances and the available options."

Legal and medical advocates for the homeless argue the city needs to recognize the encampments are where many homeless feel safest, especially during the pandemic. 

Shelters don't suit everyone, they said in a written delegation to city council's emergency and community services committee last month. Neither do the hotel rooms the city is funding, where people have been evicted after two days because there's no mental health support.

Shelters have restrictive rules, such as curfews and no pets, and come with drug and safety concerns, they say. 

Offering alternatives

The city has been "very proactive" in trying to get people housed, says Beal. She said their efforts have resulted in "good successes," but warned that not everyone is "easy to house." 

She agrees that some people do not feel safe or function well in shelters, and oftentimes they are dealing with mental health issues, which can further complicate their ability to stay in one spot. 

The city's "ultimate objective" is to "connect people to safe and appropriate housing with supports that meet their needs," John said.

A coordinated approach

That will have to be met with a "coordinated" approach by the city, community partners, case workers and healthcare providers — which Seymour says he witnessed as a reaction to the pandemic. 

"Cooperation between every agency was needed," he said, crediting the city's efforts to house homeless people and the Shelter Health Network's early action to COVID-proof shelters. 

Beal and her team began rearranging shelter layouts and erecting barriers between beds in mid-March, as the province began to lock down. They teamed up with St. Joseph's Hospital to get homeless people same-day virus tests, and created isolation spaces for people who tested positive for the virus.

So far, only three people in the city's homeless population have contracted COVID-19.

With a continued coordinated approach, Seymour says the city's on the right track to further help the homeless population — but housing remains only one aspect of a multi-faceted solution. 

"Once we get people housed, we need to get them healthy," he said.