Even with new shelter spots in Hamilton, barriers to leaving tents remain, say encampment residents

What Sierra Colvin wants this season is somewhere warm where she can stay with the people she trusts most — her community from the streets.

Colvin, 29, lives unhoused in Hamilton.

"I'd like to get off the street, especially in wintertime," she told CBC Hamilton on a bitterly cold day in early December. Colvin was visiting with friends on a sidewalk near City Hall and the Hamilton YWCA.

It can be a hard choice to decide between staying in an encampment with the people who support her and sleeping inside at a shelter, where genders are separated and there's not always enough space to house friends together. 

"If I'm in a shelter with all the people I have on these streets right now, I would actually really appreciate it," Colvin said.

In December, Mayor Andrea Horwath said the city will be looking to put an end to tents in parks after a judge ruled Hamilton's previous encampment ban wasn't infringing on Charter rights. The city's approach centres on plans to accommodate more people in an expanded shelter system. 

"What our city is doing is trying to get to a place where we no longer have tents in parks," Horwath said.

But encampment residents say lack of availability isn't the only thing keeping them out of the shelter system.

On a recent visit to several encampments in downtown Hamilton with volunteers from the Substance Overdose Prevention and Education Network (SOPEN), around half a dozen residents told CBC Hamilton they face barriers to using shelters that include:

• Fear of theft, some based on past experience.
• Concerns over being separated from partners, pets or close community members.
• Being on shelter exclusion lists related to drug use or past incidents.
• Lack of knowledge of where there is availability and how to access services. 

Colvin said being surrounded by community can sometimes be more important than a bed.

"Some of these encampments are warm, they're homey and they're able to actually [understand] you," she said.

'I don't even know how to get on the list'

In 2024, Hamilton council approved 272 new shelter beds, although only 107 are operational so far, according to the city's website as of Dec. 23. Yet to come are another 85 in indoor shelters and a planned 80-person outdoor site featuring tiny homes geared to couples and people with pets, which was initially slated to be ready in December but has faced several delays.

Once completed, the city will have 612 shelter beds in total, general manager of healthy and safe communities Grace Mater told reporters at a news conference in December. According to city data, there are 1,592 known individuals who are currently "actively homeless."

None of the encampment residents who spoke with CBC Hamilton in December knew about the new indoor shelter beds. Some had heard about the tiny homes but didn't know how to apply.

Kimmy Taylor, 52, lives in a tent near City Hall, and has been on the streets since 2014 after fleeing an abusive husband with nowhere to go. Her two children are also on the streets, and the family was separated when they initially tried to seek shelter, so now "home is a tent," she said. 

Taylor, who had just gotten out of the hospital after a week due to an antibiotic-resistant staph infection in her leg, says she has been assigned to "every type of outreach worker." She says none have been able to find her and her children housing. "It's just going in a big circle of nothing," she said.

She's heard about the outdoor shelter and would "love" to live in a tiny home with her children. "I don't even know how to get on the list."

City spokesperson Lauren Vastano told CBC Hamilton in an email that "outreach staff attend each encampment regularly to connect with individuals, ensure sites are compliant, share information, and aid them in their housing journey."

She said the city's Housing Focused Street Outreach Team is triaging referrals to determine who gets placed in the tiny homes.

'People are left with very little choice'

CBC tagged along with SOPEN volunteers Kim Ritchie and Aaron Simkin that day, as the two visited encampment residents, handing out harm reduction supplies as well as Tim Hortons gift cards, winter hats and t-shirts that said "Nice people use drugs." 

Ritchie would approach a tent yelling something friendly, like "anybody home?"

More often than not, she was met by silence, but sometimes someone would respond, and was almost always grateful for some of what the volunteers were offering. Several people she spoke with seemed unwell, or had been woken up from sleeping. Most did not want to be identified in an article.

One woman told Ritchie that her husband, who was inside their tent, had a broken hip. Another resident reported that a neighbour's tent had recently burned down. Ritchie said those living in tents are often forced to choose between freezing to death and the dangers that come with a heater, which include fires but also carbon dioxide poisoning. She said the tents she visits average about four occupants each, for body heat.

"Sleeping in tents and living a life like that is really hard on the body, but people are left with very little choice," said Ritchie, who became homeless as a teenager after her mother died and lived on the streets for about 15 years.

"Shelters often have really restrictive policies and rules that some people can't abide by. Outside of that, people don't want to leave their spouses. People don't want to leave their animals."

'I didn't fail, society failed me'

Ritchie said many drug users don't go into shelters because they can't use drugs there, something unlikely to change with the shelter system expansion.

City spokesperson Vastano shared that the new outdoor shelter was designed to accommodate people who face barriers – "this includes accommodation for couples, pets, and secure storage for belongings" – but did not respond to questions about drug use.

Ritchie added that unhoused drug users, already heavily stigmatized, face even further marginalization now that Hamilton's safe consumption site is slated for closure by March 31 following a provincial edict.

"If we don't have a safe place to use, you're going to use where you can," she said. "I can tell you for myself, as a person who's a former intravenous drug user, that this city was my… injection site. And if I had access to a safe injection site, I wouldn't have the scars on my body or the physical health stuff I do now." 

Ritchie and Simkin said they don't believe shelter spaces or new restrictions can succeed in eliminating park encampments, suggesting instead a suite of other measures addressing the root causes of homelessness, including low-barrier housing, social assistance rates that actually cover rent with some money left over, and helping marginalized people build and maintain communities.

"It's sad that we're heading to this place where we're going back to, 'If you're poor, we're going to fine you and we're going to give you trespass notices,'" said Ritchie. 

"Being houseless isn't a personal failing, it's a societal one, and I really need people to get grounded in that. I wasn't a failure as a child who was orphaned and lost all my familiar kin and was on the street. I didn't fail, society failed me in those moments."