A new around-the-clock shelter is opening in Nanaimo in June to help vulnerable residents during the pandemic.
B.C. Housing is leasing space in the City of Nanaimo’s community services building for a temporary emergency response centre to be run by the Island Crisis CareSociety.
It will have room for up to 35 beds. The centre will assist people who are vulnerable and homeless and allow them to practise physical distancing, B.C. Housing said in a statement.
The centre will give people a safe place to self-isolate during the COVID-19 pandemic, including those who are immunocompromised or otherwise at high risk for contracting the virus.
Services will include daily meals, access to showers and washrooms, laundry and health services, as well as referral to counselling, mental-health and addiction treatment, if needed.
Staff will be on-site 24 hours a day to support people living there and to monitor who is going in and out of building, B.C. Housing said.
The province had asked Nanaimo for a list of city-owned facilities that might be suitable for shelter during the coronavirus crisis.
Some non-profit groups had already ceased operating in the building because of COVID-19, Nanaimo Mayor Leonard Krog said. Other community-services organizations are staying to continue working with vulnerable residents.
Krog said the centre is a positive step, but for the long term, more facilities are needed to deliver care and treatment for “the really difficult to house, the severe cases, those suffering from significant mental-health issues and addiction issues.”
Ideally, such facilities would be in smaller community-based facilities, Krog said.
The Prideaux Street site is the latest facility to open to care for Nanaimo residents who do not have a place to live.
A recent count found about 425 people who were homeless in the city. Krog said the real number is likely higher. “Of course, many are secreting themselves in various pockets of the community, away from prying eyes and people who frighten them,” he said. “Because many on the streets are victimized by others on the streets. We know that.”
Nanaimo had the largest tent city in B.C. in 2018, when more than 300 campers moved onto a city industrial lot. The tent city was eventually dismantled and about 170 modular supportive-housing units were opened to house many of its residents in two locations.
Nanaimo does not have a tent city now, but homeless people shelter in doorways, camp overnight in parks and live in the woods.
