Homelessness is among the top preoccupations of the 2,000 delegates to the Union of BC Municipalities, who will meet at their annual convention next week.DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
City councillors across British Columbia will be looking for answers at their annual convention next week to the question of what the province’s electioneering politicians say they will do to improve the addiction, homelessness, public disorder, and mental health crises in their municipalities.
Those issues are among the top preoccupations of the 2,000 delegates to the Union of BC Municipalities – worries that show up in almost a dozen resolutions put forward by cities asking for better solutions. The same concerns are likely to be a big part of the current provincial election campaign over the next five weeks.
“We believe that we can do better, both for those who use drugs and those who don’t use drugs,” said Kamloops Councillor Katie Neustaeter in an interview.
“You’ll see the same struggles we are having through the province … at various scales and what we see is pushing people around the province isn’t a solution.”
The resolution from the Kamloops council asks that “the province develop and implement a balanced holistic plan, based on these four pillars [prevention, harm reduction, treatment and recovery, and enforcement] for resolving the toxic drug crisis,” noting that it has been eight years since the latest drug crisis was declared.
Other local governments, including Nanaimo, Penticton, and the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen, are pleading with the province to develop more complex care beds to address the increasingly high levels of brain injury among people who have experienced drug poisoning.
New Westminster’s civic politicians want more overdose-prevention sites.
In Merritt and Fort St. John, councillors are expressing concerns about the effect of drug decriminalization on public safety. Merritt is asking for a dashboard that would report statistics on the effects of that policy, which the provincial government significantly amended earlier this year by recriminalizing drug use in certain public places such as schools and parks.
Elsewhere, communities are asking for more detox beds (Abbotsford), better mental health services, including liaison officers (Nanaimo and Kootenay-Boundary regional district), expanded support for homelessness and shelters (City of Langley), and more collaboration with the province on homelessness solutions (a joint resolution from north-central communities).
Politicians in those communities say the NDP government has provided new housing, shelter services, complex care beds and other services, but their cities are still struggling with significant problems.
“Even though they created 1,000 units of housing for us, the street disorder hasn’t changed,” said Nanaimo Mayor Leonard Krog.
“It’s the biggest single source of complaints and concerns. We are not seeing the improvement on the streets. People are feeling victimized by the street disorder. And people have died.”
In Kamloops, Ms. Neustaeter said the province has provided the most significant investment in social housing in her city’s history, but there are still many pieces missing from a complete system.
The city has been unable to get funding for a sobering centre. It has seen the province spread complex care beds to group homes into suburban neighbourhoods that had never had such facilities before, creating new problems, she said.
In Penticton, “we’re overwhelmed by this wave of addictions,” said Mayor Julius Bloomfield, whose city of 36,000 sees about 70 people in shelters and 200 people on its streets every night. “There is a very clear feeling of despair for a growing number of people.”
“There’s been some moves in the right direction,” he said, but still not enough to make a dent in Penticton’s situation. “It’s time for action.”
In Cranbrook, the first vice-president of the municipal association, Councillor Wesly Graham said “the tools in the toolbox aren’t adequate.” Cranbrook has seen its visible homeless population go from about 50 in 2019 to almost 200 earlier this year.
BC Housing has contributed to big new housing projects, he said, but they’re not done yet. And, throughout the Kootenays, there are only a limited number of rehab beds, but no transitional or supportive housing that people can move into afterward.
The crisis has consequences that spread into many other areas of municipal services: some communities note they end up being short of police staff or having to pay a lot of overtime because of the requirement that a police officer accompanying someone to hospital because of their drug or mental-health condition has to stay there, sometimes for hours, until that person is admitted.
As a result, said Mr. Graham, local politicians are waiting to hear what the province’s competing candidates for premier will have to say as they battle for support in the upcoming Oct. 19 provincial election.
NDP Premier David Eby will address the convention Thursday, while B.C. Conservative Party leader John Rustad speaks Friday.
Besides the main issues, two other topics are showing up as major concerns.
One is how cities are contending with the province’s growing list of requirements for new housing. Many are wondering how to integrate them with current city planning and also how to provide the needed community services – everything from sewers to parks to street lights – after the province legalized fourplexes in every city in the province with more than 5,000 people and mandated that cities allow significant density near major transit hubs.
“You can densify a totally built-out neighbourhood but, if everyone does it at the same time, the pipes in the ground aren’t able to handle it,” said Mr. Graham.
Cities as large as Vancouver and as small as Fernie say they need more support from the province if they’re going to keep up with everything that’s needed.
Municipal representatives will also debate the province’s recent efforts to put in place codes of conduct aimed at providing mechanisms to deal with bad behaviour by council members.
That has resulted in controversies in several communities, with councillors voting on whether their colleague should be reprimanded or have duties taken away from them, said Mr. Graham.
“We need more decorum around the table. But the current concern is that we don’t feel like there’s the resources to deal with poor conduct.”