TORONTO —
Across the country, people are being told to stay home and stay apart as a way to slow the spread of COVID-19. But when you don’t have a place to live, following those guidelines and staying safe from the virus is a huge challenge.
With homeless shelters reducing capacity to allow for physical distancing and few options for housing, more people are camping out on the streets, in city parks, or, as in one B.C. woman’s case, a beat-up van.
Tucked behind a shopping mall sits a 1988 Dodge Ram — 50-year-old Kathy Denton’s current home.
Early in the pandemic, she became homeless for the first time, forced from her apartment after her relationship fell apart.
“My stress level was through the roof,” Denton told CTV News. “I cannot explain how bad it was at that time for me.”
She’s also unemployed and thus can’t afford a place of her own.
“How can you afford to rent a place if are not bringing in at least $2,000 a month?” she pointed out.
The van — which has no running water or stove — was only supposed to be a temporary solution.
“I am on the housing list,” Denton said. “Maybe I will get in, but it is not going to be right now.”
Nov. 22 is National Housing Day, which began in 1998 when the Toronto Disaster Relief Committee declared that homelessness was a national disaster in Canada. In 2020, housing is more important than ever amid a pandemic that makes gathering indoors in large numbers with strangers a potentially dangerous situation.
As COVID-19 cases continue to spike in B.C., space in short-term housing and shelters is increasingly difficult to find.
Jeremy Hunka helps run one of Vancouver’s oldest shelters, the Union Gospel Mission, and tells CTV News that “we don’t have enough places for people to go.”
There’s more demand for beds now than during the pandemic’s first wave, he explained.
In B.C., a ban on evictions that was put in place early in the pandemic was lifted on Sept. 1, potentially contributing to the number of those experiencing homelessness in the province.
“The need is up, space is down, threat level up,” Hunka said. “People are stressed. Some people are getting sick.”
According to the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness, up to 235,000 Canadians spend time in homeless shelters each year.
Across the country, infections are up among the homeless. On Nov. 6, public health officials in Manitoba announced there was an outbreak at Oscar’s Place, a homeless shelter in The Pas, Man.
At a shelter in Calgary, there have been three separate outbreaks.
“There are 60 clients who have tested positive, and four staff,” Sandra Clarkson, executive director of the Calgary Drop-In Centre, told CTV News.
Their most recent outbreak started earlier this month, only weeks after they had lifted their outbreak status to allow more to access the shelter.
In Ontario, the battle for support for the homeless is only heating up. Activists staged a demonstration outside of the condo Toronto Mayor John Tory lives in on Sunday, constructing green “foam domes” as snow fell around them to highlight the need for more housing help.
Breaking: Incensed Torontonians set up outside Mayor John Tory’s luxury condominium to build makeshift shelters for community members he refuses to house. pic.twitter.com/490ocZzLK8
Some shelters are trying to keep their residents safe by putting up glass dividers between beds, something that’s been done in Toronto’s Better Living Centre at Exhibition Place. The facility, part of the city’s winter plan for expanding shelter services, has been criticized by activists for the lack of privacy and the prison-like design.
In addition to the virus, worsening weather is a major concern for this housing crisis. Snow and dropping temperatures can turn living on the streets into a death sentence, even in a year without a deadly pandemic.
This leaves many of those experiencing homelessness with an impossible choice: try and find a space in a crowded shelter and risk contracting COVID-19, or stay in an outdoor encampment and risk the freezing weather. Many cities also have bylaws against encampments, and will issue eviction notices to tent residents as well.
Denton knows winter will be a challenge.
“I would rather not be living in my van, please,” she said.
Another hurdle is the hefty parking tickets she gets, just from having to park her van somewhere every night, one more example of the obstacles put in the way of those experiencing homelessness.
LONGUEUIL, Que. – People in a part of Longueuil, Que., were being asked to stay indoors with their doors and windows closed on Thursday morning after a train derailed, spilling an unknown quantity of hydrogen peroxide.
Police from the city just east of Montreal said it didn’t appear anyone was hurt, although a CN rail official told a news conference that three employees had been taken to hospital as a precautionary measure.
The derailment happened at around 9 a.m. in the LeMoyne area, near the intersection of St-Louis and St-Georges streets. Mathieu Gaudreault, a spokesman for CN rail, said about eight cars derailed at the Southwark rail facility, including four that toppled over.
“As of this morning, the information we have is it’s hydrogen peroxide that was in the rail car and created the fumes we saw,” he said, adding that there was no risk of fire.
François Boucher, a spokesman for the Longueuil police department, said police were asking people in the area, including students at nearby schools, to stay indoors while experts ensure the air is safe to breathe.
“It is as a preventive measure that we encourage people to really avoid exposing themselves unnecessarily,” he told reporters near the scene.
Police and fire officials were on site, as well as CN railworkers, and a large security perimeter was erected.
Officers were asking people to avoid the sector, and the normally busy Highway 116 was closed in the area. The confinement notice includes everyone within 800 metres of the derailment, officials said, who added that it would be lifted once a team with expertise in dangerous materials has given the green light.
In addition to closing doors and windows, people in the area covered by the notice are asked to close heating, ventilation and air exchange systems, and to stay as far from windows as possible.
Gaudreault said it wasn’t yet clear what caused the derailment. The possibilities include a problem with the track, a problem with a manoeuvre, or a mechanical issue, he said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 14, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia’s Liberal party is promising to improve cellphone service and invest in major highways if the party is elected to govern on Nov. 26.
Party leader Zach Churchill says a Liberal government would spend $60 million on building 87 new cellphone towers, which would be in addition to the $66 million the previous Progressive Conservative government committed to similar projects last year.
As well, Churchill confirmed the Liberals want to improve the province’s controlled access highways by adding exits along Highway 104 across the top of the mainland, and building a bypass along Highway 101 near Digby.
Churchill says the Liberals would add $40 million to the province’s $500 million capital budget for highways.
Meanwhile, the leaders of the three major political parties were expected to spend much of today preparing for a televised debate that will be broadcast tonight at 6 p.m. local time.
Churchill will face off against Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Houston and NDP Leader Claudia Chender during a 90-minute debate that will be carried live on CBC TV and streamed online.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 14, 2024.
TORONTO – A group of hotel service workers in Toronto is set to hold a rally today outside the Fairmont Royal York to demand salary increases as hotel costs in the city skyrocket during Taylor Swift’s concerts.
Unite Here Local 75, the union representing 8,000 hospitality workers in the Greater Toronto Area, says Royal York employees have not seen a salary increase since 2021, and have been negotiating a new contract with the hotel since 2022.
The rally comes as the megastar begins her series of six sold-out concerts in Toronto, with the last show scheduled for Nov. 23.
During show weekends, some hotel rooms and short-term rentals in Toronto are priced up to 10 times more than other weekends, with some advertised for as much as $2,000 per night.
The union says hotel workers who will be serving Swifties during her Toronto stops are bargaining for raises to keep up with the rising cost of living.
The union represents hospitality workers including food service employees, room attendants and bell persons.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 14, 2024.
