{"id":163347,"date":"2025-09-23T11:33:15","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T11:33:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/163347\/"},"modified":"2025-09-23T11:33:15","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T11:33:15","slug":"street-disorder-homelessness-key-issues-as-b-c-civic-leaders-meet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/163347\/","title":{"rendered":"Street disorder, homelessness key issues as B.C. civic leaders meet"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

A person walks through an encampment towards a creek in Penticton, B.C., on Sept. 19.Aaron Hemens\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Homelessness, street chaos, mental-health problems and drug addiction are the top preoccupations for many municipal politicians set to gather in Victoria next week for their annual convention.<\/p>\n

Stretched to the limit of their resources, they say that although the provincial government has been stepping up with housing support in the past year, it\u2019s still not enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the biggest issue is the street disorder and the need for involuntary care,\u201d said Prince George Councillor Cori Ramsay, echoing concerns across the province. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt is incredibly challenging to see another fire downtown. It\u2019s just heartbreaking. I can\u2019t emphasize enough how much of a challenge it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Union of BC Municipalities (UBCM) convention Sept. 22 to 26 will see at least a dozen resolutions come to the floor pleading for additional help or new solutions.<\/p>\n

Castlegar, Nelson and Trail councils have a joint resolution asking for a better strategy for rehabilitation, homelessness and public safety. Revelstoke wants the province to take charge of dealing with homeless encampments outside city boundaries, an issue affecting many cities outside the Lower Mainland. The eastern suburb of Maple Ridge is seeking more supportive housing.<\/p>\n

In Penticton, Mayor Julius Bloomfield said the issue in his southern interior city is that it is providing almost all of the homeless services for the entire regional district of Okanagan-Similkameen.<\/p>\n

He and his council are going to the municipal convention with a proposal that there be regional funding for municipal homeless services so that larger cities aren\u2019t stuck with all the responsibility, something the UBCM executive is also recommending. <\/p>\n

Penticton currently has about 120 shelter spaces and tries to find solutions for another 50 or 60 people who live outdoors. That\u2019s even though the province funded an extra 40 rent subsidies for people in the city in an effort to get them out of shelters.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat did have a positive effect during the winter,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

How fentanyl transformed Victoria\u2019s Pandora Avenue from downtown hub to open-air drug market<\/a><\/p>\n

Mr. Bloomfield said he doesn\u2019t expect the province to try to provide shelter beds or transitional housing in every small town in the district, even though those are the ones seeing overdose deaths remain steady while they are declining elsewhere. But he and the UBCM executive say there needs to be a regional approach to dealing with homelessness.<\/p>\n

In a sign of how pressing the issue is, a Monday panel focused on dealing with \u201cdisordered downtowns\u201d already has 300 people registered, said Vancouver Councillor Lisa Dominato, one of the speakers scheduled for that session.<\/p>\n

\u201cIncreasingly, the public and municipalities are feeling fed up. Cities feel they\u2019re exercising all the tools they have in the toolbox but there\u2019s a view that the province needs to step up,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Besides that dominant issue, other topics that show up with regularity in the resolutions or in conversations with politicians include concerns about health care and the lack of resources for cities to engage meaningfully with local Indigenous bands over land-use issues. In addition, there is worry over the impact that B.C.\u2019s current weak economy and huge debt is going to have.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are meeting at a time of crisis,\u201d said UBCM president Trish Mandewo, a Coquitlam councillor. \u201cWe have a struggling economy, a growing sense of uncertainty and there are real questions about how the province is going to manage its finances.\u201d<\/p>\n

Victoria is spending millions to tackle its homelessness crisis, stressing taxpayers<\/a><\/p>\n

Mr. Bloomfield said the province\u2019s recent decision to change legislation so cities can borrow money without going to the public for approval, a long-time tradition in B.C., has some concerned it\u2019s a sign that cities will be expected to take on even more expenses.<\/p>\n

The change could mean that \u201cit perhaps is because they\u2019re not going to be giving out so many grants,\u201d said Mr. Bloomfield. <\/p>\n

Cities say they are already falling behind with repairs to existing roads, water, sewage and other community basics. And they\u2019re trying to keep up with all the new services required as every city is being urged to build more housing and take in more residents.<\/p>\n

Recent court decisions granting some new levels of property rights to Indigenous groups are also adding more pressure for cities. They say they are struggling to do the work the province expects of them on negotiating with local First Nations as part of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. <\/p>\n

The Tla\u2019amin First Nation and the UBCM executive have a joint resolution asking the province for more financial help and for guidance in transforming their approach to reconciliation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are complaints from local government that they\u2019re being asked to engage\u201d but are finding themselves struggling to do that, said Ms. Mandewo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: A person walks through an encampment towards a creek in Penticton, B.C., on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":163348,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[64,63,137,514,515,9601],"class_list":{"0":"post-163347","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mental-health","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-mental-health","12":"tag-mentalhealth","13":"tag-pleasemod"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163347\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/163348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}