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As Halifax scraps plans for a sobering centre, staff at similar facilities across Canada say they’re a crucial part of the continuum of care needed to address homelessness and addiction.
After a years-long search, Halifax municipal staff failed to find a landlord for a 10-bed safe facility for people intoxicated by drugs or alcohol that would offer an alternative to a police cell.
“We really did exhaust all efforts. The search went on over an extended period of time,” said Rachel Boehm, executive director of community safety for Halifax Regional Municipality.
A major reason the municipality was unable to find a space for the sobering centre was the perception by landlords this type of service would negatively affect the neighbourhood it operated in despite there being no proof to suggest that’s true, Boehm said.
“That’s just a reality. There’s still a lot of stigma around substance use and mental illness,” she said.
Boehm said the need for addiction and mental health services has changed since Halifax approved plans for a sobering centre in 2022.
The number of people taken to jail cells for public intoxication is decreasing, she said, but data from Halifax Regional Police shows more than 750 people were still put in the so-called “drunk tank” last year.
Benefits to owning the space
There are more than a dozen sobering centres across Canada and some of them have been operating for decades.
The Morningstar Centre in Kenora, Ont. opened in 1976 and management says owning their building has allowed them to adapt to the evolving needs in their community over the years.
“We have made lots of structural changes based on our needs, so it’s been easy for us to accommodate some of those changes and to, kind of, change the space based on the programs that we’re offering,” said Denise Forsyth, director of mental health and addictions at the Lake of the Woods District Hospital, which operates Morningstar Centre.
The facility offers a wide range of services and partners with 15 agencies in the area to connect people to the housing, mental health and addiction support.
Alpha House in Calgary has been operating since 1981 and offers 24/7 emergency shelter, housing programs, mobile outreach and a sobering centre for people living with addiction.
The building it operates in is owned by the Alberta government. “Ultimately for us, we don’t have to worry so much about our sort of place in the community,” said Shaundra Bruvall, program director. Bruvall says Alpha House diverts 8,000-9,000 calls from police every month.
In Halifax, Broehm said there wasn’t any capacity for a sobering centre in buildings owned by the municipality or province.
She said they considered splitting up the 10 beds across several sites but ultimately it wasn’t practical.
Physical space acts as entry-point to long-term care
Halifax is pivoting to invest in services like its mobile outreach Crisis Assistance and Response (CARE) Team, Boehm said.
The mobile team started last year as a two-year pilot project run by Souls Harbour in Dartmouth and Cole Harbour, offering 24/7 service to people who are in mental health crisis or publicly intoxicated.
The municipality announced on Monday it’s expanding the service to parts of Halifax. But several sobering centres provide mobile outreach as part of a wide range of services. Staff say having a physical space is an easy way to connect vulnerable people to support that can help them over the long-term.
“These sites present a huge opportunity to connect with the individual,” said Wes Hewitt, executive director of Port Alberni Shelter Society. The non-profit organization owns the building that houses its sobering centre.
Hewitt said building trust with these individuals and being able to connect them to housing, mental health and addiction support are essential.
“You have a much greater chance of making a major change in somebody’s life,” he said.
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