Twenty-five years ago, the late Jack Layton stood up before Toronto city council and guilted his colleagues into declaring homelessness a national disaster.
With 450 of his homeless pawns in tow, he urged council to create more shelter space; otherwise the homeless would die in the streets.
Before anyone had a chance to catch their breath, homelessness became an industry propped up by NDP activists.
They knew if they solved the problem they’d be out of work.
Shelter spaces were only supposed to be a stopgap measure towards independence.
But egged on by the activists, the growth in shelter spaces has been nothing short of dramatic.
In 1999 the city had just 2,313 shelter spaces.
A city spokesman told me last week 11,497 were staying in “emergency accommodation” — an increase of 500% in 25 years.
Almost half (47%) are refugees, according to the spokesman, proving that declaring Toronto a Sanctuary City — as former mayor John Tory did in 2017 — has been a giant bust.
It seems nothing has changed in 25 years and Layton’s widow and our current Mayor Olivia Chow intends to carry on his legacy with 20 more “emergency shelters” and 1,600 beds in the works.
These are shelter beds at an average cost of $250 per bed per night that are supposed to be for emergency use only.
The city’s Shane Gerard says this includes the room rate and all required supports, including food, security, cleaning, laundry, and wrap-around services.
He claims the 20 smaller, purpose-built shelters will be more “cost effective” and help add “important stability” to the shelter system.
I thought affordable housing was to provide stability.
Instead of saying there is no more room at the inn for migrants and asylum seekers, Chow and her council are forcing taxpayers to absorb into lawful neighbourhoods highly expensive shelters that house a variety of addicts, people with mental health issues and migrants coming from countries where cultures and social mores are vastly different than Canada.
If they continue to beef up the shelter system, there will be less money for stable affordable housing.
Yet in the case of these planned shelter spaces, it seems money is no object.
For this latest shelter exercise the city has allocated out of the City Building Fund (comprised of that extra 1.5% in yearly taxes started by Tory) some $89.5 million to acquire the properties!
City officials are asking the feds to provide another $674.5 million over 10 years to continue the fiefdom building exercise.
At those prices each unit will cost $477,187 to build. That doesn’t include operational costs.
One of the first six shelters in the works — at 2535 Gerrard St. East — caught already shelter-weary residents of that area by surprise two months ago.
The plans for the proposed 80-bed shelter leaked out despite efforts by Chow to keep it secret. The outrage was tremendous.
Sources say the actual property — which has sat vacant for four years —was recently acquired by the city (in secret) for $7-million.
It was purchased in 2020 for $4.3-million, which means the city paid 40% more than it was worth four years ago.
Sources also say there are no comparable sites in the area.
Caught with their pants down, city officials are now working overtime to do a sales job.
They’ve hired a series of NDP-friendly consultants to advance the party line.
These third-party “Community Engagement Facilitators” will make a pretty penny essentially strong-arming the local residents into accepting the new shelters.
Third Party Public will make $106,850; long-time NDP activist and former councillor Joe Mihevc has a contract worth $79,500; and Public Progress, headed up by long-time activist Bruce Davis has signed a contract worth $199,000.
The first two to open — in 2027 if the city gets its act together — are the 2535 Gerrard St. E site and one at 1615 Dufferin St.
In a posted series of statements, the consultants can’t claim that the 2535 Gerrard St. E shelter is needed because the city’s shelter system is currently full and demand continues to increase.
Of course it does. This is a case of supply creating demand, not the other way around.
(Also see note above about stemming the tide of refugee claimants into the city.)
They also contend the city is buying land so they don’t have to continue to rely on temporary spaces in hotels. They want “permanent purpose-built spaces” that can respond to the “evolving needs” of the homeless — whatever the heck that means.
It sounds to me like an excuse for the NDPers on council to build housing, at which they have proven to be notoriously bad.
Naz Araghian, spokesman for the Hunt Club/Blantyre Residents Association, says the amount the Gerrard St. E. shelter — a temporary solution — will cost per person is the equivalent of many units the city could buy for many people.
Her issue is that this won’t solve homelessness in the long-term.
”We can’t afford Bandaid solutions,” she said recently.
Buying and renovating or building a new site for temporary shelter is the most inefficient route to take, not that any of this bothers any of the NDPers on council or their activist friends.
It is abundantly clear, however, why Chow is floating the idea of another major tax increase to fund what she calls more “investments” in the city.
I always love the word “investment” because it is nothing of the sort and does little to improve the quality of life for residents who’ve made Toronto their home for years and years.
Like all good Marxists, she wants to continue to build her housing fiefdom.
In a Sanctuary City like Toronto, this is no longer a homeless problem but a problem of not being able or willing to stem the flow of illegal migrants.
