Residents of Ottawa’s Sandy Hill neighbourhood are urging the city to cut off funding for a drop-in centre they blame for sowing fear and chaos in their neighbourhood — but city staff say they want to work on moving it elsewhere instead.
The city provides about $1.4 million in annual funding to Belong Ottawa, which runs three drop-in centres for homeless and street-involved people including Centre 454 in St. Alban’s Church at the corner of Daly Street and King Edward Avenue.
Shauna-marie Young, who started as executive director of Belong Ottawa in September, said Centre 454 offers food, showers, laundry, computers and companionship for marginalized people. It’s been on the site since 1979, and was bursting with activity when CBC visited on Wednesday.
Young said demand has doubled in the past year.
“The need is increasing,” she said. “Abject poverty, lack of affordable housing, increased cost of food, a very toxic drug supply are some of the things that are contributing to some of the behaviours that are more visible, because more people are suffering.”
But for four neighbours who appeared at a city budget meeting on Tuesday, those behaviours are intolerable. They blamed Centre 454 for a wave of theft, violence and intimidation that has left them terrified. They said the centre’s clients harass and threaten them, break into their properties, defecate in their gardens and use drugs on their laneways.
Sandy Hill resident Susan Khazaeli said Centre 454 staff are unresponsive to the community’s concerns and take no accountability for their clients once they walk out the door.
“Centre 454 is responsible for endangering the welfare and security of everyone near it,” she told council’s community services committee. “I am begging everyone here to defund this service. It does not belong here.”
Shauna-marie Young took over as executive director of Belong Ottawa in September. (Arthur White-Crummey/CBC)
Anya Fraser submitted a video that committee chair Laura Dudas said was too vulgar to show publicly. In it, a man walks into the middle of King Edward Avenue, blocks the path of a school bus and repeatedly yells profanities at it.
It was shot right in front of Centre 454, but Fraser noted that the video does not show any of its staff on hand to de-escalate the situation “because Centre 454 never takes any responsibility for their clients’ behaviour.”
She also told councillors that the centre “needs to be defunded immediately.”
“North Sandy Hill residents have had to deal with constant open drug use and gang activity, disruptive behaviour, verbal and physical assaults, theft and property damage. Their clients leave dirty needles, smashed crack pipes, spoiled food and human feces everywhere,” Fraser said.
“Whenever we ask Centre 454 to help us deal with their clients they refuse, because their unofficial policy is, ‘not our property, not our problem.'”
Centre 454 says it does intervene
Young said that is not the policy. In an interview, she told CBC Centre 454 works in close collaboration with police, the city and community health centres, and sits on a community liaison committee that includes Sandy Hill neighbours.
She said Centre 454 is partnering with Sandy Hill Community Health Centre on a program to pick up garbage and drug paraphernalia, and has brought in a contractor to deal with rat infestations.
Program manager Dean Dewar said staff are instructed to intervene when those who use the centre’s services cause disorder outside. That could mean asking them to move along, or bringing them inside.
“We build such a great rapport with our participants, so often it’s easier for us to say, ‘Hey man, this is not what we do in our neighbourhoods,'” he said. “‘[Our neighbours] don’t deserve this. We don’t allow that here.'”
He said staff flag public defecation to by-law, and also do ground checks along Besserer and Daly streets, as well as King Edward Avenue.
Dean Dewar, program manager at Centre 454, said staff do intervene when clients cause disturbances. (Arthur White-Crummey/CBC)
Khazaeli and Fraser said they’ve seen little evidence that Centre 454 is taking action. In their view, staff appear to set no boundaries for their clients, unlike many other social service agencies that impose bans for problematic behaviour.
“It doesn’t matter what you’ve done, you’re always welcome,” Fraser said. “You can keep coming back for more services, so that’s really scary for us.”
But Young said clients can face a “pause” if they endanger the safety of other clients, themselves or staff.
“We are behooved as an organization to create safe spaces, safety for our participants and safety for our team members,” she said.
“Also the community,” Dewar added. “Let’s say a person got into an argument down the street and they come to our centre, we’ll have that conversation: This is our community, this is also your community, and you can’t be acting like that.
“So there would be a pause in service for that too.”
City ‘committed’ to working on plan to move centre
At the committee meeting on Tuesday, Somerset Coun. Ariel Troster asked city staff what they are doing to address the “spillover effect” that drop-in programs can have on surrounding neighbourhoods — and whether the city budget makes investments to help.
Clara Freire, the city’s general manager of community and social services, said the city has provided additional funding to help Centre 454 address security, pest control and garbage, though she admitted it isn’t enough.
“We committed to working with Centre 454 on a plan to move out of that residential area,” she said. “There have been some leadership changes at Centre 454. We’re now in a position to have a fulsome discussion with them. The question will be where to move Centre 454.”
Clara Freire is the City of Ottawa’s general manager of community and social services. (Jean Delisle/CBC)
Rideau-Vanier Coun. Stéphanie Plante, whose ward includes Centre 454, said she’s pleased to hear there’s a potential solution on the table. She said resident complaints are long-standing.
“I think it’s just a matter, at this point, of finding a location, seeing how we can better spread out our services throughout the city, because homelessness, addiction, mental health — it’s not just a downtown issue,” said Plante.
Freire said the discussions are just beginning, but she believes Belong Ottawa might be amenable to a move.
But Young told CBC any decision on a move would have to go up to the Anglican Diocese. Though she said Belong Ottawa is open to discussing the issue, “those conversations are for the future.”
“There are, at this time, no concrete plans,” she added.
Khazaeli said the situation is urgent for her and her neighbours, and she doesn’t think the city’s focus on discussions recognizes that.
“I think the city is disingenuous, because they’re refusing to set a timeline,” she said.
“Let the winter end and close it in the spring when the weather is warm,” she added. “Just close it. I think that sense of urgency will give birth to a relocation.”
Freire confirmed that the funding agreement with Belong Ottawa does have an exit clause, but she cautioned that they are a “very valuable social services partner” that provides important services to vulnerable people.
“We have a good partnership with Belong Ottawa as a whole, so we would rather work with them on a solution that they’re part of,” she said.