Transient population coming into Centretown from the ByWard Market: councillor

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Weeks after Ariel Troster raised the alarm that increased police presence in Ottawa’s ByWard Market is pushing more vulnerable people into Centretown posted the video, the Somerset ward councillor says there is still a large transient population, mostly men, coming into Centretown.

“And they’re either unwell, or hungry, or in crisis,” she said in an interview, which is adding pressure to an already “challenging neighbourhood.”

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Troster says she frequently gets emails about visible drug use and homelessness, but in recent weeks, she has been receiving such emails as often as every few minutes.

“My intention was not to say stop serving people in the market. But it is to say, we can’t just chase people from neighbourhood to neighbourhood,” Troster said, adding that she’s hearing from homeless people and service providers that they simply have nowhere else to go.

“I was worried the dam would break, which is why I raised the alarm.”

Last month, the councillor posted a 90-second video stating that “there have been more people gathering, using drugs in public and there have been some fights and some aggression happening among people who often don’t have another place to go.”

Meanwhile, frontline agencies in downtown Ottawa say they’re struggling to meet the complex needs of vulnerable people, as more seek services in Centretown.

Michelle Hurtubise, the executive director of the Centretown Community Health Centre, says in recent weeks her organization has seen more people in the neighbourhood who have been homeless and “clearly living rough” for a long time, and they’re “not people we’re generally familiar with.”

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Hurtubise says she’s aware of “speculation” that the new faces are because increased police presence in the ByWard Market is pushing people to other areas in the downtown core.

These new faces, desperately seeking support, come after demand for their services quadrupled during the COVID-19 pandemic, Hurtubise says. The need for these community support services has remained high, even after pandemic support dollars from the federal government dried up, she said.

“It’s not possible to meet this moment,” Hurtubise said in an interview. The health centre routinely hits capacity within an hour of opening, and has to turn people away.

Centretown Community Health Centre’s clients are seeking housing, living with “really complex mental health needs,” some who are longtime drug users and seeking harm reduction and other support, Hurtubise says. The centre also provides healthcare for homeless people, who on average, are expected to die 17 years earlier than the average Canadian.

“Their complexity requires more support and response than is available right now,” she said. “When we have influxes, when there are pressure points elsewhere in the city, we can’t respond to the complexity of finding them housing, income, ID, deal with their physical and mental health issues, substance use issues.”

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Ottawa police announced crime “hot spots” in the ByWard Market, Lowertown and Rideau Street area would be targeted by patrols as part of the new “community outreach response and engagement strategy.”

As part of the strategy, police deploy “intermittent, highly visible patrols in these identified areas,” including the Rideau Street area, ByWard Market and Lowertown, to deter crime and improve perceptions of public safety, in tandem with the police service’s new neighbourhood operations centre in Rideau Centre, which opened earlier in the summer.

Sabrina LeMay, executive director of the Centretown BIA, says in some cases, businesses in the neighbourhood are struggling to find employees because people don’t feel safe in Centretown.

Businesses are also seeing “challenges like loitering, feces, needles, finding themselves not feeling comfortable cleaning up what’s left behind,” she said, calling it a “mental health pandemic.”

The BIA, she said, is working to educate business owners in the area on the resources available, but sometimes the overtaxed community programs “are oversaturated” and don’t have the means to help. She said the Centretown BIA will host an educational roundtable with businesses and community programs, educating them on where to go for assistance.

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She’s encouraging community members to befriend people in crisis.

“We need them to feel safe as well,” she said. “I hope we see that movement, and have better conversations.”

Rachel Robinson is executive director of Belong Ottawa, an organization that runs drop-in day programs in Lowertown and Centretown. Like Hurtubise, she says her programs have seen more and more people since the COVID-19 pandemic.

She says the “significant increase” is due to the affordability crisis, housing crisis, and a toxic drug supply, and doesn’t think it directly relates to the police’s new strategy in the ByWard market.

Belong Ottawa’s day programs offer showers, laundry and meals, in an attempt to meet the “basic needs” of approximately 300 people every day, she says.

The programs previously focused on social support, like a community centre, Robinson says, but now, it’s “a crisis response to basic needs.” In response to the crisis, Belong Ottawa has expanded its hours at all three locations, she said.

Like Robinson, Suzanne Oboriah, executive director of the Somerset West Community Health Centre, says Ottawa is experiencing a crisis on multiple fronts: a toxic drug supply, inadequate housing and a lack of supportive housing, all of which put “a lot of pressure on individuals in our neighbourhood.”

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“Looking at ways in which we can offer community spaces is really important,” she said. “Newer members showing up in our community, looking for community spaces, looking for harm reduction services, be it clean gear, a safe place to use. They’re really looking for community connection.”

When asked if she believes the policing strategy is causing people to move from the ByWard Market to Centretown, Oboriah said people want to stay in spaces where they don’t feel immediately threatened.

“Many folks are gathering in spaces where they have existing relationships, can access services, and are known as safe places for them to gather,” she said, adding that “notwithstanding the number of folks in our community,” the root cause needs to be addressed: a lack of supportive housing and a need for a strategy that addresses the toxic drug crisis.

“It’s fair to say we are experiencing a crisis in the city of Ottawa,” she said. “Various pockets in the city are seeing more and more pressure, including west Centretown.”

On Aug. 15, a pilot project launched in Centretown, giving people an alternative to calling 9-1-1 in cases such as mental distress or substance use. The Alternate Neighbourhood Crisis Response, or ANCHOR, is a mobile crisis service that runs 24-7, providing a non-police response for people who are in crisis.

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Some advocates, though, caution the 2-1-1 program won’t be a magic bullet for the neighbourhood’s problems.

“It’s one support for individuals in crisis, but does not have the full capacity for follow up and support to solve this problem permanently, or in the long term,” Hurtubise says.

Troster, too, says the 2-1-1 line also won’t address issues like public drug use, which is “a problem, but not an emergency.”

Her neighbourhood needs something to address the “missing middle,” she says, between harmonious neighbourhood relationships, and a crisis. Centretown could have something similar to the ByWard Market’s block leader program, she said.

“I worry people’s compassion is fraying, because of the level of chaos,” she said. “It’s a lot to have to live with. It’s not fair to folks on the street, and it’s not fair to the folks whose kids are seeing people shooting up in front of them.”

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