Deachman: Ottawa’s community centres are no place to house refugees

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Often forgotten in the debate over building temporary tent-like “Sprung” structures to help ease Ottawa’s emergency shelter and housing crisis are the people most directly affected.

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I’m thinking in particular about two groups: those trying to carve better lives for themselves in a new country; and Ottawa residents who can no longer use their neighbourhood community centres because the buildings now house newcomers.

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The first group is most direly affected, and the living conditions endured by some — close to 200 people, almost all of them new immigrants or refugees, housed at the Heron Road Community Centre in Alta Vista, and 40 more at the Bernard Grandmâitre Arena in Vanier — are anything but enviable.

The two facilities have been used as respite and physical-distancing centres in the past, and more recently as shelters to house refugees and newcomers, since 2021 and 2020 respectively.

Imagine how you would feel if you were one of 68 people sleeping (and snoring, talking, coughing, mumbling, crying, etc.) on bunk beds in a small gymnasium, or among the 40 confined at night to a concrete ice-hockey pad, your clothes and possessions stowed in a tote box. Or if you were among the emergency overflow who arrive at one of these facilities nightly, hoping to secure a cot in a hallway. It’s reminiscent of some of the short-term emergency measures enacted to help those forced out of their homes by tornadoes and ice storms, except these people don’t have homes to return to, and many of them will be living this way for as long as six or eight months as they await permanent housing.

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Despite the best efforts of city staff, there is precious little dignity here: At the Heron Road Community Centre, for example, there are four women’s and five men’s showers, but because some of those washrooms are shared by clients of the Heron Emergency Food Centre also located in the building, the women’s showers are off-limits for portions of each day from Tuesday through Friday. On Fridays, for example, women can’t shower between 7 a.m. and 2 p.m.

Men and women, meanwhile, are segregated, a precaution no doubt of great comfort to those fleeing domestic violence, but one that possibly only adds to the stress experienced by couples unaccustomed to being apart.

There are additional issues that compound people’s discomfort. There’s little to no privacy, for example, no barriers between bunks. Additionally, because these are public buildings, regulations mean the sleeping areas cannot be fully darkened. A small thing, perhaps, but as someone who put a piece of black electrical tape over the blue power light of my bedside music player, it would certainly fall into the category of Reasons I Don’t Like It Here.

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Meanwhile, there are the neighbours in Alta Vista and Vanier, who have had to do without many of the amenities residents elsewhere take for granted. In the 3½ years since Heron was converted into a women’s personal distancing centre in June 2021, then into this temporary shelter for newcomers, residents have been without their community centre for all but about eight months. The gym, exercise and weight room, amphitheatre, meeting and classrooms are now closed to the public. For many, especially but not exclusively the seniors who rely on the centre for companionship and activities such as bridge clubs or pilates, the loss is deeply felt.

And it’s just one of the facilities that nearby residents have had to forfeit in recent years, either to COVID or to emergency sheltering. The nearby Jim Durrell Recreation Centre and Dempsey Community Centre have also been off-limits to the public for swaths of time since 2020, each for physical distancing during the pandemic.

Vanier, meanwhile, has been without the Grandmâitre arena for most of the last four years, currently because of the need to house the newcomers. For one of the city’s most economically disadvantaged and under-served neighbourhoods, it’s a significant sacrifice.

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“There aren’t a lot of parks or areas for community events or recreational activities to happen in Vanier,” said Heather Head, who lives a block from the rink. “There are a lot of kids living in this neighbourhood, and not having the arena takes away one of the few options for them.”

All of which brings us to the debate over the “Sprung” structures. Alta Vista Coun. Marty Carr says this new model for welcoming newcomers ensures that the services refugees need will be provided, while not inconveniencing residents by closing their municipal facilities.

“We don’t have enough to offer housing to every person who gets off the plane. We absolutely need to have this sort of structure in place to best serve the needs of newcomers,” she says.

Are temporary structures like the Sprung ones now planned for Kanata and Nepean the answer? They’ll certainly help get the commandeered recreational facilities like Heron and Grandmâitre back to those for whom they were intended, and will be better equipped to provide the various services that asylum-seekers need, such as assistance with claims, job searches or finding homes. They can also ease the pressure on shelters such as the Mission, which was intended for the homeless, but not necessarily for homeless newcomers.

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In September, the Mission released its annual impact report, which showed record levels of asylum seekers staying there. “In the summer of 2023, the number of asylum seekers arriving at our shelter increased significantly,” wrote CEO Peter Tilley. “By October, the number of refugees occupying our shelter beds was at an all-time high of 61 per cent.

“No one’s introduction to a new country and a new life should be a homeless shelter.”

Earlier this month, the city confirmed that about 750 refugees were living in shelters in Ottawa.

No one’s introduction to a new country and a new life should be a homeless shelter.

Tent-like or not, Sprung structures surely will provide at least a little more dignity than sleeping on a cot in a hockey rink that was built in 1967. I’ve written in support of Sprung structures in the past, and if the choice is between them and the status quo, Sprung makes sense.

“We don’t have the time or money for perfect,” says Knoxdale-Merivale Coun. Sean Devine, in whose ward one of the Sprung structures is to be built. “These structures are far from glorified tents, and they’re a much more dignified outcome for these people than what’s being portrayed.”

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But if the goal is to get newcomers into permanent housing, why not scale up the model used by organizations such as Matthew House Ottawa, for example?

Matthew House currently supports about 180 refugees in 20 communal transitional homes across Ottawa. According to its figures for the first nine months of 2023, the cost of housing a refugee in a communal home was about $930 per month, about one-third the cost of a traditional emergency shelter.

The $106-million, three-year proposal the city submitted to the federal government’s Interim Housing Assistance Program does include 20 transitional housing sites, as well as a permanent one at the former Maison Notre-Dame-de-la-Providence convent in Orléans.

Like Matthew House, the Alliance to End Homelessness Ottawa, which represents more than 75 agencies working in the housing and homelessness sector, has long touted the benefits of housing over shelters.

Whether the city opts for Sprung shelters or invests in even more transitional and permanent housing, it needs to act now, because the status quo cannot continue. Residents without community centres and rinks deserve to have those services returned, while those waiting for the promise of this country need to see their hopes realized.

bdeachman@postmedia.com

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