“I think we look, collectively, like a bunch of morons,” said Ward 3 Coun. Andrew Stevens of council’s slim majority vote to reject the proposed permanent shelter site.
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Two city councillors who represent Regina’s core neighbourhoods say the rejection of a proposed location for a permanent homeless shelter is more about politics than progress.
“I think we look, collectively, like a bunch of morons,” said Coun. Andrew Stevens (Ward 3), after Wednesday’s lengthy city council meeting. “We went nowhere in seven hours (of debate) because I think some folks wanted to save face.”
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Five councillors along with Mayor Sandra Masters voted against a proposed site for a the long-term emergency shelter on Albert Street, instead directing administration to keep searching.
The drawn-out debate centred on whether city staff had exhausted all options before asking council to approve $7.5 million in tri-government funding to invest into real estate. City administration has looked at 35 properties since 2021 in search of the right space, which it believed it had found.
“It was plain to me that saying, ‘let’s just look for another location’ was a diversionary tactic,” said Coun. Dan LeBlanc (Ward 6).
Couns. Cheryl Stadnichuk (Ward 1), Terina Nelson (Ward 7), Shanon Zachidniak (Ward 8), Stevens and LeBlanc said the fact that the lease for a temporary shelter run out of The Nest Health Centre is set to expire next summer was enough to support the spend.
While Coun. Lori Bresciani (Ward 4) argued a better location or investment approach may still be out there. Couns. Bob Hawkins (Ward 2), John Findura (Ward 5), Jason Mancinelli (Ward 9), Landon Mohl (Ward 10) and Masters agreed.
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“I don’t buy it,” said Stevens Wednesday.
He questioned whether motives were “genuine,” considering several colleagues had previously voiced reservations about the city “being in the business of owning a shelter.”
“I don’t think it was really … about finding a better location or revising the process,” Stevens said. “All of the information that was required for us to make a good decision was before us (and) they just didn’t want this to happen.”
LeBlanc called it “a dramatic and cowardly retreat from past commitments” made by this council, and said it’s likely to result in a downloading of the site selection onto a new council elected this fall.
“Every time a symbolic opportunity arises for us to say ‘thoughts and prayers,’ we will take that. And every time the rubber hits the road on an actual decision, a majority of this council is missing in action,” he said.
City council unanimously endorsed a motion to fully fund a plan to end homelessness in June 2022, but the promised line item was excluded from the operating budget that fall, causing anger and confusion among some councillors and members of the public.
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The same six members that voted against declaring a state of emergency on homelessness in Regina this past September, were the ones who opposed the Albert Street site endorsed by city administration this week.
“There is an unjustifiable patience with other people’s suffering,” LeBlanc said. “That’s the heart of it. It’s not a political priority.”
The vote suggests some members of city council “have abandoned the city core,” he added.
“The people who represent the wards where physiotherapists have to administer Naloxone to people on their steps understand this stuff and vote in favour of systemic responses, and the people who don’t, don’t, and that’s really troubling.”
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Masters emphatically rejected any claim that the city has not taken the need for a solution to homelessness seriously.
“The visual may be something which creates an opinion, but it is not reality,” said Master after the meeting Wednesday. “I am tired of this notion that we haven’t been in this game when we have been, more than any other municipality in this province.”
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The City of Regina has spent $10 million since 2021 on supportive or affordable housing, mobile crisis services and emergency responses, she said. About $3 million has gone to temporary shelters, a warming bus and funding for a warming centre at Carmichael Outreach.
“I would challenge you to go to any other city, on a per-capita basis, and find that kind of investment,” Masters said.
Stevens is not seeking re-election, but LeBlanc said he will run again on Nov. 13 to ensure his “voice is at the table, at least in the election” on this issue for downtown constituents.
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