17 Jun 2024 Council meeting Safety

Mayor’s Leaders’ Table Meeting Recommendations 2024-JUN-14

Motion
That Council direct Staff to refer the following recommendation from the Mayor’s Leaders’ Table to the Nanaimo Systems Planning Organization for consideration as part of their ongoing work on the implementation of the Nanaimo Health and Housing Action Plan. That Council: 1. Recognize that homelessness in Nanaimo is an existential crisis that must be addressed with a fulsome response 2. Formally endorse the concept that homelessness violates the principle of human dignity 3. Adopt Housing First Plus as the foundational element of a homelessness strategy 4. Create a purpose driven Housing First Plus position 5. Develop a robust plan to minimize the number of people at risk of homelessness
Sources
City vote record

Ben Geselbracht Yes

There's business leaders there, and this is such a critical issue for the community. And I think the housing first model is incredibly important, and it's something that's been baked into our OCP. It's been baked into the health and housing plan. When you think that five nights with bad sleep you have 50% greater chance of psychosis. And we've got hundreds of people on the streets just from the lack of sleep alone. Can create the mental health conditions. To continue to descend. You throw on an opioid addiction, you throw on the abuse living on the street. Housing is incredibly important, and I think that's been recognized in the past. Five years by this council, and we've got the systems planning organization. Now, that's tasked with implementing the health and housing action plan and working very hard. I just. Sat down today with. One of your recommendations was to have a shared access point for housing providers that enter the names and data of people so that everybody has that information, they come into contact. Well, that's happening right now. They're developing that system that's being implemented, and I think many of those recommendations in there are actually already happening in the community, and I think that with the. Support of the mayor's leader's leaders. Table to even put more focus on this issue is great. And so what I would like to do is move to refer the recommendations to the FBO for consideration as part of their ongoing work on the implementation of an animo.

Ian Thorpe Yes

For coming. We've heard you speak before. We appreciate. Your concern and your work in this area. I did want to make a comment, though, and basically ask a very simple question of you. You referenced Switzerland, and I think it was Finland. In your research countries, and you acknowledge that Nanaimo has been doing a pretty good job. To a certain level. But I think, as Councilor Manley just alluded to, we have to acknowledge that. The issues. Of housing and mental health and addictions is not a municipal function that we can solve it's. A provincial, if not national mandate. And you reference the pillars that this program stands on. And I know I made this comment to you once before. If we look at our provincial government and their philosophy as compared to the philosophy of, apparently, Switzerland, Treatment. I see minimal efforts being put towards that prevention. I see negligible efforts being put towards that right now and enforcement the same negligible.