Community Hub opens to assist city's homeless

Article content

A new service being offered through the Saint John Out-of-the-Cold Shelter aims to provide some warmth to those who need it during the day.

In a media release issued Tuesday, the city stated a new daytime “Community Hub” has been opened “in response to the growing needs of our homeless community members.”

The hub operates at 344 Somerset St. and has been designed to work in partner with the 40-bed shelter “to provide a warm, safe, and welcoming environment for those in need to spend their days, reinforcing our commitment to support and uplift every member of our community,” the city’s media release stated.

The shelter and hub are operated by Outflow Ministry Inc. Outflow also operates a 30-bed men’s shelter on Waterloo Street.

Tony Dickinson, director of shelter and homeless ministries with Outflow, said the hub held a “soft opening” late last week and, so far, it’s seeing regular traffic as individuals access it and use the services it offers.

“It’s been growing. For the first couple of days, as expected, we didn’t see a whole lot of people, but the last couple of days we’ve seen more people staying behind as the word gets around,” he said. “We’ve been having some drop-ins throughout the day, so it’s growing, which is what we expected.”

Dickinson explained those who visit the hub have an opportunity to use its showers, get some snacks and water and staff are available should someone want to discuss “taking the next steps in their lives.”

While more services are planned to be added in the coming weeks, Dickinson said, the focus and impetus to get the hub up and running was to give people who are homeless a place to get out of the cold on winter days. While the shelter that operates in tandem with the hub will close once warmer weather arrives, the hub will operate throughout the year, he said.

“It will give people access to folks from social development around housing, our own housing team, mental health and addictions, health services… It will be an area where people can connect with the people they need to connect with to either help them get out of homelessness altogether or to at least make things more manageable until that can happen,” he said, noting they’re also partnering with Fresh Start Services, which will be providing some services in the hub.

Fast-tracked opening prompted by death

While the hub had been originally scheduled to open in April, it was announced last month by Social Development Minister Jill Green the centre would be opening sooner.

Green, in telling media of the decision to open earlier than initially planned, said the death of 44-year-old Peter “Evan” McArthur, a Saint John man who succumbed to burns he suffered in an encampment fire on Jan. 6, played a role in the decision to speed up the process.

McArthur’s mother, Heather, told Brunswick News seeing the hub open is encouraging but noted she feels there’s still not enough being done.

“It’s never too little, it’s not enough, but it’s never too little,” she said noting every agency and organization that provide assistance to the homeless is appreciated. “I do believe we’ve all got to get on the same page as a community because a lot of these services aren’t recognized by other services we have and they could all be working with a united purpose instead of individually.”

McArthur said she remains disappointed in the provincial government and what she said is its failure to recognize the needs of the homeless in Saint John. She said while the hub is a step forward, she would like members of the government to speak to homeless residents and hear from them, hear their stories and their suggestions.

“They’ve acknowledged there’s a need… but it took the death of my son to instigate a faster pace,” she said. “This (the hub) was in the works, and I applaud them for that, but something that’s in the works is not what we need, we need something that is working and that’s why we have all got to be on the same page.”

While she said she doesn’t have any clear answers on how to fix the homelessness issue, McArthur said she stressed she’s pleased the hub has now opened but is “so sad my son’s death was the motivating factor. Do we need to do more? We always need to do more, but maybe we need to do it in a different way.”