Amid the deep freeze, the city bus houses only a few homeless people

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The city will continue to use a bus for the overcrowding from a winter homeless shelter this weekend as the bitter weather sharpens the focus on Londoners rooted in poverty.

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Eighteen homeless people spent Thursday night on a bus, and city officials said the bus will be available Friday afternoon from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. every weekend through Monday morning.

The 40-bed winter shelter in First-St. Andrew’s United Church at 350 Queens Ave. has been packed since it opened in December, trying to find different spots for a handful of people each night, its director says.

But by Thursday night, so many people were looking for help that the city sent a bus and let him run outside all night, the shelter’s director, Sarah Campbell, said Friday.

The First St. Andrew’s overnight winter accommodation has provided beds for 223 different people since opening, suggesting that around 180 people are looking outside for a different place to sleep each night.

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Campbell is urging City Hall to find a better solution than a bus and urging volunteers to help as staff continue to get COVID-19 symptoms and call in sick.

“The bus worked. But that’s not a solution,” she said. “We have this extremely cold weather. It’s literally a matter of life and death. People die at these temperatures.”

Campbell credited City Hall for moving quickly Thursday and arranging a bus within six hours.

“Good on us, we’ve done something. But how do we know that there are cold weather warnings every winter and that we had to come up with a six-hour fix?” she said. “We need more space. If we can find a bigger space to move to, I hope to make that move by Monday.”

The Middlesex-London Health Unit issued a cold weather alert on Thursday – the second in less than a week – and later on Friday that alert was extended to Monday morning.

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The Overnight Church is part of City Hall’s winter response to homelessness. The center branch of the YMCA offers day housing, also managed by Campbell and her team.

In addition to the 40 emergency beds at the core, the city has established a 30-bed emergency shelter at Fanshawe Golf Course, but only for people who are already close to qualifying for shelter, not those with the most severe addiction, mental health and medical challenges to live on the street. A second 30-bed tribal shelter on the grounds of Parkwood Hospital sleeps 20 people.

Homeless advocates estimate that up to 300 people are still sleeping in tents, doors and abandoned buildings this winter. This anecdotal evidence appears to be corroborated by information gathered by Campbell at the church home, which suggests nearly 200 people are exposed to the cold each night.

“That would suggest it to me. They’re somewhere,” said Campbell, also executive director of the Ark Aid Street Mission.

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Campbell thanked Londoners for already helping with the winter shelters, saying each day St Andrew’s Church members made up the beds for the next night, left encouraging notes and helped with the breakfast packs for the YMCA day shelter.

“I need our community to get back up,” she said. “If you have extra coats, boots, gloves, etc. please donate them to one of the many places people can access these items.”

The shelter could also use overnight volunteers to help get and deliver nighttime coffee and snacks, or just sit and provide a sense of security. “People feel safe when someone is there and just watching so their stuff doesn’t get stolen,” Campbell said.

Anyone interested in helping can email [email protected].

Amid the scramble for immediate solutions, Campbell said she wonders what it will take for London to tackle a growing homelessness problem.

“I’m getting discouraged right now. We have been in a pandemic for almost two years. And we know that winter comes every year,” she said. “More people fall into deep poverty, more people become homeless, more people suffer.”

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