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This year’s homeless count proves what we’ve been hearing for a year: That the influx of refugees and asylum seekers have taken a huge toll on Toronto’s shelter system.

The city’s recently released $250,000 Street Needs Assessment (SNA) — conducted the evening of April 26 and the fourth such survey since 2006 — showed that 2,618, or 40%, of the city-administered shelter spaces are occupied by refugees or asylum seekers.

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In fact, minus the tremendous influx of refugees, the actual number of homeless using city shelter spaces increased by about 600 since the last survey in 2013.

This contrasts to the 2,400 shelter/motel beds, 600 24-hour respite site spaces and 102 shelter beds added in the past year or two.

The city report indicates that the 2,400 shelter/motel beds (at $105 per night) have been added “primarily to respond to increased demand from refugee/asylum seekers.”

According to a city statement released at the same time as the SNA report, only 11% of shelter spaces were occupied by refugees in 2016. That jumped to 25% at the end of 2017.