Shelter soon will be less than a block away for people living in the Welcome Love tented city near Shallow Creek Park.

City councillors decided Tuesday night to turn the former police station at 180 Greenwich St. into a temporary winter shelter at a cost of $393,000. The shelter will be operated by Rosewood House, which already operates a shelter on Nelson Street.

Plans call for the new shelter to open Dec. 2 and remain open until April 30. It will accommodate up to 60 people with funding coming from the city’s social services contingency reserve fund.

“I think they did the best they could,” Ian Aitken, executive director of the Community Legal Clinic of Brant, Haldimand, Norfolk, said following council’s decision. “This is a much better location than the Beckett building.

“But it won’t address all of the issues faced by people living in the encampment.”

Aitken earlier spoke to councillors about the local affordable housing crisis, which has led to encampments at various locations throughout the city.

“I know everyone is shocked by the number of homeless people in our community,” Aitken told councillors. “We’ve noticed in the last couple of years that clients of the clinic, people on fixed incomes, are struggling to remain in homes they’ve lived in for years.

“I give a shoutout to the city for the work it has done but the community has reached a brick wall.”

There is no market housing, no emergency shelter, no place to go for those on fixed incomes who have been forced out of their homes, Aitken said.

“I’m unhappy to tell you that it’s likely to get worse,” Aitken said. “More people are likely to be forced out of their homes due to an increase in market rent.

“This crisis has become unmanageable.”

The situation became dire in October when homeless people looking for a warm overnight bed where turned away from Rosewood and the Salvation Army Booth Centre because both shelters were full.

Then, faced with unseasonably cold weather and a snow storm, city officials opened a temporary shelter at the Beckett Adult Leisure Centre at 219 Colborne St. City officials were planning to continue to use the centre over winter.

But Coun. Jan Vanderstelt suggested the former police station as a possible location and got immediate support from councillors John Sless and Rick Weaver.

“We had a building right next to the Welcome Love camp,” he said of the former police station. “And … it just seemed to be the right and respectful fit.”

Vanderstelt reminded councillors and those in the council chambers that there is always a solution no matter the problem faced. He and other councillors thanked staff for their work.

“We’re facing an unprecedented increase in homelessness and what we had planned won’t work and this is our reaction to that,” Weaver said “Originally, I liked the Beckett building, however, this new location has more room and is more suitable for storage for property in the basement level.

“People in the encampment have property, they want to keep it and we have an ability to safely store belongings in that facility.”

Coun. Richard Carpenter congratulated Mayor Kevin Davis for his leadership on the issue.

“We moved very quickly on this and this location makes perfect sense,” Carpenter said. “The tent city is right behind this location.”

Councillors were told that one of the reasons people from the Welcome Love encampment were reluctant to spend a night at the Beckett building is because they would have to leave their belongings at the encampment and risk losing them.

The former police station has storage lockers in the basement which makes it possible for people to store their belongings overnight. As well, there is enough space for segregate those in need of shelter by gender.

The former police station also has accessible washrooms and showers.

Davis praised city staff for reacting quickly to the problem.

“Our staff are committed to serving this community,” he said. “They’ve worked hard to make this possible.’

But Coun. Brian Van Tilborg noted the new shelter is a Band-Aid solution, while Coun. John Sless noted that the money for the shelter is coming from a reserve contingency fund.

“That money won’t be available next year so the question is where will the money come from then,” Sless said.

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