FALL RIVER: HRM is dealing with the homeless situation the best they can given how out of their wheelhouse it is, said the councillor for Waverley-Fall River-Musquodoboit Valley.
Cathy Deagle Gammon answered questions on the contentious topic during a recent interview with The Laker News where we asked her about the housing and homeless situation, given what took place in August and what has transpired since then.
“August was a terrible event and I feel very bad for everything that happened that day, for everybody involved,” said Deagle Gammon. “As a councillor I thought that there was a plan and the plan fell apart. There were a lot of lessons learned.”
She said there have been a lot of upset people saying the ball is getting thrown back and forth between HRM and the province when it comes to dealing with the homeless situation.
“Homelessness and support for housing are a provincial mandate, it is so far out of our wheelhouse,” said Deagle Gammon. “We don’t have staff with that kind of expertise.
“I come from a non-profit background and the social services kind of atmosphere, and I know how complicated this all is. We’re trying to do the best that we can in collaboration with the province, with the service providers.
She said HRM wants people to be safe and dry.
“We don’t want people living in tents,” said Deagle Gammon with concern in her voice. “I don’t want to see somebody in a shelter that might get burnt down. That’s not dignified living either.
“We need to produce a better plan. Everybody knows that the plan that we thought was in place for hotels and shelters wasn’t there? Awful, never to be repeated.”
Deagle Gammon spoke of the modular units that were coming during the late November interview, saying some should have been ready by the end of December and go to a site in Dartmouth that is chosen, with the remainder going to a Halifax site. ‘
During the late November rain storms, she said she was thinking of the unhoused in HRM.
“I didn’t sleep thinking there was a storm coming and what’s going to happen to those people who were unhoused,” she said. “HRM made an emergency plan there as well.
“Ultimately it is the individual’s choice to accept or to not accept the offer that is made, and we have to always make sure that we respect people’s individual choices.”
She said she’s continuously nervous that the wrap around services required to sustain people, because a roof over your head is not enough, might not all be in place.
“When you are homeless, you’re homeless for a whole bunch of different reasons and the person on this side of the table and the person on the other side of the table, their reasons are different,” said Deagle Gammon. “The solutions to support them are vastly different as well, and so the service providers have a huge job.
“The three levels of government need to make sure that we are there to ensure they are resourced in the way that they can do their job. That’s what makes me nervous.
“Sometimes we don’t want people to over commit and under deliver. That’s what happened before. We can’t let that happen again.
“This is not our expertise, but I feel we’re doing our best.”
