After homeless taxied to Victoria, mayor says neighbours need to ‘start doing your part’

Victoria’s politician is challenging the city’s neighbouring municipalities to “start doing your part” to structure the region’s homeless.

On Thursday, Victoria metropolis assembly heard from unit that immoderate different municipalities successful the portion person been putting stateless radical successful taxis and sending them to the metropolis to entree utmost upwind shelters.

“We were provided with receipts from cab drivers who were conveying individuals who were intelligibly susceptible and successful request of immoderate enactment successful exigency situations into the metropolis from different jurisdictions,” Victoria Mayor Marianne Alto said, adding the metropolis paid the fares truthful arsenic not to “stiff the cab drivers.”

Council responded by passing a question to person Alto constitute to the Capital Regional District asking for much regionwide structure spaces and to constitute straight to neighbouring Saanich to inquire it to bash more.

Alto said Saanich was singled retired due to the fact that it is some geographically larger and much populous than Victoria, but is location to conscionable 25 full-time structure spaces, portion Victoria hosts 350. Victoria is location to astatine slightest 80 per cent of the structure spaces regionwide.

“We recognize that we are the halfway city, we recognize that we location a important magnitude of the services that are important for susceptible folks, and due to the fact that of that, we recognize we besides get a important fig of people,” Alto told Global News.

“Our statement is that an atrocious batch of those radical are not really from Victoria — and it isn’t that they are from acold away, they are really from precise adjacent and if they had the accidental to person those services, exigency and non-emergency, they would alternatively enactment home.”

Saanich Mayor Dean Murdock said helium was gladsome Victoria was initiating the conversation, but wouldn’t perpetrate to straight adding caller structure spaces successful his city.

Murdock said Saanich is blessed to spouse connected solutions, but that enactment connected homelessness indispensable beryllium astatine the determination level.

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“What is wide is that we nary longer person capable numbers of spaces to conscionable the need, and we person to attack this arsenic a region. We each person a relation to play successful creating these spaces,” helium said.

Murdock suggested enactment to grow structure spaces passim the portion beryllium spearheaded done the Capital Regional Housing Corporation, which helium said had the mandate and resources to bash the work.

“That’s the spot we person the speech truthful we are not tripping implicit each other, we are not duplicating efforts, we are not each going to elder governments to say, ‘We request assets enactment for this,'” helium said. “This has to beryllium a coordinated response.”

He added that galore section governments don’t person the staffing oregon the expertise to present caller structure spaces.

Victoria, however, is calling connected its neighbours to instrumentality contiguous action, peculiarly with wintertime coming.

“Every municipality has a abstraction wherever they could look astatine temporarily providing structure and immoderate enactment for adjacent a twelve people,” Alto said.

“You’d instrumentality a important strain disconnected the city. And much importantly, you’d beryllium capable to enactment and structure your ain radical who privation to beryllium home. ”

Victoria’s exigency programme coordinator says nary different municipalities successful the Capital Regional District presently person plans to unfastened warming centres this winter.