These shelter residents in Hamilton among those who have already cast a ballot in municipal election

As many Hamiltonians head to the polls Monday, some residents have already voted, including Kathy Rogers, who lives at Carole Anne's Place, the women's shelter run by the YWCA in downtown Hamilton.

The city held three pop-up polling stations at shelters and day centres Friday, where Rogers, 59,voted for the second time in her life.

"I wasn't gonna vote, but yeah,there has to be a change here. Big time. I'm living in a homeless area," shesaid.

Rogers said housing was her main consideration whenvoting. She wants more accessible housing and fewer condos, she said.

In 2019, Elections Canada changed itsID policiesto make it possible for peoplewithout a fixed address to vote by usingthe address of a shelter, day centre or soup kitchen. (Voters at the polling stations across the cityMonday can also cast a ballot without a permanent address or ID in a similar fashion.)

In addition to Carole Anne's Place, Wesley Urban Ministries's downtown drop-inday centreand Mission Service's women's shelterWillow's Placealsohosted polling stations.

Many of the hot-button issues in this year's municipal election impact residents living in shelters and outdoors, such as affordable housing, the strain on Hamilton's shelter system, and the response to theopioid crisis.

A group monitoringmortality rates within the homelesspopulation in Hamilton reported recently thatbetween December2021 andMay 2022 at least 10people experiencing homelessnessdied. Out of those, eight people died of an overdose andseven out of the 10 werepeople staying in ashelter.

As the pop-up polling stations were underwayFriday, the Canadian Drug Policy Coalition reminded candidatesof the recommendations they made earlier this year for harm reduction measuresin shelters.

These recommendations includeda call for"transparency across all shelter systems in relation to service restrictions," the need to"focus on behaviour and not drug use,"and to "build trust between staff and service users."

Rogers' personal support worker, Renee Baldachino, said the shelter system in Hamilton is broken and housing costs are unaffordable.Baldachinoalso said she doesn't vote.

"I don't vote for a simple fact that they ended up electing people that don't affect change. And Hamilton needs a lot of change. We need to get people off the street," she said.

'They really are part of the community'

Carole Anne's Placeresident JamyPierre sees voting as a chance to have a say."Voting is essential to me just to share my voice and have a chance at decision making and being a part of the democracy," she said.

Pierre said she has had trouble voting in the pastbecause she didn't have proper ID. This year, she was able to vote in the cafe in the YWCA.

ViolettaNikolskaya, senior program analyst for the YWCA, saidthe amount of residents voting on Friday was higher than expected.

"We saw 20 per centof the folks that we serve come out to vote, which blew us away," she said.

Nikolskaya said for some of the long-term residents, Ward 2, where the shelter is based, is their home.

"[Voting]gives people an opportunity to be recognized as a resident of this ward, because for some of our residents, they've been here for a year and they really are part of the community."

Not allresidents aware of initiative

At Wesley Urban Ministries's day centre on Rebecca Street, case managerMonica Petrauskasspoke positively about the city initiative.

"It reaches a very marginalized part of the population and it allows a democracy across the region, right? It really gives everybody the right to vote," she said.

While visitors to the day centre had access to the polling station, none of the visitors CBC Hamilton spoke to were aware of it set up inside of the centre, and many were apathetic at the idea of voting.

At least one person, who said they had been living in their vehicle for six years, said they thought they were unable to vote because of a lack of fixed address but would do so this year.

When asked about promotional efforts to spread word about the polling stations, the city said it was up to the individual facilities to do so.

"All centres were provided city resources/elections promotional materials to use and the centres did the outreach,"Andrea Holland, the city of Hamilton's city clerk, told CBC Hamilton in an email.

• Find all CBC Hamilton'selection coverage here.