Homelessness: Here's how the pedestrian mall in St. John's could be a catalyst for real change

This summer, the City of St. John's will transform a part of the downtown into a "pedestrian mall." The plan is also a critical opportunity for another kind of change.

The plan is to create a pedestrian-only walkway and allow businesses to add temporary extensions outside their storefronts. This will attract visitors to the downtown to help ailing businesses recover from Snowmageddon and COVID-related financial losses.

When foot traffic increases during the trial, the uncomfortable realities of homelessness will become more apparent.

The pedestrian mall could be a catalyst for the city, the business community and social services to consider proactive not reactive strategies to manage homelessness.

In recent years, the Downtown St. John's Business Improvement Area noted there has been a visible increase of people experiencing homelessness in the downtown.

According to a recent report by End Homelessness, there were 165 people experiencing homelessness in their point-in-time count (on April 11, 2018). The report cautioned that numbers were likely higher given the difficulty of measuring homelessness.

Strict bylaws don't work

As downtown spaces attempt to revitalize and draw customers to commercial corridors, local governments and business communities have traditionally relied on strict bylaws that criminalize behaviours associated with homelessness, such as loitering, panhandling and rough sleeping.

The assumption is that ticketing or arresting people for these behaviours will deter panhandling and create a hospitable environment for consumers.

Studies have overwhelmingly shown that a strict law enforcement approach creates a "revolving door" where people experiencing homelessness find themselves returning to the same if not worse conditions without sustained medical, psychological, or social support.

These punitive strategies only exacerbate homelessness and make life more difficult for marginalized populations.

There has been some recent discussions in St. John's about enacting these types of bylaws to deter aggressive panhandling.

Rather than relying on a reactive law enforcement approach to manage homelessness, the City of St. John's, downtown businesses, and the social service sector should consider some emerging proactive approaches to homelessness.

The business community in Toronto's downtown Yonge Street home to the tourist hotspot Dundas Square has been rethinking its approach to managing homelessness within their commercial boundary.

Under its new Safe and Inclusive Streets Strategy, Toronto's Downtown Yonge Business Improvement Area collaborates with a "mobile crisis intervention team,"where specially trained police officers work together with mental health nurses to respond to mental health crisis calls. The business association supplements this with its own "community engagement team," comprising employees who respond to calls from businesses dealing with people in mental health crisis.

The business association also partners with the Canadian Mental Health Association to offer regularworkshops to help business/property owners understand de-escalation methods and the complexities around homelessness and mental health.

The business association also distributes maps of downtown local social service drop-in centres and creates social media content to educate the community about panhandling and supervised injection sites.

Outside Canada, some business associations in Seattle and Washington, D.C., work with local social services to help connect the homeless to mental health services, work opportunities, and permanent housing.

These are just some recent examples of local governments, business associations, and social services working proactively to tackle homelessness. Not only do these strategies help people experiencing homelessness connect to much-needed supports that can transition them off of the streets, local businesses also benefit by reducing the number of panhandlers outside of their storefronts.

These ideas are not only applicable to large cities but can be implemented in other cities with similar local agencies. In fact, Toronto's strategy can be replicated in St. John's given that we have both a mobile crisis intervention team (operated by the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary and Eastern Health) as well as a local Canadian Mental Health Association.

Outreach workers can offer help

There appears to be local interest in supporting more proactive approaches to homelessness.

The Downtown St. John's Business Improvement Area has recently mentioned plans to hire outreach workers to help link people experiencing homelessness to local community services. There are some excellent local agencies that could use this support such as Stella's Circle, the Gathering Place and Choices for Youth, among others.

This is not to suggest homelessness can be solved by local collaboration alone.

Homelessness is a complex issue that requires larger discussions about affordable housing, funding for mental health services, and employment opportunities.

Traditionally, these types of downtown pedestrian transformations spark discussions about budget, design, functionality, and marketing practices of the plan.

But this summer's downtown pedestrian plans could be a critical opportunity for local stakeholders to discuss the uncomfortable realities of homeless and its proactive governance in downtown St. John's.

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