Low Barriers, Low Standards
How (not) to take care of people
Low barrier shelters were recently the topic of some controversy in Maple Ridge. The provincial government was in the process of buying an unused hotel and transforming it into a low barrier shelter for homeless people in the area. On the surface this sounds nice—but what low barrier means is that addicts would be allowed to stay and use drugs on the premises. Instead, they shifted their attention away from buying the Quality Inn and are instead putting $15-million towards a permanent facility.
An issue surrounding the low barrier shelter was that it enabled addicts to continue their habit without any sort of conditions, or even offering help. If the shelter provided people a way to get clean, then it could be a clinic and shelter, which would lessen the impact it would have on the community, as well as helping people get over an addiction.
The announcement followed a 2012 decision to shut down Riverview hospital, which housed a significant portion of the homeless population who would be living in the proposed shelter. So instead of continuing to treat these people in a hospital, the government has chosen to leave them on the streets for four years, untreated, then put them up in a hotel and allow them to continue their destructive habits without giving them any resources to help them on a road to recovery.
The hotel was going to cost B.C. Housing $5.5-million. To put that into perspective, they could put 561 people into rehab programs for the same cost, and that isn’t even factoring in the upkeep costs for the shelter. Instead of combining shelter with treatment, people are only being given a roof over their head. That does not look like a sound investment.
B.C. Housing’s plan for the low barrier shelter had the potential to put so much in jeopardy. The people using the shelter would have been exposed to drugs if they weren’t already using them. The addicts would have been regularly using in the area, not confined to the building while high. The community would’ve had to shoulder the burden of dealing with addicts in a small area, and the residents would have suffered from lower housing prices due to their vicinity to the shelter.
Neighbourhoods close to shelters become more dangerous because of the potential for needles being discarded in the area, any amount of addicts wandering the streets, and more. That’s enough reason to want to keep children away. Finding an addict passed out on the street would be rough for a kid, and finding a used needle could be even worse.
So no, there might not have been any widespread disaster, but the shelter would have made it harder for Maple Ridge families to create a fun place in the community where kids can be kids. Where parents don’t need to worry about what they’ll find on the street, or who they’ll find on the street. There’s enough to scare people these days anyways, we shouldn’t add something else to an otherwise peaceful neighbourhood.
