City of Hamilton Encampment Protocol

Despite having a comprehensive strategy with many effective interventions in place, the level of need for affordable housing and homelessness supports is exceeding available resources.

This challenge significantly worsened during the pandemic, when Hamilton’s coordinated system enabled community partners to come together to respond quickly to expand emergency programs. This response, which received generous provincial support, included expansion of drop-in programs, street outreach services, isolation centres, and shelter spaces from 341 pre-pandemic to more than 500 through the pandemic. Data from the Municipal Benchmarking Network Canada shows in 2020 and 2021 Hamilton invested more dollars and had more shelter beds per capita than other comparable communities.

In 2022, 4,037 individuals accessed homeless-serving programs funded by the City of Hamilton, of which 26% of people were experiencing chronic homelessness (those experiencing homelessness for more than a six-month period) and 27% were in significant need of health or social service supports. As of the end of December 2022, 1,536 individuals were considered to be actively homeless in Hamilton, up from 1,024 in 2020 before the pandemic and, as in other jurisdictions, this number is continuing to grow.

Another issue challenging Hamilton’s support systems is the rapid increase of housing costs and inflation which are creating significant affordability pressures, particularly without an increase in provincial social assistance rates. The result: the scarce supply of affordable housing in Hamilton is often not accessible to people with very low incomes as rents have outstripped social assistance support levels.

These challenges often disproportionally impact equity deserving groups. There is an acute need and opportunity to develop more targeted supports and to deepen coordination between health, housing and support for Hamilton’s Indigenous community to ensure the experience of those being assisted with housing and other supports is more seamless. The City is now focused on deepening its collaboration with health sector partners. The coordination and investment in the healthcare system and the housing sector require working together in closer cooperation in order to address these challenges.

Availability of Housing Supports and Municipal Resources

The City of Hamilton’s housing budget is $146 million in 2023, of which 51.6% was provided by the City, 26.5% by the provincial government, and 21.9% by the federal government. Over the past 10 years, the proportion of the support from senior levels of government has been falling as demands and needs have been rising. 28% of individuals accessing homelessness services also required health-related services, which is a provincial accountability and not in the City’s mandate to provide. In addition, health resources are limited in availability.

A Human Centered Approach to Homelessness

The City supports the ongoing investment in the construction of new housing to address the local and regional housing shortage, with an emphasis on addressing the need for affordable and supportive housing. Housing and supports for individuals with health and mental health challenges is the City’s single largest area of advocacy when speaking with the governments of Ontario and Canada. This is true as a priority for other municipalities, who face similar challenges. 

As the City advocates for higher levels of government to provide additional funds and programming to individuals in need of support, it is proposing to move from a strategy of actively discouraging encampment to providing a framework which would, subject to some provisions, allow encampments of limited sizes to be on public property.

The City appreciates encampments are not a solution to homelessness. The City also acknowledges that in the absence of available shelter for individuals living encamped, a situation that is occurring more frequently than in previous years, asking them to move without providing an alternate location for them is not supportive or fair.

The City’s encampment response needs to support and recognize immediate needs of unsheltered individuals until appropriate resources are available to house and support those experiencing homelessness in Hamilton.

The City is putting forward two strategies:

If sanctioned sites are approved, the protocol would serve as an alternative for unhoused residents who are unable or would not choose to live in a sanctioned site. If the City decides not to proceed with sanctioned sites, the protocol would serve as the primary guide as to how and where encampments can occur.

As a community, it is important that we have a response to encampments, as, encampments will continue to exist in Hamilton as well as other cities across Canada in the short-term until more housing is built and much needed investments in health and social services are made by the Provincial and Federal governments.

Municipalities cannot tackle this crisis alone. We will continue to advocate to senior governments for assistance. Until that help arrives, we need to consider approaches to supporting our fellow Hamiltonians without shelter in the short-term. When additional investments are secured, it will allow the City to engage in a more wholistic approach to housing, and supports, which will make the existence of encampments unnecessary.