Committee endorses declaring ‘humanitarian crisis’ on homelessness

“This city cannot do this work alone,” Mayor Ken Boshcoff told the quality of life standing committee on Tuesday.

The committee unanimously endorsed administration’s recommendation to declare a humanitarian crisis on homelessness in Thunder Bay. The recommendation will go to city council in March.

“I look forward to working with Indigenous partners, service providers and other orders of government on concrete collaborative actions for our community and our neighbouring region. We are moving forward and our action will reflect our sincere response,” Boshcoff said.

Boshcoff met with Chief Michele Solomon of Anemki Wajiw (Fort William First Nation) and Nishnawbe Aski Nation Grand Chief Alvin Fiddler to discuss the loss of life in the city’s homeless population after Solomon and Fiddler sent a letter to Boshcoff, urging the city to declare a state of emergency on Feb 3.

The leaders left the meeting saying they are committed to working together on the homelessness crisis.

Coun. Greg Johnsen asked city administration what declaring the humanitarian crisis would do for the city.

A declaration would formalize a collaborative partnership with First Nations partners, as well as the District of Thunder Bay Social Services Administration Board, Cynthia Olsen, the city’s director of strategy and engagement, told the committee.

“It allows for a unified opportunity for us to collectively look at system change within the community. It allows us an opportunity to have multiple voices for advocacy for various, additional multi-ministerial support that communities require to address this complex issue,” Olsen said.

She said it would also allow administration to bring forward reports or recommendations to council that align with the declaration of the crisis in the community.

City manager John Collin added that council has already seen the administrative work in progress after council declared a climate emergency five years ago.

“By declaring that, it then focused council and administration on dealing with issues associated with climate change. It allowed the community to come together with a particular focus moving forward. It has resulted in some very concrete, both short-term and long-term initiatives to deal with climate change. I would suggest respectfully, again, and I stress the two situations are not at all the same, but the principle is the same with a resolution from council saying that this is a humanitarian crisis,” he said.

Coun. Kristen Oliver said she appreciated the recommendation because it will look at the “systemic barriers” that go beyond homelessness in the community.

“It gives us this opportunity to look at this in a broader lens and to acknowledge there’s a significant work that needs to be done by both the provincial and federal governments, especially on support on the healthcare side,” Oliver said. “When you look at the point in time counts, and the contributing factor to a lot of homelessness is mental health and addictions, both of which are lacking the resources and support that people living in crisis desperately need.” – tbnewswatch.com

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Thee question that is not being asked of our elected and non-elected residents of City Hall and the various FNs is are they prepared to support an infinite number of ‘unhoused/addicted/mentally-ill’ people for the rest of their lives all the while supporting the thousands of people that presently or will in the future lose their jobs?

This is important because as well all know, once this money tap is opened and all of that sweet, sweet taxpayer dollars start to flow out, it can’t ne turned off.  Why not? For the very reason that the elected and non-elected residents of City Hall want the tap installed and opened in the first place.

Is there an upper limit to this outflow of sweet, sweet taxpayer cash?   Will anyone say STOP!   Of course not.

There is a limit on how many non-working people the taxpayers can afford to support.  Its a simple math equation.  For some reason, no expert or group of experts have come up with this number.

What percentage of the population can be 100% financially supported by the rest of the population before things collapse?

What government services or programs are you willing toto have cut in order to pay to support ‘the unhoused/addicted/mentally-ill’ people for the rest of their lives?  That money has to come from somewhere?  Pay mor in taxes?  Add more government debt?

There is only one taxpayer.  It does not matter whether we are talking Municipal, Provincial or Federal. That taxpayer is you.

Right now, Federal and Provincial governments are operating on credit.  Maxing out that Visa and Mastercard plastic.

Government debt in Ontario and Canada combined, as of right now, is around 1.8 trillion dollars.  That is a level of debt that can never be repaid.

The combined annual interest payments Canada and Ontario taxpayer are paying, as of right now,  is around 60 billion dollars.

THAT level of debt is what ids causing inflation.  That’s it.   Your governments are causing inflation and nobody cares.

Sooo, every time a government runs a deficit budget, prices go up.