City council received a standing ovation Monday night from a full gallery after the David Busby Centre was granted $200,000 in funding to help finish their new 24/7 facility on Mulcaster Street and get it open for the winter.
Prior to the direct motion for funding being approved, Busby Centre executive director Sara Peddle made a presentation to council about the state of homelessness in the city and how the new facility, located at 88 Mulcaster St., is coming along.
"We need to get the doors open, because we have cold nights ahead of us," she said, adding they are operating temporarily out of St. Andrew's church during the day and Collier Street United in the evening after bouncing around much of the year.
The new Mulcaster centre is nearing the end of renovations at a cost of $920,000. They've managed to raise $520,000 toward the project, and were asking the city for $200,000 in hopes of matching funding from other levels of government.
Peddle said a similar request will be made to Simcoe County. Community fundraising also continues. She called it a "healthy recipe" for community and government to come together.
Simcoe County has also provided $80,000 for operating costs in 2019.
"The county has really been instrumental in our making sure that our operations are sustainable for when we get back into the centre," Peddle said.
She suspects that could happen in the matter of a week or so.
The Mulcaster Street renovations double the current space available from 3,000 to 6,000 square feet and will also include emergency group lodging, formerly offered by the Out of the Cold program, as well as better kitchen facilities, space for health care, counselling and housing support.
"The reason our project is so important is because we're currently in an affordable-housing and homelessness crisis as we speak," said Peddle, noting a local homeless count in April found 305 people in Barrie experiencing homelessness.
Mayor Jeff Lehman said even if a person's only complaint against funding the project, "it's still the right thing to do, to support projects like this one," while also commending all of the work done by the staff and volunteers and the Busby Centre.
"It is very difficult for me to even imagine our city trying to function without the services of the Busby Centre," Lehman said. "I see this as one of those big steps forward. It's just a little too far to make the jump right now, and we can help them do that."
The new centre will also use the ‘Housing First’ approach, which aims to end homelessness by quickly moving people into independent and permanent housing, followed by providing additional supports and services as needed.
In the past, the Out of the Cold program, which has since dissolved, was operating out of rotating church basements, but the new centre will be a full-time facility dedicated to the city's marginalized population. Out of the Cold's emergency lodging program was taken over by the Busby Centre.
In October 2014, the Mulcaster Street properties were purchased by the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) to support the Pathways vision. David Busby Street Centre moved into the building as part of phase one following a renovation project. Phase two included branching out into the rest of the building, with construction beginning this past June.
BUSBY BACKGROUND
The David Busby Centre has been operating in Barrie for 25 years, opening its doors March 1, 1993 under the name of ‘Barrie Street Centre’.
Founder Mandy Hilliard spent more than two years visiting over 70 churches, businesses, service providers, health-care professionals and community members, asking them if there were homeless people in the county who could be helped.
On the first day the centre opened, one person came. Then it was three people on the second day and five on the third.
It continued to grow.
In November 1994, it was renamed to honour the work of Rev. Canon David Busby, whose passion was helping the less fortunate. He had recently retired from Trinity Anglican Church, which was the centre's home, and had been an inspirational figure for Hilliard.
Nine days after signing the legal papers to allow the centre to carry his name, Busby died in an airplane crash in the Grenadine Islands.
By 1995, the centre was seeing up to 9,000 visits per year and evolved far beyond just a drop-in centre. More social and medical supports were added.
In 1997, the centre had 13,000 visits per year. They also launched their Street Outreach Program, which continues to this day. Two years later, a needle exchange program was developed.
Last year, the centre's running tally included 19,520 visits, almost 9,400 breakfasts served, 3,100 showers and more than 500 people sheltered.
The centre describes homelessness as "the situation of an individual, family or community without stable, safe, permanent, appropriate housing, or the immediate prospect, means and ability of acquiring it."
For more information on the David Busby Centre, click here.
The David Busby Centre is an active member in the Simcoe County Alliance to End Homelessness (SCATEH), which includes 70 partners across Simcoe County.
For more information, visit the Simcoe County Alliance to End Homelessness at www.scateh.com.