Les Bellamy heard an explosion last night and saw this fire below his downtown Kelowna home where homeless people were camped.

Image Credit: Facebook/Les Ballamy

When Les Bellamy heard an explosion late Sunday evening he looked out the window of his downtown Kelowna home to see a fire amongst some shopping carts next to the Kelowna Library.

Firefighters were quickly on the scene and no one seemed to have been hurt but it’s a sign of an increasing number of people sleeping rough on Kelowna streets.

“We’ve noticed, especially in the last three weeks, there’s been a lot of outside shelters being put up,” Bellamy told iNFOnews.ca. “They’re getting insulated tarps that we often use on construction sites – and, with all the commercial construction going on downtown, there’s lots of those tarps around – so they’re setting those tarps up with shopping carts.”

His observations about the increasing numbers are bang on, Darren Caul, the City of Kelowna’s community safety director, said.

“The number of people experiencing homelessness just continues to grow,” Caul said. “We have seen an increase in the capacity of emergency shelter beds this winter and the sum total of the number of beds available in the city simply isn’t matching the need.”

That’s not through a lack of trying. The city, Journey Home and B.C. Housing have been working hard since last spring to find more shelter spaces but with little success.

While the target was to increase capacity by 30%, only about 10 more beds have been added.

READ MORE: Kelowna's emergency shelter spaces to grow by 30%

“Some think it’s just finding physical bricks and mortar but it’s finding the right bricks and mortar in a suitable location, and then finding suitable operators and ensuring we have the capacity to provide the necessary supports and structure required when you open up such a site,” Caul said. “There are a lot of puzzle pieces that need to align before B.C. Housing is in a position to open up and announce another emergency shelter site."

The city does provide a designated overnight camping site for the homeless near Richter Street and the Rail Trail in the North End of downtown.

Ten to 15 people camp there on any given night. It could take about 50.

City bylaw officers do a daily count and are finding anywhere from 30 to 75 people sleeping rough in the downtown and North End areas of the city on any given night.

The city doesn’t have the resources to do similar counts in other areas of the city, although it patrols the Rail Trail on a regular basis.

Caul pointed out that the city has to provide space for people to camp if there is not enough indoor accommodation. Those who camp at the city site have some security, running water and washrooms but many choose not to go there.

For some, it might just be too long a walk, Caul said. For others, they may not like to have to take their tents down every morning.

That doesn’t mean they have any permanence in other parts of downtown. Bylaw officers or police will often force rough campers to move on, Caul said.

“Often it’s a case where the police may be checking on a person’s welfare to ensure they are safe and well,” he said. “As we head into the temperatures that we are now experiencing, the shift in focus is increasingly to the safety and welfare of those who are sheltering outdoors around our community.”

While there have been a few people who seem to have moved in recently from Merritt after it was evacuated because of flooding, that’s not a significant number, Caul said. Some on the streets have lived in Kelowna all their lives. The population is transient so it’s hard to determine where they’re from or what their needs might be.

Some of those sleeping rough have multiple, or complex, issues like mental health and addictions. That’s not new.

“My perception has been, we have always had a percentage of the unhoused population who present complex needs,” Caul said. “At the same time we know, the longer people are sheltering outdoors their needs and their risks increase. And we do have some people who have been sheltering outdoors for an extended period of time.

“We also know the opioid crisis continues to escalate. And all the strains and stresses of natural disasters and COVID and smoke and fire and just that exposure for extended periods to the elements that accompanies living on the streets, all those have a cumulative effect on individuals.”

Temperatures are expected to drop as low as -6 C overnight tonight and -5 C later in the week.

READ MORE: Mayor, attorney general 'shocked' by assault near proposed Kamloops homeless shelter

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