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There’s been a visible increase of suspected homeless people hanging around the streets of Rutland since Kelowna’s only “welfare” office relocated there.

Daily counts of the number of people sheltering outdoors show that the number seen in Rutland is around 25 a day, compared to 10 at around the same time last year.

Despite the increase, the head of Rutland’s business association wants talk about Rutland to turn more positive.

“I think that they (residents) are just raw right now because of the lack of transparency when that office went in,” Nancy Wells, president of the Uptown Rutland Business Association, told iNFOnews.ca. “The building is not going to go away. We’re not going to cure homelessness by just being on the negative side of things. I think everybody has to step up and see how, together as a group, we can do what we can do.”

The Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction office moved from Dilworth Drive to Highway 33 near Dougall Road in April and residents started complaining about an increase in street people and open drug use shortly thereafter.

READ MORE: Rutland residents fear downtown Kelowna’s problems are being dumped on them

Rutland resident Cody Shannon has contacted every politician he can think of trying to get answers to what they are doing about the increasing problems and only gets told they're talking.

"You had the problems on Dilworth," he told iNFonews.ca. "You guys all knew what the problems were on Dilworth. There’s a reason the owner did not lease the building to the provincial government again and what’s being done about it. Is there an increased police presence? Is there increased bylaw presence? Are we dealing with the open drug use?"

Shannon has not been threatened himself but he worries more about the safety of his family.

"I'm smart enough to keep my distance but I’d love to hear the stories about why we need two cops hanging around the welfare office," he said. "It’s not me I’m worried about. I won’t let my son bike with his cell phone to get a slurpee because he’ll get jumped."

While it is true that the number of people sleeping rough in Rutland has increased over last year, the increase is not dissimilar to what’s happening in the rest of the city.

“The number of people sheltering outdoors across the city has increased to roughly 250 people, compared to about 100 people in January 2022,” the City of Kelowna said in an email to iNFOnews.ca. “In Rutland, the numbers have increased to about 25 people, up from 10 in January.”

City bylaw officers go out early each morning and do a count of people who have been sleeping outdoors every night.

Darren Caul, the city’s community safety director, recently told a Chamber of Commerce breakfast that the 250 count is likely a conservative number.

He also said only 9% of the people going to the social services office are unhoused.

“It was hard to tell when they first opened because there were a lot of new people coming in to pick up cheques and take part in the services that they offer there,” Wells, who was at the breakfast meeting, said. “For the first while we did see quite a bit of change but it’s very hard for us to tell who is homeless, who isn’t homeless.”

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Given that, she can’t dispute the numbers the city provided.

Wells attributes the sharp rise in concern from residents and businesses to the fact that no one knew the office was relocating there. She only found out when a staff member from the association stopped by during the construction phase to ask about it.

“We know this is not going to go away,” Wells said. “How do we, as an organization, support our business and help them? How to we still continuously support new development for new people wanting to come into this area? We still maintain that in Rutland, we really, in general, are quite safe.”

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