‘Alberta model should be the Canadian model’: Barrie mayor praises Alberta on how provinces handle homelessness

Barrie Mayor Alex Nuttall says the country should be following Alberta’s lead when it comes to rehabilitation.

Barrie Mayor Alex Nuttall returned from his trip to Alberta on Wednesday where he learned more about how the province and municipalities are handling the homelessness crisis.

Nuttall spoke to Calgary Mayor Jeromy Farkas and Provincial Minister of Mental Health and Addictions Rick Wilson and learned about various strategies Alberta uses and programs it has to help support those experiencing homelessness and mental health-related illnesses.

One of those programs includes installing 300 more beds to ensure people who can’t make the decision for themselves are able to get into rehabilitative services.

That’s a number that would almost triple if provided in Ontario.

“Alberta is about a third of our size and I would say that we would need 900 to 2,000 beds to match the ratios in terms of population and beds for rehab,” said Nuttall.

Nuttall added the country should be following Alberta’s lead when it comes to rehabilitation.

“I’ve been very clear over time where my heart sits on this in terms of mandatory rehabilitation,” said Nuttall. “The Alberta model should be the Canadian model is what I learned.”

Alberta has several programs available to those who need help including navigation centres, recovery communities and therapeutic living communities that are found in jails across Alberta, something Nuttall took a keen interest in.

“They’re moving from being prisoners to being patients and in one of their prisons they’ve removed any locks on any of the cell doors, because the rehabilitative services, the counselling, the support services inside of the prison are functioning,” said Nuttall. “I think for us as a lesson it is truly a case where they’ve taken the idea of the judicial system being for reform of the individual and put it into practice rather than a place you go to put them in timeout for a couple of years.”

While the talk with Wilson was positive, Nuttall was also in Calgary speaking with Farkas about the city’s encampment situation.

While Barrie has removed encampments, Calgary is still struggling to remove theirs, but has incorporated strategies trying to put those experiencing homelessness into support systems.

“They still provide tickets to those who are breaking bylaws and are homeless. Then they use those tickets to create a separate court to try to divert the individuals into addiction support,” said Nuttall. “What I learned there was let’s find as many touch points as we can to help people move into getting their life on track.”

Nuttall was also joined by Fire Chief Kevin White who spoke with Calgary Emergency Services on how emergency personnel respond to crisis calls.

“It was great to talk to their fire management team about issues that we have in common even though we’re a smaller department compared to Calgary’s department,” said White. “It was great to see how they handle some issues, like responding to the opioid crisis and such things that are happening in our city now.”

Nuttall is defending his trip calling it an important one to help solve the growing homelessness crisis in Ontario.

“If we can bring back to Ontario what is now actually providing positive results in Alberta, it’s going to take time and effort,” said Nuttall. “It’s going to take connection and it’s going to take working together in terms of cooperation and collaboration to make that happen.”

Nuttall plans to have a conversation with Associate Minister of Mental Health and Addictions Vijay Thanigasalam soon and is hopeful the federal government will come to the table as well, something that Ontario Big City Mayors has been talking about since last year.