The Regional District of Central Kootenay will take a closer look at what role it can play in responding to rural homeless encampments.
During Thursday’s board of directors meeting, directors voted in favour of a recommendation directing staff to draft a report outlining potential response options related to rural encampments. The report will be brought back to the Rural Affairs Committee for discussion.
The recommendation follows concerns raised during the board’s May meeting by Electoral Area E Director Cheryl Graham about encampments in the Bealby and Horlick Point area near Nelson, which were also discussed during the June 17 Rural Affairs Committee meeting.
At the time, Graham described challenges related to sanitation, public safety, wildfire risk and overlapping jurisdictions.
On Thursday, Graham said the report would help directors better understand what options they have when residents bring concerns forward.
“As rural directors, residents come to us,” Graham said. “So having a report would be something that we have because we don’t have a city council. We don’t have anybody except for this board.”
She said it would give directors a clearer picture of how the district can respond to encampment-related issues and help support affected residents.
“It just would be helpful, I think, for all of us to get a clear understanding. This is really to help our residents who are dealing with these things directly.”
Electoral Area A Director Gary Jackman, who also sits on the Rural Affairs Committee, said the issue was discussed for more than an hour during the committee’s June 17 meeting.
According to committee minutes, the discussion focused on challenges related to affordable housing, support services, public safety, mental health and what some described as the downloading of provincial responsibilities onto local governments.
Castlegar Mayor Maria McFaddin, who does not serve on the committee, saidthe conversation needs to extend beyond encampments.
“This is a much bigger conversation over advocacy that we need to be having in our social system,” said McFaddin.
“As someone who’s been a part of that system for a very long time, it’s not working. What we’re doing is not working and we need to have a major overhaul of what we’re doing within that system that actually gets to the true solution.”
Directors approved the motion directing staff to prepare the report following comments from some members who said they would like more clarity around jurisdictional responsibilities, particularly when encampments are located on Crown land.
The committee will submit input to staff outlining topics and direction it would like included in the report.
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