Vancouver Park Board holds meeting citing safety concerns around homeless in warming centres

The Vancouver Park Board called a special public meeting Thursday night to address safety concerns surrounding warming centres for the homeless that have been set up in community centres.

On Tuesday, the warming centre at Creekside Community Centre was closed after a child picked up a needle in a washroom. 

The city said the closure of the centre was unrelated to the incident. 

In a release, NPA Park Board commissioner Sarah Kirby-Yung said "we appreciate the need to provide additional cold weather shelter relief for those in need. At the same time, Park Board facilities and staff are there to provide recreation services, and safety for patrons has to come first."

Kirby-Yung told CBC's On The Coast that community centre staff are not equipped to deal with situations that arise when the homeless use the facilities overnight.

"Our concerns are this was intended to be a temporary trial and it wasn't done in a way that provided training or support for our staff so that they could really respond to the unique needs of our vulnerable and our homeless populations," she said.

The temporary warming facility at the West End Community Centre was also shut down earlier today. 

The City of Vancouver first opened warming centres in mid-December during Vancouver's prolonged cold snap.

Since then 2,000 people have used the shelters on nights where temperatures plunged well below zero. 

Comments cause controversy

Coun. Kerry Jang called Thursday night's meeting "fear-mongering."

"I think this is ridiculous. What they're saying is we should force homeless people back outside in the cold ... instead of coming up with any solutions, we're punishing them," he said.

"To simply push people who are already very vulnerable back on the streets, it's unconscionable. As a healthcare professional it makes me very angry."

DJ Larkin with Pivot Legal Society said she understands why parents are concerned.

"Nobody wants a child to pick up a needle. Nobody wants that. Even the people that are using them," she said.

But she added the basis of the argument may be on shaky legal grounds.

"Shutting down the the shelters on the presumption that you cannot have a homeless person safely access a community centre, or on the basis that other people in the community are the proper patrons of the community centre, is making a decision based on prejudice and stereotyping, and that is a form of discrimination," she said.  

There are now four centres where people can get warm: the Quality Inn, Britannia Community Centre, Carnegie Community Centre and the Evelyne Saller Centre.

With files from CBC radio's On The Coast