19 people now live at Hamilton's new outdoor shelter, with all 80 spots to be filled this month

Hamilton's outdoor shelter now has 19 residents and the plan is for it to be full by the end of the month, operators and city officials say. 

The temporary shelter on Barton St. W. — which aims to serve people for whom traditional emergency shelters aren't suitable — was supposed to open in December but faced numerous delays.

Mayor Andrea Horwath acknowledged that during a tour and news conference the city hosted for reporters on Friday.

"I was hoping that the space would be operational before the snow flies," she said. "But I'm really, really happy that we're here today."

The shelter is the first of its kind in Hamilton but the model, in which residents live in small cabins and share separate common spaces, is not new. Similar publicly and privately run projects based around tiny homes have operated in Kitchener-Waterloo and Kingston.

Proponents say the model is a faster and cheaper alternative to building traditional shelters, and offers a safer alternative to encampments for people who can't or won't go to shelters.  

Social service provider Good Shepherd is managing operations at the site. Chief operating officer Katherine Kalinowski previously told CBC Hamilton the site would be geared to people living in encampments, especially couples and those with pets. Typically, emergency shelters do not allow pets or permit people to room with adult family members or romantic partners.

"Our focus is on helping people move from survival and subsistence toward finding a new place to call their home in this community," Kalinowski said Friday, adding residents have told her team the site is "transformative."

Friday's tour did not include an opportunity for reporters to meet and speak with residents, but they got to see inside an empty cabin and some of the common areas. Music was playing within one occupied cabin and someone had some of their belongings set up outside, including bicycles. In the kitchen, a half-completed puzzle was out on a table. 

The site's 40 cabins are pre-fabricated and city manager Marnie Cluckie said they are winterized. Between single and double units, there will be space for 80 people on the site, city officials say. Common spaces include washrooms, laundry and a community space that doubles as a kitchen. 

During the tour, Good Shepherd said 24 beds are currently available with more opening up as construction continues. Each cabin has a bed, small TV and fridge, Aaron Deanes, the site's director said. Single cabins are the same as doubles, but have a fireproof dividing wall separating the rooms. 

Many residents at the site will have experienced trauma, loss, violence and stigma, Kalinowski said. For them, the ability to close and lock a door at night is a big deal, she added. 

City leaders have said the outdoor site is temporary but it's not clear how long it will be in use for. There is no target timeline for how long residents can stay, Kalinowski said. 

While living on the site, residents will have access to services including a clinic and workers who will help them move into more permanent forms of housing when possible.

There will be a green space once it warms up. There will also be a space for dogs, who residents must keep on leash and are encouraged to walk in the neighbourhood. The shelter will provide poop bags. 

Good Shepherd is working with the city's animal services department to make sure they know the dogs coming to the site and can manage them, Kalinowski said, adding so far, there are more cats in residence. 

The shelter will also offer harm reduction supplies for drug users. 

Kalinowski previously told CBC Hamilton that while drug use would not be officially permitted, substance use would not likely result in residents being kicked out.

"What we are [doing] rather than telling people what to do is encouraging and supporting people to be safe, to take care of their health and to look out for each other," she said in January.

The shelter will have around-the-clock security. Overnight visitors won't be allowed.

Homelessness is a "humanitarian crisis," Kalinowski said Friday, referring to a recent report by the Association of Municipalities of Ontario, which found more than 80,000 people were homeless in the province last year. 

The report also found there are 25 per cent more people living in shelters or on the streets than there were two years ago. 

City officials said in Hamilton, there are about 1,600 people experiencing homelessness and 200 in encampments. They said that once the outdoor site is fully operational, the city will have added 272 shelter spaces since January — an 80 per cent increase and the most in 20 years.