Belleville residents frustrated, divided over how to address addictions crisis | CBC News

As Const. Aaron Crawford walks along the Moira River in downtown Belleville, Ont., he points out a man emerging from a trail leading to the shore.

Crawford says he arrested the man less than two hours ago for stealing $400 from a local business. 

He’s now back on the streets.

“This is the epitome of a revolving door,” Crawford said. 

The vulnerable residents he frequently arrests struggle with addiction, homelessness or mental health issues — and sometimes all three, he said.

Crawford said he can arrest them or take them to the hospital but either scenario generally leads to the same conclusion: a quick release back onto the streets.

“It just seems like there’s just nowhere for these people to go,” Crawford said. “I’m walking by people smoking fentanyl every day … people nodding off, nearing death.

“It’s just another stroll in the park.”

Addictions emergency declared

Belleville made national headlines in early February, when police in the eastern Ontario city said 13 people overdosed in a matter of hours. Two days later, as the number rose to 23, the city declared an addictions emergency. 

That emergency has underscored a multitude of problems — including homelessness, crime and a lack of mental health supports — that residents and other stakeholders say have now reached a breaking point. 

But they’re divided on two things: how to tackle those problems and whether the current solutions are working.

The epicentre of the overdose crisis is the Bridge Street United Church on the east side of downtown.

There, staff from the John Howard Society of Belleville offer food, showers and laundry to homeless and other vulnerable residents.

According to the organization’s executive director J.J. Cormier, five people walking on the sidewalk near the property collapsed at the “exact same time” on Feb. 6.

That day had a “huge impact” on staff and people who access the drop-in centre, Cormier previously told CBC News.

When the centre opened in 2021, it was meant for 15 people who needed to be off the streets because of COVID-19 restrictions, Cormier said. 

Three years later, due to rising housing costs and the pandemic, that number has ballooned to 200, Cormier said. Guests congregate on the sidewalk near the property while the centre runs its daily operations.

For Brian Orford, who’s been homeless for six years, the centre is a lifeline.

“Before these guys opened, we had nothing. Nowhere to go. And you get banned from everywhere,” he said. “It’s just like home … It keeps us warm and safe.”

Orford, who has overdosed multiple times, is stark about what would happen if the centre wasn’t available. 

“So many of us would be dead right now if it wasn’t for them, myself included.”

Time and money needed

Belleville has a plan to address the crowded centre, but city officials say they need time and money. They’ve already invested $2 million to convert a banquet hall into a new space to provide addiction, mental health and housing supports. 

The city’s mayor, Neil Ellis, had called for the Ontario government to chip in another $2 million to get the project off the ground.

The province promised to provide $216,000 in one-time funding to meet the immediate needs of the city and surrounding area. 

Ellis has re-upped the call for funding, but he’s also asked staff to examine how Belleville can pay for the project itself.

That could mean a tax increase, a levy or using long-term debt — all pending council approval.

Downtown businesses frustrated

For some downtown business owners, both the cost of building the facility and the amount of time it will take are bitter pills to swallow.

Sheranda Salvagno, who runs a restaurant called L’Auberge de France, said she’s had to deal with issues like people walking into her restaurant and stealing from the tip jar or from customers’ wallets. 

She’s installed a spiked fence at the back of the restaurant to keep customers safe. It’s cost her close to $20,000.

“We didn’t think we’d have to do this. So that makes us a bit sad,” Salvagno said. “This is the ongoing trend — that people need to protect their properties by putting gates in.”

For two weeks, Salvagno said a man and a woman were living underneath the stairs behind her business.

She said she offered them food and tried to direct them to other resources, but they wouldn’t leave until they were escorted away.

“There’s no one in this community that doesn’t want to help, but it’s at a level that it’s so difficult, and we are enabling it,” she said. “No one should live under stairs.”

Mark Turner, a restoration technician for more than 30 years, says the situation “spun out of control” a few years ago. 

He can’t explain the influx of homeless residents, but said the impact has been “chaos, destruction and a lack of law and order despite the attempts of our police service.”

“We have to have compassion, but we [also] have to have a little bit of accountability,” Turner said.

Not all business owners share Salvagno and Turner’s frustration, however.

“We could stand to have a lot more empathy for what [vulnerable residents] are going through,” said Miriam Hoban, a nurse and tattoo artist.

“I think everyone is just a few turns away from finding themselves in a predicament,” said Hoban, adding that break-ins “come with the territory” of having a business downtown.

Salvagno said she has security cameras inside her diner, but when she hands footage to the police, they don’t have enough resources to tackle the issue. 

“There’s no consequences,” she said. “And I think the police’s hands are tied.”

‘The crux of poor policy’ 

Const. Crawford said the first “revolving door” is the hospital.

Officers can bring someone to the emergency room for mental health support and medical assistance, Crawford said, and they might be held there overnight.

But generally, if their drug test comes back positive, the “mental health system” deems the issue a drug-induced psychosis, keeps them for a day and sends them out again, Crawford explained.

Not only that, but Crawford said any trip to the hospital requires two officers, and could mean an hours-long waits and a drain on the force’s resources.

If the hospital can’t help, officers may charge vulnerable residents and hold them for a bail hearing, Crawford said.

But going through the courts may not change anything since prosecutors aren’t moving forward with simple drug possession charges, he added.

For Crawford, not being able to bring the people he arrests somewhere they can be cared for is “frustrating.”

The current situation, he said, is at a “breaking point.”

“The crux of poor policy and poor decisions [are] all [coming] to a head,” Crawford said.

No immediate answers in sight

Hilary Thomas, who works with the John Howard Society of Belleville, is looking forward to the new facility because it can provide 24/7 support.

“We’re family here,” Thomas said, adding that she’s known some guests of the drop-in centre for more than 20 years.

“The hardest part for me every day is shutting that door.”

According to Cormier, affordable and supportive housing is a key solution, and “until that happens, you’re just creating a revolving door.”

The less stable housing there is, the harder the pressures on police and mental health systems, Cormier said.

“It’s a community thing and it absolutely affects the downtown business core, for sure.”

As for Orford, he wants to get clean someday. But he said he first needs a stable home and isolation from drugs.

“Being out here, it’s just massive depression all the time. You get stuck in that rut, and you finally give up. I’ve pretty much given up,” Orford said.

Thomas hopes Belleville can come together and find a solution that works for everyone. But until then, the centre is the best answer.

“We’re doing everything we can to try and have somewhere for these people to feel safe,” Thomas said.