The emergency response to house people experiencing homelessness in Guelph hotels is costing triple what the shelter system was costing and far above the cost of providing permanent housing.
As of Monday, a total of 74 people are being housed in hotel rooms within the community, said Lori Richer, housing stability manager with County of Wellington Social Services, the agency that funds shelters in Guelph.
Richer said the emergency response has been a big win from a public health perspective. They have seen an improvement in relationship building, positive health outcomes and decreased interactions with emergency services for the individuals staying there.
“Moving the shelters to the hotels early on in the pandemic to provide social distancing for people experiencing homelessness has been a success,” said Richer. “We have not had anyone test positive for COVID-19 in the shelter.”
Richer said the cost to the county for the initiative, which includes 24/7 staffing, food and PPE, averages out to about $301,000 a month.
Richer said that is about $200,000 more per month than in spent per month with the regular shelter system, which has been shut down in Guelph since the beginning of the pandemic.
She notes the shelter system in Guelph does not operate on a 24/7 basis, which is one reason for the added costs.
Currently there is no expected end date for the initiative.
“Returning to the shelters would limit the shelter capacity in order to adhere to public health standards and stretch staffing resources,” said Richer.
The best long-term solution would be to secure permanent housing solutions for those people that are experiencing homelessness, said Richer.
Using an estimated cost of $1,128 for a one bedroom apartment, Richer estimates the cost to find permanent housing to be somewhere in between that of shelters and using hotels for the initial outlay of funds and the cost drops dramatically after that.
“If all 74 secured housing and needed assistance with first and last month’s rent the one-time expense would be $166,944,” said Richer.
She said the ongoing costs to support someone receiving social assistance would be about $41,736 a month.
Those figures only factors in rent, not other costs like support staff, hydro and gas.
“We know from Housing First programs that finding permanent housing solutions is cost effective in comparison to an emergency response.”
The local By-Name List of people experiencing homelessness was averaging about 121 people per month prior to the pandemic, but has grown to 154 for July. Since the beginning of April there were 29 housing placement for people on the list.
“Finding a housing placement is our biggest challenge right now,” said Richer.
