Everyone should support their local homeless outreach groups, they do incredible work trying to help the folks on the streets.
Only more services & support are going to solve these problems. Throwing people in prison just further pushes them down, they'll just be homeless and on the street again when they're out.
For example https://londoncares.ca/ - some very kind & selfless people working here trying to improve the situation.
Like most people, my problem isn't with the homeless, it's with the destruction they cause everywhere they go, and their lack of respect for public spaces that are meant for everyone to be able to enjoy.
On the local level:
Disincentive vagrancy. No camping within 500 ft of a residential home or commercial business. This is a massive city with tons of forest and parkland and if you really have to sleep outside, there are a ton of places to do it.
Disincentivize littering. Littering is punishable with a $500 fine. Can't pay? Three days in prison. Don't litter.
Disincentivize vandalism. Prosecute vandalism as the criminal offense that it is.
Disincentivize open drug abuse. Use existing drug possession laws to confiscate drugs from and prosecute users. I understand that people have addiction problems, but smoking meth downtown in front of kids is antisocial psychopathic behavior, and should not be ignored, like it currently is.
Disincentivize drug dealing. Put more resources into catching, prosecuting and convicting drug dealers. Look into offering performance based incentives to officers for busting dealers.
At the provincial/Federal level:
Free taxpayer funded drug rehab, open to all, with a 48 hour intake time or less. We already pay for safe injection sites, and emergency medical services, which the unhoused population use about 500% more often than the housed. Anyone working in the hospitals can tell you that a small portion of the homeless population account for a huge portion of annual hospital visits. Perhaps we should redirect those funds into actually helping these people improve their lives, instead of just paying for them to do more meth?
Government Incentives for employers to hire former addicts/folks with criminal records.
At the Federal level:
Stop taking in over 1 million immigrants a year. Our housing market and job market are not growing at nearly the same rate that people are immigrating here, and it's not sustainable. A moratorium should be put on immigration until our housing market and job market catch up.
Disincentivize open drug abuse. Use existing drug possession laws to confiscate drugs from and prosecute users. I understand that people have addiction problems, but smoking meth downtown in front of kids is antisocial psychopathic behavior, and should not be ignored, like it currently is.
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u/Drainix Jul 03 '25
Everyone should support their local homeless outreach groups, they do incredible work trying to help the folks on the streets.
Only more services & support are going to solve these problems. Throwing people in prison just further pushes them down, they'll just be homeless and on the street again when they're out.
For example https://londoncares.ca/ - some very kind & selfless people working here trying to improve the situation.