Hamilton City Council approves full-time encampment enforcement police beat

Hamilton City Council has approved funding to keep six full-time police officers assigned to encampment enforcement.

The move will cost just over $500,000 for the rest of the year.

City staff say the extra officers are necessary to enforce the ban on camping in public parks, but critics argue the strategy focuses too much on enforcement instead of housing solutions.

The issue was front and center at Hamilton City Hall today, as council debated a report on the Hamilton police’s encampment enforcement beat.

The report showed that between March and June of this year, the City’s coordinated encampment response team received more than 1,600 complaints, issued over 340 trespass notices, and cleared 429 cites, which generated 245 tonnes of waste in parks and open spaces.

“Until there problem of there being enough housing for people who need it is solved, we accept, collectively, that there will be cost to park clean-ups, to managing encampments,” Alex Wilson, Ward 13 Councillor said.

“Whatever that solution is, there will be costs associated with it. My understanding is the best way long-term to run that number down is to reduce the number of folks experiencing houselessness.”

Other councillors voiced their frustration with the province and the federal government.

“We put in a little over $100 million, and the province puts in $29 million,” Ward 9 Councillor Brad Clarke said.

“The issue for me is many of the reasons we have homeless people is provincial policy and federal policy that we have no control over.”

Outside council, the impact was felt most directly.

“The one major issue Doug Ford did was wrong, was allowing rent to increase once a person moves out,” says Anne, who is experiencing homelessness.

“It should follow the landlord and tenant act, where it’s 2.4 per cent, whether it’s a landlord and tenant, or a new company, you should not be able to raise [prices] this much in this time of crisis.”

Council voted in favour of the report 11-3, which means six police officers will continue full-time enforcement.

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