For 80-year-old Allan Saltern, having a hybrid operating room at Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC) would have meant less time spent recovering in hospital and more time doing the things that are important to him.

Saltern was born and raised in Peterborough before spending 35 years working for General Motors and living in Oshawa. Upon his retirement at the age of 55, he moved to Chemong Lake before returning to Peterborough to be closer to care services for his wife and 100-year-old mother.

A lifelong sports enthusiast, Saltern spent decades refereeing hockey and playing in old timer’s tournaments. He’s also a passionate angler who enjoys participating in fishing competitions.

“Nothing is like a day on the water because you have no worries,” he says. “You go out, whether you catch fish or whether you don’t. There’s an old saying: a day on the water is better than a day working. It just relieves all your stress.”

A hybrid OR means smaller incisions, fewer complications, faster recovery, and safer care

Saltern knows about stress as well as anyone. While in Tennessee in 2023 for his 50-year wedding anniversary, he began experiencing leg pains and could not walk very far.

When he returned home, his doctor referred him to vascular surgeon Dr. Sajjid Hossain at PRHC, who informed him he was at risk of leg amputation due to restricted blood flow. Saltern underwent a successful double bypass on his left leg and had balloons inserted into arteries in the right leg.

Unfortunately, he experienced a severe reaction to the complex vascular surgery.

“I spent 21 days in the hospital, and I was only supposed to spend five,” Saltern says. “I had to learn to walk all over again.”

According to Dr. Hossain, Saltern’s complications could have been avoided if PRHC had a hybrid operating room, which combines a fully equipped surgical suite with advanced medical imaging, allowing physicians to attend to vascular patients who often face multiple serious conditions at once.

A hybrid OR at PRHC will be the most innovative surgical suite in the region

With the ability for healthcare professionals to perform multiple minimally invasive procedures and open surgeries, a hybrid OR means safer and more cost-effective care with less impact on patients and better outcomes.

“A hybrid operating room will mean smaller incisions, fewer complications, faster recovery, and ultimately safer care for patients, especially in those emergency situations,” says Dr. Hossain. “This is what vascular surgery should be.”

A priority for the PRHC Foundation’s $70 million Campaign for PRHC to keep world-class care close to home at the regional hospital, the hybrid OR will be the most innovative surgical suite in the region.

“PRHC is serving a population with increasing rates of vascular disease, yet it is one of only a handful of Ontario’s Level 2 vascular centres without a hybrid operating room,” says PRHC Foundation president and CEO Lesley Heighway.

“When having one is the standard of care, not having a hybrid OR presents real challenges. It means difficulty recruiting surgeons who’ve trained on the technology and sending patients elsewhere for care where they’ll wait longer to receive it.”

A hybrid OR will transform vascular care and attract young healthcare professionals to PRHC

Vascular disease is the leading cause of preventable death and disease in Canada. PRHC’s regional vascular program serves a population greater than 600,000 including patients from Peterborough City and County, City of Kawartha Lakes, Northumberland County, the Haliburton Highlands, and the region of Durham.

“A lot of the patients that I serve don’t live close to the hospital — they’re from rural communities and they already have to travel to access care,” Dr. Hossain says. “Having a hybrid operating room would allow our community and all of these communities to have access to the same level of care that they’re getting in a major city. They don’t have that at the moment here in Peterborough.”

PRHC has just four surgeons performing more than 1,000 vital vascular surgeries in two dedicated operating rooms per year — that is a patient volume equivalent to six surgeons. Dr. Hossain, who trained in a hybrid operating room, knows it would not only “transform” patient care but also attract more young healthcare professionals to PRHC.

“At their core, physicians want to help individuals, and they want to be able to work somewhere where they can help others to the best of their abilities,” Dr. Hossain says.

“Investments in advanced technologies, clinical programs, and support from the community really help show these young physicians — who are considering somewhere to put down roots and build their career — that this is a place where everyone is behind you, and everybody is going to support you to do what you were trained to do.”

Since government doesn’t fund equipment or technology, donor support is essential to bring a hybrid OR to PRHC

For patients like Saltern, a hybrid OR would mean less time spent in the hospital and away from caregiving for his aging mother, who he says also receives “excellent care” from PRHC.

“If Peterborough would have had a hybrid OR when I had my operation, it would cut down my stress level and made my family less worried about me,” Saltern says. “The care that I received at PRHC was excellent.”

“For vascular patients and their families, timely access to advanced surgical care close to home is vital — preventing strokes, loss of limbs, and death,” Heighway adds.

“We’re so grateful that patients like Allan, who’ve experienced great vascular care at PRHC but want even better for the next patient, are willing to share their stories to help everyone in our community understand just how essential it is to have a hybrid OR. Because of stories like Allan’s, we can all appreciate a hybrid OR’s crucial impact and get behind it with our support.”

Since learning that the government does not fund hospital equipment and technology advancements, Saltern has been vocal about encouraging donations to the PRHC Foundation, to ensure future patients are treated faster, with less risk, and have quicker recovery time so they can get back to the people and things they love most.

“We really need to have this hybrid OR to help people recover from their surgeries faster, relieve a lot of stress, and make it easier on the families involved,” he says. “Thanks to you, the donors, this will support Peterborough and the surrounding areas who rely on Peterborough Regional Health Centre.”

To learn more about bringing a hybrid operating room to PRHC and to make a donation, visit the PRHC Foundation website at prhcfoundation.ca or call 705-876-5000.

This branded editorial was created in partnership with the Peterborough Regional Health Centre Foundation. If your organization or business is interested in a branded editorial, contact us.

With a $2.1 million investment by the Ontario government, over 4,500 more residents of the city and county of Peterborough will have a permanent primary care provider within the next year.

On Friday (May 29), Peterborough-Kawartha MPP Dave Smith announced the funding as part of the province’s Primary Care Action Plan and a commitment to connecting every Ontarian to primary care by 2029.

The funding followed a successful application led by the Peterborough Family Health Team, with support from the Peterborough 360 Degree Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic, Peterborough Community Health Centre, Peterborough Street Medicine, Peterborough Newcomer Health Clinic, and the New Canadians Centre, in partnership with the Peterborough Ontario Health Team.

Funding will support Connect Clinic expansion to move 2,700 unattached patients to primary care

“Family medicine and primary care are the keys to keeping a cost manageable, compassionate system,” said Peterborough Family Health Team CEO Duff Sprague in a interview with kawarthaNOW following the announcement.

As part of the second round of funding under the Ford government’s Primary Care Action Plan, the Peterborough announcement came a little over one month after news from the City of Kawartha Lakes Family Health Team that it was the recipient of $1.834 million under the plan.

The largest portion of the Peterborough funding, $1.16 million, will go towards the Peterborough Family Health Team’s Connect Clinic, which operates from two downtown locations at 185 King Street and 555 George Street North.

The Connect Clinic provides transitional support and wraparound care to currently unattached patients while they are waiting to be matched with a family physician or nurse practitioner.

According to a media release from the Peterborough Family Health Team, the Connect Clinic has supported 6,600 patients since its launch, with over 1,000 successfully transitioning to permanent primary care providers within the region.

Sprague told kawarthaNOW that the new provincial funding will expand resources at the Connect Clinic through the recruitment of one nurse practitioner, two registered practical nurses, one registered nurse, three administrative staff, and one pharmacist.

He said the additional staff capacity is intended to enable the Connect Clinic to serve more patients and increase the number of attachments made to permanent primary care providers.

“We have agreed to move 2,700 patients through the Connect Clinic between now and the end of March 2027,” Sprague said

Sprague said that, during the Peterborough Family Health Team’s discussions with the government, the province agreed the Connect Clinic may act as a “transitional attachment” for patients, but the long-term goal must be to move them from the clinic on to a longer-term relationship with a family physician, nurse practitioner, or primary care team, as opportunities become available.

Approximately 90 physicians are supported by the Peterborough Family Health Team through the provision of nurse practitioners, nurses, mental health workers, dietitians, pharmacists, and administrative staff.

Sprague said that a key goal of the Connect Clinic is to build a complete medical record to support patients transitioning to a new physician, or as they go through the medical system at large.

“You’re not going to be starting from scratch, and it’s going to be a far easier transition into the practice,” he explained.

Funding will also support those facing barriers to healthcare, including newcomers and unhoused or precariously housed people

Many of the partner organizations receiving the new provincial funding work with individuals who face barriers to care and may not have had regular care or supervision by a physician in a number of years.

For instance, the Peterborough Newcomer Health Clinic, which operates from the Peterborough Family Health Team space at 185 King Street, supports patients in their first year as newcomers to Canada.

In a past interview with kawarthaNOW, clinic founder Dr. Madura Sundareswaran said that many refugees have a history of fragmented healthcare and typically arrive in Canada with little to no medical documentation.

Both Sprague and Dr. Sundareswaran said the Newcomer Health Clinic’s recent integration with the Connect Clinic has already begun the process of streamlining patient-provider attachment services.

In addition to expanding services at the Connect Clinic, the Peterborough Family Health Team will use the provincial funding in part to provide a designated nurse to Peterborough Street Medicine, a physician-led organization that provides care to unhoused and precariously housed individuals.

Peterborough Street Medicine offers services at locations such as Brock Mission, Cameron House, the YES Shelter, and the modular housing community on Wolfe Street, without requiring participants to enrol with a family physician.

Nurse practitioner-led clinic aims to attach 1,825 patients, and community health centre will hire two physicians to train medical students

As for the Peterborough 360 Degree Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic, it will receive $688,000 in provincial funding to enable the clinic to attach 1,825 new patients to nurse practitioner-led primary care.

“It’s a really ambitious target — it’s going to take a lot of dedication from my team,” said Danielle Howson, executive director and nurse practitioner lead at the Peterborough 360 Degree Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic. “But, as ambitious as it is, I’m really excited to see what we can do with that.”

To enable them to meet this goal, the clinic will add two nurse practitioners, retain one registered nurse following the closure of Peterborough’s Consumption and Treatment Site, and add two administrative support team members.

For Howson, this investment will better allow the Peterborough 360 Degree Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic to attach patients in a timely manner through collaboration with the Connect Clinic. She explained that the communication and transition support provided by the Peterborough Family Health Team allows patients to match with care teams that suit their needs.

As part of its ongoing work to recruit more physicians to the family medicine sector, the Peterborough Family Health Team is working in partnership with the Peterborough Community Health Centre to provide training for medical students.

The centre will receive $207,000 in funding to be enable the recruitment of two salaried family physicians who will provide direct training for students. This differs from the fee-per-service model that physicians engage with under the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP).

Sprague explained that this funding model allows physicians to focus on education and training without concerns regarding the number of patients they see.

“A physician is not going to be able to clear off a lot of patients in the day when they’re training a medical student,” he pointed out.

Healthcare sector still facing challenges with recruitment and compensation

However, Sprague noted that the Peterborough Family Health Team does not only focus on recruiting new physicians, but also works with many retired family doctors who provide services on a part-time basis at the Connect Clinic.

“The funding is intended to help strengthen long-term healthcare capacity in the region and support the development of future healthcare providers through collaborative primary care initiatives,” a spokesperson for Peterborough Community Health Centre wrote in an email to kawarthaNOW.

While Sprague said he is grateful for the investment and identified MPP Smith as a strong partner in the application process, he recognizes there are still challenges faced across the family medicine sector.

“Family health teams used to be the employer of choice, but now we have a little more trouble filling positions than we used to,” he said.

Speaking to trends across the province, Sprague said that significant investment must be made to ensure that compensation for primary care clinicians is comparative and competitive across the healthcare sector.

Further to this, Sprague said that work must be done to make family medicine more appealing to medical students and graduates, saying that those leaving school in the current healthcare market are often looking elsewhere.

“I can’t help but think, if we start having med students come in and get exposed to family practice, more of them will choose that route, and more of them might choose Peterborough or Peterborough County,” he said.

The Ontario Turtle Conservation Centre (OTCC) in Peterborough has appointed a new executive director to take over the role from Dr. Sue Carstairs after 16 years.

Glenn M. Cunnington, a conservation scientist and senior program leader, will join Canada’s premier facility for turtle conservation, rehabilitation, and research as of Monday, June 15.

“Glenn brings with him all the qualities that OTCC needs to continue moving forward,” said Dr. Carstairs, who has held the role of executive and medical director since 2009, in a media release. “He is an expert in Ontario’s turtles, having been on the Committee On the Status of Species at Risk in Ontario for five years.”

Under the leadership as Dr. Carstairs, who was named to the Order of Ontario in 2020, the OTCC has evolved from a grassroots and volunteer-driven initiative into a world-renowned conservation centre.

By splitting her two roles into separate positions, the non-profit organization’s board of directors is marking a significant milestone in its strategic succession plan by allowing each position to become more specialized, increasing the organization’s scope and impact as it continues to grow.

While Dr. Carstairs will continue in a co-leadership position as medical director, long-standing OTCC veterinarian Dr. Kristen Janke will gradually assume the full medical director role. When that happens, Dr. Carstairs will still remain involved with OTCC, but at a slower pace.

As for Cunnington, he holds a Ph.D. focused on Road Ecology from Carleton University, an M.Sc. in Watershed Ecosystems, and a B.Sc. in Conservation Biology from Trent University, as well as a diploma from Fleming College in Fish and Wildlife. He is a published author in road ecology and brings deep experience in stakeholder engagement, grant writing, and financial stewardship.

He most recently worked as watershed programs manager with the District Municipality of Muskoka, a position he has held for the past four years. Prior to that, he worked at the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources in Peterborough as a species at risk permitting coordinator and in Bancroft as a field biologist, and has also worked for Parks Canada.

“It is a tremendous honour to join the Ontario Turtle Conservation Centre as its next executive director,” Cunnington said. “I want to thank Dr. Sue Carstairs for her extraordinary leadership over the past 16 years. I am stepping into a healthy, growing organization with a remarkable culture, world-class clinical care, and an ambitious path towards 2030 already in motion.”

A registered charity, OTCC rehabilitates injured turtles at its specialized turtle hospital, conducts field research, and leads comprehensive educational programs to foster environmental stewardship.

“The OTCC remains dedicated to protecting and conserving Ontario’s native turtles and their habitats,” reads the media release. “Core operations — including healing injured turtles, incubating eggs, and releasing healthy turtles and hatchlings back into the wild — will continue uninterrupted through this transition.

For more information about the Ontario Turtle Conservation Centre, visit ontarioturtle.ca.

The City of Peterborough has formally launched the Clean Streets Peterborough program following city council’s approval of the initiative on Monday night (June 1).

Combining waste management changes, public education, enforcement, and community outreach, the program aims to tackle illegal dumping, overflowing public bins, improper waste set-outs, and garbage accumulation in parks and public spaces across the city.

“This program responds by making proper disposal easier, improving education and reporting tools, and strengthening our ability to keep public spaces clean and welcoming for everyone,” said Mayor Jeff Leal in a media release.

The program’s measures include eliminating the city’s large article collection fee of $60 for the first item and $30 for each additional item for the remainder of 2026. A public survey found that disposal costs were repeatedly identified as a factor contributing to illegal dumping of furniture, mattresses, and appliances.

Another measure is temporarily doubling residential garbage bag limit from four bags every two weeks to eight bags every two weeks until the end of 2027. The public survey found that extra garbage was identified as one of the hardest waste items to dispose of properly.

The city will also reduce the cost for replacing a green bin from $88.49 to $35.40.

Other measures under the Clean Streets Peterborough program include enhancing public education, community engagement, and outreach around proper waste disposal — including targeted outreach to landlords, property managers, businesses, and multi-residential properties — as well as improving waste reporting tools and providing additional park cleanup support.

The city will also be launching a targeted surveillance camera pilot project at selected parks and public spaces, with increased monitoring and enforcement in problem areas.

During Monday night’s council meeting, councillor Alex Bierk raised several concerns about the surveillance camera pilot project, including privacy, retention, efficiency, and cost, and asked that the surveillance camera pilot project be separated out for a vote.

Council voted 9-2 in favour of the surveillance camera pilot project, with only Bierk and councillor Joy Lachica voting against it. Council then voted unanimously 11-0 in support of the entire Clean Streets Peterborough program.

In approving the program, council also approved the resumption of enforcement against unattributed garbage left on boulevards in the downtown area after a temporary pause approved by council earlier this year.

At Monday night’s meeting, councillors also heard a public delegation from Heather Monroe on the Clean Streets Peterborough program. She raised concerns about garbage — including drug paraphernalia — along the rail trail from Monaghan Road to Park Street, which is frequently used by residents.

Councillor Lachica later put forward an amendment to the Clean Streets Peterborough motion that city staff establish an agreement with Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) regarding the clearance of items within their corridor/property lines. The amendment was approved by a 11-0 unanimous vote, prior to council’s vote to approve the main motion.

As for evaluating the success of the Clean Streets Peterborough initiative, city staff say results will be monitored through waste collection data, tonnage reporting, large article collection volumes, waste collected from parks and public receptacles, complaints and reporting trends, enforcement activity, and ongoing community feedback.

“This information will help shape future decisions about waste collection services, organics participation, multi-residential servicing, public space waste management, and long-term landfill planning,” the media release states.

For more information on the Clean Streets Peterborough initiative, visit peterborough.ca/cleanstreets.

In a reversal of its decision at general committee the previous week, Peterborough city council has voted against deferring a winter shelter response plan until August, and also voted in favour of pre-committing funding for a six-month response plan.

At its regular meeting on Monday night (June 1), councillors voted against Mayor Jeff Leal’s motion to defer a report from community services commissioner Sheldon Laidman recommending options for a planned seasonal winter shelter model for people experiencing homelessness in winter 2026-27, instead of the temporary temperature-based shelter response used this past winter.

Laidman’s report presented two options for a planned overnight shelter model, both of which would provide at least 30 additional beds nightly using the former fire station at 161 Carnegie Avenue, where the city operated an emergency temperature-based shelter response for up to 40 people per night over 10 days during the winter of 2025-26.

Option A would operate for three months from January through March and would cost about $303,000 annually, plus $20,000 in startup costs, while Option B would run for six months from November through April at an annual operating cost of about $576,600, plus $20,000 in startup costs.

Two councillors changed their general committee votes in favour of a deferral

Last Monday, general committee had voted 6-4 in favour of the mayor’s motion, which had originally proposed deferring the report until 2027 budget deliberations but was later amended to defer the report until August, asking staff to come back to council then with possible alternate locations for the shelter.

At that meeting, Mayor Leal and councillors Dave Haacke, Andrew Beamer, Lesley Parnell, Kevin Duguay, and Gary Baldwin voted in favour of the deferral and councillors Don Vassiliadis, Joy Lachica, Matt Crowley, and Keith Riel voted against. Councillor Alex Bierk didn’t vote as he was absent from the meeting.

At the June 1 regular council meeting, councillors Vassiliadis, Lachica, Crowley, and Riel once again voted against the deferral, with councillor Bierk also voting against it, and councillors Parnell and Baldwin changed their vote from the previous week, defeating the mayor’s motion 5-6.

Councillor Baldwin then proposed a motion to pre-commit the necessary funds for a six-month winter shelter response plan, which was essentially the same as Option B in Laidman’s report. Council voted 9-2 in favour of the motion, with only councillors Dave Haacke and Andrew Beamer — the two councillors for Northcrest Ward where the former fire station is located — voting against.

Public delegations speak against and in favour of the plan

The meeting began with registered delegations, including three members of the public who spoke to the winter shelter response plan.

Rodney Marois, who addressed council over the phone, said he had had concerns about the proposed Carnegie Avenue location, including accessible washrooms, and the ability of One City Peterborough to run the shelter in addition to Trinity Community Centre.

In responding to his concerns, councillor Bierk revealed that Brock Mission would be operating the shelter, adding that washrooms would be accessible at the Carnegie Avenue location.

Delegate Margie Sumadh, a Town Ward resident, first apologized to security staff for her disruption at general committee the previous week, where she approached the council horseshoe while shouting at councillors, before speaking against deferring a winter shelter response plan.

“We must learn from the lessons of last year,” she said. “Let’s support staffed, planned response. Let’s do better, and not wait for life-threatening temperatures to force a crisis-mode response … This is action for community safety that must not be delayed.”

Another member of the public, Town Ward resident Rob Hailman, had some harsh words for council. He began by saying that he had been in the process of preparing a longer delegation, “but I questioned as I was preparing it whether the body I find myself before is worthy of the effort,” before reading an excerpt from German philosopher Friedrich Engels’ 1845 book The Condition of the Working Class in England, which equates systemic neglect and starvation to “social murder.”

“While the forms of social murder have changed in 180 years, murder it remains and governments at all levels are its perpetrators,” Hailman said. “Housing and homelessness is one area of which this is brought into sharp relief. In Peterborough, we are once again faced with evidence that the majority of our council are wilful murderers and the remainder are collaborators.”

Northcrest Ward resident Mary Ellen Myers spoke against the Carnegie Avenue location for a winter shelter, stating that the location was not well used by homeless people last winter and calling it a “failed project.”

She said the location was close to the Riverview Park and Zoo, used by families, and to two condominium developments whose residents are primarily seniors, with many living alone.

She noted the location’s distance from services available in downtown Peterborough, mentioning the “exorbitant cost to taxpayers” for a taxi service rather than requiring people to use nearby public transit. She said that the proposal would provide “free accommodation, snow removal, cleaning service, internet.”

“People should do some work for all the services provided to them … this should not be free,” she said. “A nominal fee should apply.”

She added that most have “a publicly funded source of income … and should be encouraged to budget that money, or find work to generate some extra income so they can make a contribution to the services we’re providing.”

She then said the location should be closer to the downtown, mentioning the Murray Street Baptist Church and the former Kawartha Gymnastics site currently being used for storage of public works equipment.

At the conclusion of her remarks, other Northcrest Ward residents in the public gallery began clapping, leading Mayor Leal to admonish them.

In a rhetorical question, councillor Parnell asked Myers if she was aware that she and councillor Baldwin and possibly other councillors had revisited other possible locations for the shelter in the past week.

Councillors debate Carnegie Avenue location for shelter

When debating the motion, councillor Haacke referred to a total of $11 million of provincial and municipal funding being spent on homelessness in Peterborough, and not wanting to spend more money until the source causes of homelessness are addressed, suggesting that upper levels of government should instead be investing in a building project for the treatment of mental illness and addiction.

Several councillors appeared to be defensive of the public reaction to their vote supporting the deferral at general committee, including councillor Baldwin, who referred to disparaging comments he read on social media over the past week, such as “The old six need to go,” “We have to have a complete change of city council,” and “Let’s get rid of Leal and his gang.”

Baldwin said he has always supported a winter response program, noting his vote at general committee supporting the deferral was only so staff could take the time to find a more appropriate location. He wondered if staff had looked at a General Electric property, the Shoppers Drug Mart property on George Street, or the space at St. Andrew’s Church where Redpath Wellness Centre used to be located.

Baldwin said he had prepared a motion if the general committee decision to defer is reconsidered, but questioned the transportation costs required to use the Carnegie Avenue location.

For his part, councillor Riel spoke against the deferral, noting that the city cannot evict people from encampments unless the city provides them with shelter beds. He said that it costs $17,000 a day to treat a homeless person at Peterborough Regional Health Centre.

Riel said he understood why Northcrest Ward residents don’t want a shelter in their neighbourhood, but noted it was a city-owned building that can offer shelter “when necessary,” before sharing an anecdote that a young couple in their early twenties who had both lost their jobs and were living in their car showed up at the Carnegie Avenue shelter last winter.

‘This is the wrong location and I will not be supporting a shelter at the former fire hall’

In his remarks, councillor Beamer — who is running for re-election in Northcrest Ward — noted the number of Northcrest Ward residents in the public gallery and overflow room and thanked them directly. He said he supported a winter response plan, but not at the Carnegie Avenue location.

He reiterated his comments from the general committee meeting that temporary shelters become permanent shelters, and added that shelters should not be in residential neighbourhoods because of increased crime and garbage and the impact on property values. He also criticized the cost of the shelter, including transportation costs because of its distance from downtown.

“I support a winter shelter response, but this is the wrong location and I will not be supporting a shelter at the former fire hall,” Beamer said.

After Beamer completed his remarks, Northcrest Ward residents in the public gallery began clapping, leading Mayor Leal to admonish them once again.

Speaking against the deferral, councillor Crowley said the municipalities are being forced by upper levels of government to deal with an issue that municipalities cannot resolve.

“Municipalities seem to be the foster parents for someone else’s children,” he said.

Councillor Bierk also spoke against the deferral, asking councillors if they have a better idea than city staff for a suitable location, they should propose it.

“This is not some luxurious thing we’re proposing on the back of the hard-working taxpayer — this is a necessity,” he said, adding that the winter shelter is the “bare minimum.”

He said some of the alternate locations being proposed were not realistic, claiming it would take four months just to clear out the former Shoppers Drug Mart property and that the St. Andrew’s Church location could only support maybe 10 beds “in a Frankenstein way.”

Bierk also noted the two demographics of homelessness people that have increased significantly include first-time shelter users as well as seniors. He said that, if the decision to proceed with a winter response plan is deferred for too long a time, there will be no winter response plan at all.

“We need to act now,” he said, adding that staff could look at transportation costs as well as the concerns of Northcrest Ward residents before the shelter is operational.

Councillor Duguay began his remarks by saying there have been “unacceptable” attacks on his family on social media with comments that “were not factual and unfair.” He said his support for the deferral was to allow staff to consider alternate options for the location, before noting that Carnegie Avenue may be the only option.

Parnell on alternate locations: ‘They were all a solid no’

For her part, councillor Parnell said she “reluctantly supported the deferral” at general committee, mainly because of the location. She said she immediately began looking at new potential alternate locations and revisited past locations previously considered.

“They were all a solid no,” she said, noting that some of the locations are not up to code and would require significant costs to bring them up to code. “We just simply do not have an ideal location for another shelter. It doesn’t exist in any ward.”

She said it was “untrue and unfair” for people to criticize her for doing nothing, and added that she personally spends “significant time” volunteering for Brock Mission and Cameron House.

Mentioning “the cat is out of the bag” with respect to councillor Bierk’s comment during public delegations that Brock Mission is interested in operating the winter shelter, Parnell said “it is a bit of a silver lining” that One City Peterborough will not be involved as Brock Mission “does have rules and we do seem to have better results with Brock Mission.” She added that she would not be supporting the deferral.

Councillor Lachica, who said she waited to speak “to see where we are all at,” objected to some councillors characterizing the homeless population as “mentally ill and addicted only,” calling it “appalling” and a “complete stereotype.”

“There are different reasons why people are homeless,” she said, adding the issue is getting worse because of the affordability crisis, absentee landlords, renovictions, and people increasingly living in poverty. “For us as a council to be characterizing a population as criminal and dirty is inappropriate.”

Staff warn delay could leave city without winter response

In response to a question from councillor Vassiliadis about whether staff would only be looking at alternate locations in the central area or city wide, commissioner Laidman said there was no limitation but the August timeframe would make it “very difficult to do any type of intensive review and to have something appropriate back at council in that time period.”

Vassiliadis also asked Laidman if the Carnegie Avenue fire hall would be an option in the winter if council did not approve a winter response plan, who replied that staff do not have the capacity to open a winter shelter based on temperature.

“Staff will not be contemplating the opening of an overnight emergency shelter unless council approves something in this budget coming forward in this report or another report, because otherwise it just won’t be feasible,” Laidman said.

In his remarks, the mayor spoke about what the city has done to support homeless people, including the Wolfe Street modular housing community, before stating that the way to get rid of shelters is by developing permanent transitional housing.

“I had to use strong mayor powers to put 52 transitional units on 738 Chemong Road to help people who were homeless,” Leal said, referring to his controversial use of strong mayor powers to amend the city’s zoning by-law to expedite a Brock Mission development and to exempt it from the city’s site plan requirements.

“I don’t regret that decision then, I don’t regret it today, and if I had the opportunity I would do it again to provide more transitional housing to the vulnerable in this community.”

Council then voted on the deferral motion, which lost 5-6, following which councillor Baldwin introduced his motion to pre-commit funding for six months for the winter shelter response program.

After a brief debate on the motion, with councillor Beamer reiterating that he wouldn’t support it and stating that “This cannot become permanent,” council voted 9-2 in support of Baldwin’s motion.

The original version of this story has been updated to include the name of the first delegate who presented to council on the winter shelter response plan.