Safe Harbour’s temporary winter shelter in Red Deer for the homeless will stay open until 2019, after city council approved the agency’s development permit yesterday afternoon.

However, that term is one year shorter than what Safe Harbour was initially hoping for -- three years.

Council, which is the development authority for the site, zoned as direct control, amended the application to two before approving it.

Coun. Paul Harris said to keep the shelter open until 2020 would be a shift toward making it a permanent facility, when it was originally approved as a temporary one in 2015. The goal is to build a 24-hour permanent shelter in the future.

“We’ve got enough resistance from the community already that I don’t think we would be acting in good faith as a council to make it three years,” Harris said.

The shelter is located in Red Deer’s Railyards district, which the city plans to one day develop into a high-density residential neighborhood as part of its Greater Downtown.

Harris also pointed to complaints Safe Harbour’s business neighbours have made about the area, such as loitering, public intoxication, property crimes and littering.

The flight of businesses from the area would affect its development, he said.

"I do not want to lose one more business from the downtown. We have not only lost businesses as a result of what's happening in the downtown ... we have businesses that are threatening to move out of that community because of this particular shelter," he said.

Safe Harbour’s executive director Kath Hoffman said she thinks the agency is unfairly singled out for the city’s social ills.

“We’re not the problem. The problem was there. We came to help with the problem. All over the town, there’s loitering, there’s garbage, there’s sex on the street … We get blamed for the problem but we came because of the problem,” Hoffman said.

Council also passed a related motion directing city staff to work with agencies, RCMP and the community to develop a plan that would address those problems.

“The problems that circulate around the agency aren’t theirs to own. It’s the community’s to own. So it’s really important we work with them to provide support for Safe Harbour Society to address some of the issues,” Harris said.

Toward a permanent solution

That second motion also reaffirmed the city’s advocacy for provincial funding for a permanent 24-hour shelter.

Safe Harbour’s facility operates during daytime, from November to April. But it was only meant to be a temporary fix for Red Deer’s homeless.

“We have been trying to get 24-hour shelter in this city forever,” Hoffman said. “That’s our drive, to have appropriate trauma-informed care for these people that we’re serving.”

Hoffman said Safe Harbour has worked with the city on a homeless shelter study that will inform planning of such a facility.

She said one of the needs the future project would address is interim housing for clients until they find long-term homes.

“There’s a lot we can do in that building if we build it to be flexible enough to respond to the community need.”