The provincial government has unveiled its strategy to end chronic homelessness.
The strategy —called Your Way Home: Manitoba’s Plan to End Chronic Homelessness — will see the government move residents of one encampment at a time into housing, including 300 new social units that have been purchased and will be supported by non-profit organizations, Premier Wab Kinew said during a morning news conference.
“We as a society have decided that living in a tent is not what we want to see anymore. And the way — grounded in compassion — that we’re going to do that is by making the next step out of a tent easy and attractive for the folks who are living there,” Kinew said at the news conference.
MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILES
Tessa Blaikie Whitecloud speaks at a news conference in November 2023 as Mayor Scott Gillingham looks on.
Encampments will only be moved once housing is secured for every person living there, the province said in the release. The former encampment sites will then be cleared by clean-up teams. The sites will be monitored by foot patrols to ensure they remain cleared, the release said.
The province said it is working with the City of Winnipeg on a 30-day timeline beginning in February. Kinew called it a $20-million commitment over two years.
The co-ordination of the strategy will be led by Tessa Blaikie Whitecloud, the premier’s new senior adviser on ending chronic homelessness. Premier Wab Kinew called her “the quarterback” of the strategy during the news conference. Whitecloud is a former executive director of 1JustCity and was CEO of Siloam Mission for the past three years. She previously taught sociology at the University of Winnipeg
Mayor Scott Gillingham, who spoke at the news conference, called it “a great day.”
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