One of Calgary’s main political parties running a slate of candidates in the upcoming municipal election is proposing rules prohibiting overnight camping or rough sleeping near Stephen Avenue.
The policy is part of an overall safety platform unveiled this week by The Calgary Party, led by mayoral candidate Brian Thiessen.
The platform suggests the party would create “no overnight sleeping zones,” and “enforce rules prohibiting overnight camping or rough sleeping within a two to three block radius of Stephen Avenue.”
“These are human beings who feel unsafe, and so they sleep in public places so that they will feel safe from an overdose, from theft,” Thissen said Friday. “That’s overlapping with business owners and the public who want to enjoy these public spaces.”
The rules around rough sleeping are limited in Calgary, with a section of the city’s Parks and Pathways Bylaw that deals with camping/erecting camping tents in a park.
According to a city spokesperson, their Vulnerable Persons Team works with partner agencies to help people experiencing homelessness in finding a safe space to transition and out of the elements.
In an interview with Global News, Thiessen said the party’s platform focuses on providing housing first to address homelessness.
“You’ve housed people, you’re treating them for mental health and addiction issues, and then you can get to the part which a lot of people start with, which is we want to get people off the streets,” he said.
The party’s downtown policy also includes measures to increase police presence downtown, crackdown on open drug use, panhandling near roadways, loitering in transit areas, and an expansion of mental health and addictions support.
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“It’s always tricky because you don’t want to layer on tickets and fines to the unhoused and make it impossible for them to dig their way out,” Thiessen said.
“That discussion about bylaws has to happen in conjunction with community courts.”
Wendy Irvine, who runs the Unicorn Pub on Stephen Avenue, told Global News her staff experiences social disorder issues daily.
When asked about The Calgary Party’s proposal, Irvine said she is supportive of cleaning up Stephen Avenue, but wonders about the impact.
“Totally enforce it, but where are they moving into? For us at the Unicorn, we have the back alley, and that’s where they all go,” she said.
Global News reached out to several local homelessness advocates but did not hear back.
The proposal echoes a letter, obtained by Global News, from 18 downtown business and property owners sent to the mayor, premier, city council, the province as well as municipal election candidates.
“When will we take action to address what those who live here already know — that Calgary is no longer the clean, safe and welcoming city of which we have always been so proud,” the letter said.
The letter recommends several proposals to expand permanent day and night shelter for the unhoused, improve safety in the downtown core and along Stephen Avenue, and reform of municipal bylaws to make it easier to enforce expectations of behaviour in public spaces.
A ‘no rough sleeping’ zone around Stephen Avenue is also amongst the proposals.
“The amount of damages and things that we have been seeing and witnessing comes on the burden of obviously the building owners, but that gets transferred down to the tenants,” said Mark Garner with the Calgary Downtown Association.
“We can’t just replace windows in one of the businesses down here and two weeks later it’s broken. We’ve got to do something different.”
According to the most recent citizen satisfaction survey, 94 per cent of respondents agree that the city should be doing more to address safety issues in Calgary’s downtown.
In its latest State of the Downtown report, the city noted calls for downtown safety response by peace officers, security guards and community partners are down 12 per cent since last April.
Calgarians head to the polls in the next municipal election on Oct. 20.
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