A 40-bed homeless shelter for Indigenous People in Halifax is set to close at the end of this month.
The Mi’kmaw Native Friendship Centre (MNFC) indicates they want to refocus their mandate and have concerns over their North Park Street location.
Executive Director Pam Glode Desrochers says they also don’t have funding secure to operate next year.
“Funding from the province for 2022 also hasn’t materialized and all existing staff members have contracts that will end on December 31,” writes Glode Desrochers in an internal memo. “We have not yet signed a new lease for the current building and have real concerns about the building.”
“We has just three week in 2020 to plan for opening, many of the cultural plan and programs were not implemented,” said Glode Desrochers. “We are going to take time to reset and restructure the program. This will take place in January and February.”
As of December 7th, there are 443 people known to be homeless in the Halifax Regional Municipality, 91 of whom are known to be Indigenous. The MNFC shelter is the only shelter in the region that gives priority to Indigenous people experiencing homelessness.
“We are shocked and deeply saddened by our employer’s decision to close our shelter in the midst of the worst housing crisis this city has ever experienced,” said Catherine Hubbard, a
Shelter Case Manager.
According to the shelter staff, the closure of the shelter at 2029 North Park Street is fueled in part by an attempt to unionize.
“It is deeply disturbing that this decision was announced to us within an hour of us filing an application at the labour board to unionize,” said Rosalie Hyslop, another Shelter Case
Manager. “The shelter team of the MNFC’s emergency shelter had been discussing unionizing in recent months in order to protect the well-being of both staff and clients and it is
impossible for us to accept that this hasty decision to eliminate our jobs and close the shelter is not related to our decision to form a union.”
The Friendship Centre first opened in its shelter last year and add they will continue to support their clients.
