Tiny cabins: City to examine pitch for vacant downtown school site

A plan for tiny cabins to house homeless people on the site of a former high school in downtown Hamilton has taken another small step forward.

City staff will examine how to negotiate zoning hurdles to allow the temporary community to take root at the former Sir John A. Macdonald Secondary School property.

The public school board has already given the Hamilton Alliance for Tiny Shelters (HATS) conditional approval in principle to use the eight-acre property for a year.

On Thursday, HATS asked councillors for flexibility on zoning and $100,000 in funding to support the initiative meant to close the gap between housing and the street.

The beauty of this is that we could move in tomorrow," organizer Julia Kollek said.

And time is of the essence, Kollek added, noting the frigid weather. It's winter. It's the big motivator, right?"

The tiny cabins initiative comes as shelters struggle with capacity challenges and COVID-19 outbreaks, and coincides with more visible encampments in recent years.

HATS aims to start with 10 cabins - but hopes for 20 - on the vacant property, which sits between Bay Street North, Hess Street North, York Boulevard and Cannon Street West.

The group has lined up a local manufacturer to provide the insulated, eight-by-10-foot cabins that would be set up with heat, lighting, fire extinguishers, small fridges and microwaves.

Bathrooms, showers and laundry facilities are to be provided in a shipping container or trailer. A kitchen where residents and volunteers could cook meals is also in the mix.

HATS - whose core members include the Hamilton Roundtable for Poverty Reduction, Social Planning and Research Council of Hamilton, Hamilton Community Legal Clinic, Indwell and the First Unitarian Church - have garnered a range of supporters, including faith groups, services agencies and politicians.

When you have that amount of support around a program, I don't believe we can fail," Coun. Brad Clark said.

But there some issues" to work out, noted Jason Thorne, general manager of planning and economic development.

At first blush, if the tiny cabins could be described as an emergency shelter, there are many properties across the city that would have the appropriate zoning, Thorne said.

But one challenge with the Macdonald site is a radial separation restriction that doesn't allow shelters within 300 metres of each other, he noted. The Salvation Army's Booth Centre on York Boulevard is within that distance.

A minor variance through the committee of adjustment or direction from council to pause" bylaw enforcement, as was done initially to accommodate temporary restaurant patios during the pandemic, are options, Thorne said.

Flexible" bylaw enforcement helped A Better Tent City get off the ground in Kitchener, said Jeff Willmer, a co-founder of what's now a community of 50 residents in tiny cabins.

After nearly two years and at its third location on school board and city property in a mixed industrial area, the project has offered dignity, stability and hope" for people who have struggled to stay off the streets, Willmer said.

What we've found is that residents have really risen to the challenge and their lives are being transformed before our very eyes."

On the Macdonald plan, Coun. Jason Farr said all but the location is great," noting pushback from residents.

We're dealing with a very divisive issue and people have opinions on both sides," said Farr, who pushed for enforcement of the city's anti-tent parks bylaw amid court challenges and protests.

HATS knows the school board wants to demolish the shuttered high school for future plans, project organizer and roundtable director Tom Cooper said.

The tiny cabins can be moved elsewhere, but in the meantime, the downtown location near service providers makes sense and showcases Hamilton as a welcoming community."

We don't hide away our social challenges, but we embrace them and we find creative solutions."

City staff have been asked to report back on the HATS proposal Feb. 17.

Teviah Moro is a reporter at The Spectator. tmoro@thespec.com