A number of big decisions were made yesterday by Kamloops council to try and address social issues.

All transitional housing providers will now need to have 24-7 security, weekly counselling for clients, and on-site nursing if needed. That passed by a 5-3 vote, with mayor Ken Christian and councillors Arjun Singh and Kathy Sinclair against the idea as it was proposed.

“I do support that, given the sense that we know that the Tranquille area and the downtown core, specifically, are very populated with businesses but also with marginalized populations,” Coun. Mike O’Reilly says. “Not to say that there aren’t issues in other parts of town, but we know there are in those areas.”

Coun. Bill Sarai brought forward the motion calling for that change. He says this means security should be provided by those social agencies if the city asks for it.

“If we see issues coming forward in new housing units, or even ones that are operational now, and all of a sudden we have neighborhood issues, we should be able to go to them and say we’re not going to get bylaw here everyday to stand guard. And say it’s on you to provide security for the neighboring businesses and houses, because the problem is coming from your housing unit.”

City staff will also look into funding for doing daily patrols downtown and on the Tranquille corridor. As proposed, it would mean patrols being done eight hours per day, seven days per week. Mayor Christian and Coun. Sinclair were against it, as the motion passed by a 6-2 vote.

The city will also now start a “security camera registration program,” where businesses can supply footage to police. That proposal passed unanimously, by a 9-0 vote.

Christian emphasized this is not surveillance of any public places.

“We’re talking about utilizing already existing camera systems that are surveilling private businesses and may spill out onto the street or the back alley, that kind of thing. But I don’t want the public to be over-convinced that this will stop some of the wanton acts of vandalism and things that go on.”

Christian says even clear video evidence of crimes may not lead to convictions, which he says does not address the problem.

Council also voted to have BC Housing make council aware of any issues before deciding on future social housing projects.

Meanwhile, council has directed staff to investigate how it could spend up to half a million dollars on preventing and alleviating issues on the streets.

Councillor Kathy Sinclair says there are street-affected people causing issues who are in need of complex care. She says those people may have brain damage and mental health issues and may not even known they’re unwell.

“And so the result is, we get fires being started, we get people defecating all over the place, we get people in distress causing distress to everybody else. RCMP is not going to fix this issue, Corrections is not going to fix this, and there’s no other place for these folks to go. So this is an attempt to say, let’s get these people some help.”

The original motion from Coun. Dale Bass had called for spending up to $500,000 for 24-7 outreach support, for daytime spaces and storage space for street-affected people, and for more temporary housing in the long-term, such as tiny homes.

Bass says the amended motion that council passed misses the point in the short-term.

“My concern was that we were getting deep into the weeds here. We’re a governance body, and we should just set the goverance goals and say to staff ‘go operationalize it.’ But at this time, (council members) weren’t quite willing to do that.”

The money has been proposed to come from COVID-19 Safe Restart Funding from the B.C. government. Coun. Sadie Hunter says that would be an “entirely appropriate” pot of money to pull from, saying social issues have been amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It’s critical. It’s not just the vulnerable populations that are feeling the extra strain of COVID-19. And it’s very visible. Even walking downtown on my way here today, I was sworn at, I was threatened. And it’s a very common experience for many of our residents.”

Staff will come back to council with recommendations at a later date.