Image Credit: CFJC Today / Kent Simmonds

By Dylana Kneeshaw

WINTER SHELTER ADJUSTMENT

Kamloops councillor believes emergency shelter temperature threshold should rise to the freezing mark

Jan 18, 2024 | 5:30 PM

KAMLOOPS — The BC Coroner’s Service has released new data showing 36 outdoor deaths have been reported to the agency in the first 16 days of this month. In comparison, there were 34 outdoor deaths reported during the same timeframe last year. Twelve of the recently reported outdoor fatalities took place within the Interior Health region.

According to the coroners service, outdoor deaths include those that take place in public spaces, such as streets, sidewalks, parking lots, parks, or residential yards or driveways. Vehicle-related deaths, or those classified as suicide or homicide, are excluded.

The cause of the recent 36 province-wide outdoor deaths is not confirmed. However, a Kamloops city councillor says those fatalities are part of why she wants an adjustment made to the level of cold weather that activates emergency winter shelters.

“That’s two (deaths) a day,” notes Councillor Dale Bass. “Twelve of them, I believe, were here in the Interior Health area. I don’t know how many were in Kamloops.”

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Given the recent cold snap the southern Interior has been dealing with, Bass says she doesn’t want to see hypothermia driving up outdoor death numbers.

“In Vancouver, you don’t get treated for shelter until it’s 0 C, and up here it’s -10 C. That’s not right.”

Bass will be putting forward a notice of motion at next Tuesday’s (Jan. 23) council meeting to begin the process of adjusting the temperature threshold the city uses to determine when emergency weather shelters are opened. Currently, if the mercury hits -10 C or lower, then the city activates emergency response weather shelters. Bass wants to raise the temperature threshold to 0 C.

This season, the 30-bed Kamloops emergency response winter shelter is operated by the Mustard Seed at the Kamloops Alliance Church using funding from BC Housing.

It will take some planning if council votes to make this change, as it will mean more operational periods for the emergency winter shelter.

“There’s things that roll from this obviously (such as) building capacity for the agencies that run them. Making sure that could start say, in early November. It’s hard to tell with climate change anymore. And that’s an issue for the provincial government to address.”

According to Bass, the cost to the taxpayer would be through the province, as BC Housing funds the current shelters. She’s confident the province will make the adjustment happen, as it will also follow current BC CDC recommendations.

“I dove into all the causes of hypothermia, and what the BC Centres for Disease control had been saying on it, and they say it should be 0 C throughout the province.”

The motion will be presented to council on Jan. 23, and should it go forward, it will be debated around the horseshoe at the following council meeting.

“It’s a no-brainer. Who’s going to say, ‘Yeah, let’s leave them out in -10 C?'” adds Bass.