Ontario to end funding for supervised consumption sites this spring, closing 2 in Ottawa

The Ontario government is pulling its funding from Ottawa’s two supervised consumption sites to focus on HART hubs. CTV’s Austin Lee reports.

Premier Doug Ford is defending the Ontario government’s decision to end provincial funding for supervised consumption sites in Ottawa, Toronto and other cities this spring, saying the new Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment (HART) Hubs will “help people.”

The province announced Monday morning that Ontario will end provincial funding in the next 90 days for the seven active drug injection sites in Ontario, including the supervised consumption sites at Ottawa Inner City Health and the Sandy Hill Community Health Centre in Ottawa.

“We aren’t encouraging handing out needles and drugs and there’s no community that wants it. We’re putting in an investment of over $550 million in HART Hubs that are going to help people, get them proper shelter, get them the support they need, get them employment if they need,” Ford told reporters in Brockville, Ont.

“What I don’t believe in is sticking these injection sites in the middle of a community, down the street from a school, needles are all over the place. It’s like giving an alcoholic a card for the LCBO and saying, ‘OK, go in there and go to town.’

“I’m passionate about this, by the way, and that’s why I approved more than half a billion dollars. I don’t want to hurt these people; I want to help them.”

Ontario says it is initiating a 90-day wind-down period for the facilities, “to give clients time to transition to the support provided by their local HART hub.”

“During this period the government will work directly with the municipalities and community partners to ensure a safe, coordinated wind-down of provincial funding for the drug injection sites and successful transition into the new model of recovery,” the province said in a statement.

Ontario has opened 28 HART Hubs across the province, with the government saying they deliver “recovery-focused care and supports” in the community, with two hubs operating in Ottawa.

The Pinecrest Queensway Community Health Centre’s HART Hub offers primary care, mental health and addictions services, mental health and addiction supportive housing and other services.  The Ottawa HART Hub on Eccles Street offers a 24/7 health care model that integrates primary care, mental health, substance use treatment, housing with supports and health systems navigation.

Ottawa Inner City Health and the Sandy Hill Community Health Centre said over the weekend they received notice on Friday that the funding for their supervised consumption sites will be withdrawn.

“We are deeply concerned about what this decision signals for the people who rely on these services to keep themselves safe and connected, the people doing this critical work, and the communities in which they work,” the two organizations said in a statement on Saturday.

Sandy Hill Community Health Centre consumption and treatment services director Dean Dewar hopes the province will reconsider.

“I am quite devastated. I’m concerned for our clients, concerned for the staff who work at both safe injection sites and for the community members. I think this will mean a lot more open drug use,” said Dewar.

“In the last six months, we have responded to over 250 overdoses here. That would be a major strain if that went to the hospital system.”

Dewar told CTV News Ottawa the province has informed the organizations to direct services to the HART hub located inside the Somerset West Community Health Centre.

It’s a move he says will result in an influx of clients at the Centretown location.

“That’s a lot of people being re-directed with both Sandy Hill Community Health Centre and Ottawa Inner City Health referring our clients there. That’s a significant amount of people and quite high acuity,” he said.

Ottawa Inner City Health CEO Rob Boyd told Newstalk 580 CFRA they thought there was a “risk” the Ontario government would shut down the facility.

“I held on to some hope that, given the size and volume of the service at the trailer, that the government would seriously consider not shutting it down,” Boyd said Monday morning.

“Still, it came as a complete surprise and shock to us, and we were given very little timeline to kind of respond to what it is the government is asking us to do.”

Boyd says the Ottawa Inner City Health trailer has seen between 600 and 900 visits in recent months.

“When the trailer closes, that behaviour is going to continue; it’s just not going to be happening in the trailer. It’s going to be happening in the local community,” Boyd said.

“Obviously, we’re going to see an increase in the amount of public drug consumption that’s happening and we’re also going to have a lot more delayed responses to overdoses as a consequence to this.”

Rideau-Vanier Coun. Stephanie Plante said she “was and wasn’t surprised” the Ontario government is withdrawing funding.

“The premier had sort of mentioned several times he was not a fan of these sites,” Plante told Newstalk 580 CFRA’s Ottawa at Work with Patricia Boal.

“I was sort of surprised at the 90 days. The drug supply isn’t the most reliable thing, so hopefully this will give them some time to pivot; maybe they’ll pivot to other programming.”

Plante said supervised consumption sites do “connect people.”

“They are kind of a lifeline for people who come in every day, they see a nurse, they can do things like get wound care, they’re talking to a frontline worker, they see familiar faces. It is a way to keep people with addictions, who often have a lot of shame and stigma, connected to people that they know in the community and connected to healthcare services,” Plante said.

Plante said organizations that offer “outreach services” to connect with people, “will have to pick up the slack.”

In October, the Ottawa Public Health supervised consumption site on Clarence Street was forced to close after the Ontario government did not endorse the renewal of an exemption the site needed to continue operations. Last spring, the supervised drug consumption site was forced to close at the Somerset West Community Health Centre because of its close proximity to schools and childcare centres.

The Ontario government introduced new rules in 2024 that prohibit consumption sites within 200 metres of a school or a childcare facility.

With files from CTV News Ottawa’s Adam Beauchemin and Austin Lee

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