Lighthouse doorway makes cold bed during snowstorm

As blowing snowgives Saskatoon a taste of the coming winter chill, a member of the homeless community says people are sleeping outside The Lighthouse because they can't get funding to access the shelter.

Last week, the provincial government announced it would not provide any new funding to the shelter's stabilization unit because only five people in the program had been able to access stable housing.

• The Lighthouse worries cuts may hurt people who use Sask. shelters

"Government cannot provide new money beyond what we have already agreed upon to The Lighthouse because we do not believe that the stabilization unit has produced enough long term, meaningful results," a government spokesperson said in an email.

Cracking down

The unit was created in 2013 to give people who were intoxicated or under the influence a place to sleep, keeping them out of jail cells and emergency rooms.

The province has also cracked down on the shelter's increasing use of emergency access per diems from the Ministry of Social Services.

It said The Lighthouse had been claiming per diems to shelter people who were being funded to stay elsewhere long-term.

Sleeping outside

Patricia Cuthand, who stayed at the shelter Tuesdaynight, said there was a group of people sleeping outside the shelterbecause they couldn't get funding.

"The whole doorway was full of people and they were pretty cold," she said.

"They were pretty worried about where they are going to stay, you know, just to keep warm, and about not being able to get funded to stay at the Lighthouse."

Tommy Morningchild said he would have been on the street if he hadn't sleptat The Lighthouse.

"I was just walking around and that snowstorm came and it was pretty cold and wet and it was miserable," said Morningchild.

"That's about it. I'm just glad the Lighthouse is letting me stay there.

"Or otherwise I'd be on the street looking for a place right now."

'The hardest decision to make'

The executive director of the Lighthouse said Tuesday night wasn't the first night the shelter had to turn people away.

Don Windels said they've had to turn away more than 20 people in a night due to the shortage in funding.

"It's been the hardest decision to make," Windels said, adding that many people who need to use the stabilization unit don't have anywhere else to go.

Windels said the shelter has been trying to figure out what will happen now, with one idea being that it will use a lottery system to determine who will be given refuge for the night.

"One shelter, what they did is they put people's names in the hat, and for those that are supported for that night in other words, if we got donations to support one person, one person would be able to come in."

Nowhere else to go

Windels said, in essence, the definition of homelessness has changed. In terms of funding for the Lighthouse, it now doesn't include people who have shelter available somewhere else.

However, Windels pointed out that although some of the people who had been using the stabilization shelter had other places to stay, they may not have been able to go there. One example would be someone who is intoxicated who is supposed to be staying in an alcohol-free location.

Despite the shortage offunding, Windels said the decision must have been difficult for the province to make.

"I think that they didn't look at all the facts and maybe all of the ramifications of this because these are people. They are important. They all have names. They all have lives, stories. They all have families."

In a news release, the province noted it will continue to support people who do not have an alternate source of shelter, or shelter funding.

The Ministry of Social Services said it's under contract to provide $762,000 in base funding to the Lighthouse, and that will not change.

In a statement last week, the Lighthouse said to date in 2016, there have been over 440 unique individuals that have utilized the stabilization shelter.