By Don White.

Maybe it was the August break. At their first regular meeting on August 31, members of Nanaimo Council were sufficiently relaxed to let show their willingness to take personal responsibility for moving our city forward. In fact, their debate on one particular issue amounted to a workshop on how personal willingness to act – not just talk – influences the Council’s voting predilections. You can view the entire lesson online beginning at 2:00:10.

The issue and motion on the table was whether the City should send a letter to BC Housing expressing interest in having a Navigation Centre (a hybrid shelter, purpose-built supportive housing facility for the homeless) sited in Nanaimo. Victoria has indicated its intention to fund two such centres, one on Vancouver Island, to provide secure beds as well as the needed, wrap-around health care services for a number of hard-to-house homeless.

Nanaimo staff asked Council to provide direction on whether to proceed. Councillors Bonner and Hemmens moved that the Mayor send an expression of interest to Victoria of the City’s interest for hosting a navigation centre that came with an agreement for Island Health to provide the needed health care services to its residents. Everyone weighed into the debate, however, the positions taken by Ian Thorpe, Leonard Krog, and Bonner-Hemmens define the full range of Council’s attitudes on taking personal action for resolving the problems that plague our city.

Ian Thorpe referenced concerns already raised by Armstrong as to why she would not support the motion and used them as a springboard to his own position. Given the lack of existing support from Island Health for mental illness and addiction issues – issues that underlie many of the homeless cases – Thorpe would not support an expression of interest in Nanaimo having just the navigation centre. Were this a proposal for a treatment centre, he’d be for it. As it stood, however, he’d be voting no to sending the letter to BC Housing.

Krog agreed the problem is less about homelessness per se as it is lack of support by other levels of government for treating mental illness and substance addiction. But the current ask of Council is only an expression of interest in funding to help deal with the problems locally. The uncertainty of such a centre’s success can’t be reliably estimated at this time, however, if Island Health fails to provide the needed services, he’ll withdraw his support. Krog concluded that not expressing interest to BC Housing at this time would be imprudent.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Bonner and Hemmens were the most committed to moving things forward – even without guarantees of Island Health support. As co-chairs of Nanaimo’s Health and Housing Task Force, they appear to most clearly understand the possible advantages and/or disadvantages of the proposed navigation centre. In Hemmen’s words, they have been working for two years now to enable a facility like this.

As is her way, Hemmens had done extensive research on similar facilities and believed, given our dire current situation, that Council would be “silly” not to write a letter expressing interest in the centre. As this Council’s bulldog, Don Bonner is probably the most action-oriented and tenacious person at the table. Doing nothing, he argued, is worse than giving the navigation centre proposed by BC Housing a chance. If it is unsuccessful, Council can simply try something else. Neither Bonner nor Hemmens put conditions on their approval.

Neither did Maartman, Brown, nor Geselbracht. Maartman, in possibly her most clearly articulated and impassioned speech this term, was all in with her support. If this centre will take 60 of those hardest to house individuals out of the city’s doorways, she’s for it. So were Councillors Geselbracht and Brown. That Nanaimo currently lacks all necessary provincial and federal health resources to make this centre work optimally is not a reason to reject it. Nor is our not knowing exactly how it will turn out. We can put the needed infrastructure in place and learn as we move forward.

Turley didn’t speak for or against the motion, but voted with the majority. The motion to express interest in the facility to BC Housing Result passed, with only Armstrong and Thorpe opposing. But voting aside, it’s worth analyzing the three different positions held by their main proponents.

By rejecting the motion outright, Thorpe puts himself, and council, into the position of waiting for others to make the move. If BC Housing doesn’t come up with an entirely different proposal, nothing happens. The status quo remains unchanged. By not proposing his own initiative, Thorpe remains passive and emphatically reactive – only responding to proposals made by others – unfortunately his too common stance on the current Council.

The prudent approach argued by Leonard Krog can be successful – but also only provided others move along the way. Should the supports for mental illness and substance addiction pledged by Island Health fail to materialize, a conditional supporter like Krog withdraws his/her approval. At that point, Krog votes no and Nanaimo winds up in the same position as it does with Ian Thorpe – waiting for others to propose solutions. The difference between the approaches of Thorpe and Krog is only the point at which things stall.

Conditional approval, therefore, regardless of whether it is prudent, also puts the power of change in the hands of others. It also fosters dependence, self-helplessness. In the case at hand, instead of our own elected officials and paid staff working towards solutions, Island Health determines whether we will advance in solving the problems of homelessness, mental illness, and drug addition – a truly frightening prospect, as we’ve seen.

Blind action/acceptance is certainly no answer, but neither is refusing to take personal, unconditional responsibility to change as much as you are able. In the final analysis, the quality of our community will always/only result from what we do ourselves. By refusing to sideline self-reliance and by accepting personal responsibility to resolve existing problems, as much as possible, we reduce our passive dependency on the whims of others.

In terms of the issue debated at the August 31 meeting, by choosing to be “hopeful” and not making her support conditional, Hemmens combines her research-based support with the action-oriented Bonner. Together, they commit unconditionally to moving things forward as much as they are able. They take on personally working to achieve that little bit more than what is merely possible, that small bit that constitutes improvement. For the long run, Bonner and Hemmens position themselves as the real change agents on this Council.