Coalition assisting refugees demands action to help asylum seekers sleeping on Toronto streets

On a day that city officials are set to meet with their provincial and federal counterparts about aid for refugee settlement efforts, a coalition of groups working with asylum seekers in Toronto is calling on all levels of government to act immediately to help newcomers to Canada who have been locked out of the city's overwhelmed shelter system.

At a press conference held Friday near Toronto's shelter intake office at Peter and Richmond streets downtown, a host of speakers demanded that politicians stop pointing fingers and start doing something to address a problem that has left asylum seekers from Africa and other locales sleeping outside because there is no shelter space.

One of those speakers was Kizito Musabimana, the founder and executive director of the Rwandan Canadian Healing Centre, who came to Canada from Rwanda as a refugee in 2000.

"The country that I came to, the country that saved me, was not this," he said.

"The federal government is pointing fingers … the city was pointing fingers or at least saying they need help, and the provincial government of course sometimes is not at the table. We want everybody to get at the table and answer to everybody here," he said, to chants of "now" from the amassed crowd.

Toronto's at-capacity shelter system has been turning away refugees and asylum seekers since the beginning of June and referring them to federal programs, saying it needs more financial support from the federal government. However, many asylum seekers can't get federal help if their claims haven't been fully granted, leaving dozens of them stuck in limbo with nowhere to sleep.

Asuman Najib Ssali, who told CBC News he left Uganda because he and his family faced persecution for opposition to the government, said Friday he has been forced to sleep outside and is waiting for government assistance.

"We sleep outside here. We stay here as we wait for the government to help us," he said.

"What we expected, it's not what we're seeing."

In a statement, Mayor Olivia Chow said senior staff from all three levels of government are set to meet Friday afternoon to "discuss immediate and long-term solutions to the crisis.

"Toronto's shelters are full. Over a third of their residents are refugees," Chow said. "Our City is currently serving 3,000 refugees each night, including those fleeing the war in Ukraine, in both dedicated refugee shelter spaces and in our base shelter system. 

"The Federal Government must recognize this is a crisis and partner with the City to address it."

Chow said she is looking for "concrete solutions for the end of the immediate crisis," on top of a longer-term plan to provide shelter for refugees when they arrive.

That would include, she says, $157 million for what the city is spending for existing refugee shelter spaces, support with additional housing and personnel, and a significant expansion of a rent supplement program so people can be moved into housing.