Halifax made 'conscious decision' to keep date it would clear encampments secret

Sheri Lecker remembers Aug. 18 as a hot day, a day when she had to carry water with her to refresh people who had just lost many of their most important belongings. 

Halifax police were breaking up a series of tent encampments where homeless residents had been living, and Lecker was rushing around the city trying to find housing for people who were displaced. Hotels were mostly full of tourists and shelters had few beds. 

"I remember one person didn't have ID," she said of a group of people she met that afternoon. "They didn't have phones. They didn't know who to connect with. Where were they going to go? What should they do?" 

If Lecker, the executive director of Adsum for Women and Children, a Halifax-based organization that helps find safe housing for hundreds of people every year, had known the removal was coming that day, she said she might have been able to do more to help those living at the sites. 

"Maybe it wouldn't have changed the answer for where they were staying that night, but it would have lessened some of the trauma that they experienced and the chaos of the day," she said. 

But she did not know what was about to happen, and that was by design. 

According to documents obtained by CBC under access-to-information laws, the city's chief administrative officer said there was a "conscious decision" not to make the date known to service providers like Adsum. It's unclear exactly who made that decision, but there was concern advance warning would pose "serious risks" to the operation and staff.

Lecker feels the municipality's choice seriously damaged the trust between the municipality and some of the housing and homelessness organizations that work in the city, and harmed the homeless residents who were displaced that day. 

Early on the morning of Aug. 18, Halifax police began to remove tents put up by people living in Halifax parks at Horseshoe Island, Peace and Friendship Park, and the Common. They also removed tents and wooden shelters put up by a group called Halifax Mutual Aid at the old Central Library grounds on Spring Garden Road. 

Hundreds of people gathered for a protest around the wooden shelters on the old library site, attempting to physically block police and municipal employees from removing the structures. During the afternoon police used pepper spray on the crowd and 24 people were arrested and charged. 

The first public warning that something was about to happen came on Aug. 16, two days before the removals. The city placed approximately 40 notices on tents and shelters, telling the people inside that living in parks is illegal and directing them to move out, or risk being fined or arrested. 

But unlike a previous set of notices the city sent out in July — notices it later said it wouldn't enforce — there was no deadline given to remove the shelters.  

On the same morning, the city's CAO, Jacques Dubé, sent a message to the mayor and councillors, telling them the notices were being posted. 

"We intend to remove all tents and temporary shelters at some future date and will advise when that operation begins," Dubé wrote.