What’s the winter plan to ensure no one dies in the cold? Rally and petition

This past year, the City of Ottawa closed the emergency overnight shelters held at Bernard Grand Maître Arena, Dempsey Community Centre, Heron Road Community Centre, and the Graham Spry Building under the premise of having created capacity within Ottawa’s existing shelter system.

Ottawa’s shelters have approximately 950 beds and Ottawa’s homeless population is nearing 3,000. There are drop-in facilities, including HART Hubs, Belong Ottawa, and Centre 507 but they do not offer places to sleep. Their hours and capacity are also limited and can be inconsistent.

The City’s 10 Year Housing and Homelessness Plan set out to have “no one unsheltered” by the end of 2024. Kale Brown, Ottawa’s Manager of Homelessness Programs and Shelters, insists there is a warm bed for everyone. However, front-line workers and unhoused neighbors know that most of the resources celebrated by the City are simply not enough. In addition, as of October 2025, Ottawa Public Health irresponsibly lists outdated overflow shelters that have been permanently closed. There are currently no clear, dignified solutions to ensure that nobody suffers or dies in the cold.

Local politicians think they will solve homelessness in Ottawa by quoting the City’s false promises instead of listening to the realities of unhoused folks, their loved ones, and front-line workers on the ground. We urgently need multiple warming centres that:

– Remain open from the 20th of December 2025 to the 20th of March of 2026 (staffed by experienced and trauma-informed workers, operated 24 hours 7 days a week)

– Have sleep capacity in the form of beds, cots, or mats (making people sleep on chairs is inhumane)

– Apply the City’s own shelter standards of equity and inclusion to these facilities

Have several accessible locations (with transport available for service users)

Leave no one behind (which means no one turned away)

This winter, without proper emergency solutions in place, our unhoused community members and loved ones will continue to suffer serious injuries or die.

No more unloading of a governmental responsibility onto non-profit and precariously funded organizations. No more empty talk. No more excuses. We need concrete actions and a guaranteed winter plan by November 26th 2025 so we can trust a plan will be operational in time as the weather gets colder.

Join us on Wednesday, November 19 at 4 pm to demand an immediate winter plan and a commitment to opening warming centres from the City of Ottawa. We will meet at 110 Laurier Avenue West, by the Dorothy O’Connell Monument to Anti-Poverty Activism located in the south lawn of Ottawa City Hall.

Enter your information into the Action Network tool to send a petition email to Mayor Mark Sutcliffe, General Manager of Community and Social Services Clara Freire, Manager of Housing and Homelessness Kale Brown, and City Councillors. The tool will ask you for an address. If you don’t have one, or don’t want to share your address, please list the address of a nearby community health centre or library.
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/ottawa-whats-the-winter-plan