The City of Kamloops is hoping to get help from a provincial government program that provides teams to combat homeless encampments and connects people to temporary housing.

The Homeless Encampment Action Response Temporary Housing Program or – HEARTH – sees municipalities work with the province on fast-tracking local solutions to large homeless encampments. It is largely tasked with tackling larger, entrenched encampments of unhoused people.

City of Kamloops Social, Housing, and Community Development Manager, Carmin Mazzotta, says council and staff are advocating for a memorandum of understanding with the government – through BC Housing.

“What you’ve seen is communities who have had large, entrenched encampments like Kelowna or Prince George or Abbotsford, you’ve seen the Ministry establish MOU’s with those municipalities,” he said.

“This is what has allowed say – Kelowna to move forward on those 60 tiny homes for unhoused individuals and the sixty modular units that are going to be up and opening as well this winter.”

Those agreements formalize the commitments from the province and communities that sign them – to work together.

Cities commit to bring forward available land and expedite land-use decisions for new shelter and supportive-housing projects funded by government.

“Council continues to advocate for the city to be brought in as part of that program,” Mazzotta said. “We may not have large, entrenched encampments that have caught the eye of the province but as we all know we have dispersed encampments across the city.”

“We think that’s warranted, and then that program would enable those funds to flow to get additional shelter space and rapid response housing space which we need.”