'This is a community': City struggling to cope with humanitarian crisis in Pleasant Hill

Dr. Ephthymia Kutsogiannis is running out of options to solve a growing problem outside of her dental clinic.

"I've been in the area for over 30 years and the last seven to eight years I've noticed a tremendous change in that specific block. Basically a degradation of the area," Kutsogiannis said.

Kutsogiannis told members of city council’s community services committee about her increasing concerns about the safety and cleanliness of the street around Pleasant Hill Dental Centre, which she owns and operates in the 1500 block of 20th Street West.

She called the surrounding area “an encampment,” which is located nearly next door to a Saskatoon Tribal Council health centre, Prairie Harm Reduction, the Westside Community Clinic and other organizations that serve vulnerable people.

"I'm very concerned and very disgruntled at what has been occurring, and very concerned about my safety and people's safety in the area," she said.

"What I have to deal with day in, day out, I don't think anyone else in the city has to deal with — and it's getting to be overbearing."

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Kutsogiannis says she has had to delay appointments because of people sleeping in her doorway and refusing to leave until police respond. She has found human feces in front of her business, and has grown tired of trash piling up as people offered free meals by nearby organizations discard their trash in front of her clinic.

She said she wants the city to "start doing something" about the garbage and people camping on the sidewalks, adding that she has found police to be very helpful in her many conversations with them, but she's not interested in additional meetings without any results.

"The issues of encampments, of garbage, are not things we want on any block," Mayor Charlie Clark said.

"So we are working to mobilize efforts around clean up; around the likelihood of encampments."

Toby Esterby is the chief operations officer of the Saskatoon Community Clinic. He disagrees with Kutsogiannis' assessment of degradation of the community.

Esterby says what he sees being degraded are the social services people need most.

"It's a degradation of the services and supports that should exist to lift people out of poverty, to lift people out of episodic or chronic homelessness, and to lift people out of significant trauma and health concerns," Esterby said.

Esterby also agrees the area could use some help. He rarely sees anyone from the city cleaning up trash on the ground or emptying trash bins, but he is used to seeing other parts of town cleaned up multiple times a day.

"We create a safe place for people to be feel welcome. We create a safe place for people to not be chased away. We create a safe place for people to talk to someone about the challenges that they're facing. And what they're going through," he said.

Without a place to wash their hands, use the washroom or do any basic personal care, Esterby says the 1500 block of 20th Street West has become their home.

"When you get to know people, you realize that this is a community of people that are gathering just as any of the rest of us would in our neighborhoods, they are gathering in their community," he said.

With the task of solving homelessness being much more complex than moving homelessness out of sight, Esterby says people will continue to gather outside the front doors as long as they feel welcome.

"We need to have places for people to go," Clark said. "We need provincial support in that coordinated effort. The challenge is that every month we have more people homeless and on the street."

Esterby feels the homelessness crisis in Saskatoon will get worse before it gets better, and that social issues need to become a priority for the greater population.

"We need to tip this upside down," he said. "We need to start taking care of each other."

At last month's board of police commissioners meeting, Saskatoon police revealed it is nearly ready to deploy three officers to the force's community mobilization unit to patrol that specific block once they finish training.

Another three officers are being redeployed from general patrol to further expand foot patrols in Pleasant Hill.