Windsor’s warming bus initiative comes to an end after 55 days on the road

A warming bus initiative meant to help people experiencing homelessness in Windsor has come to an end.

The temporary service was launched on Feb. 23, 2024 thanks to $1.1 million in one-time federal funding from the Reaching Home: Canada’s Homelessness Strategy Program.

“The initiative first started out being a warming bus initiative ensuring that people had a warm place to stay during the night. But clearly we also wanted to take it to the next level and ensure that they were being provided with support in our community, whether it be housing supports or health needs,” said Andrew Daher, human and health services commissioner at the City of Windsor.

In the 55 days since the program launched, more than 1,800 individuals used the unique service, according to Daher.

The warming bus initiative was a partnership between the City of Windsor’s Human and Health Services Department, Transit Windsor and the Downtown Mission.

“We're hoping that the federal government will come back next year around the exact same time and provide the same winter funding,” Daher said.

The program saw a designated Transit Windsor bus run on a predetermined route that started and finished at the Homelessness and Housing Help Hub (H4), targeting core areas of the city, as well as stopping at emergency shelters and other drop-in programs with extended hours.

“We had two individuals that used the bus every single day and once the staff started coordinating and engaging with them, they found that they were developing a friendship,” Daher explained. “And after that friendship, guess what happened? We were able to connect them into some market rental supportive housing that now they're both living in. They're off the street. They're no longer homeless and they're actually sharing a two bedroom apartment.”

“A 17 year old came onto the bus for the first time and when the staff started engaging with that individual, we found out that he was homeless for about five days. Literally, within 24 hours, we were able to get him connected into housing, and now he's been supported in our community, and quite frankly, these are the type of stories that we should be focusing on,” he continued.

“We need to continue to piggyback off the successes,” added Daher. “These successes can now transform into the revitalization strategies that the mayor and council just brought forward as part of the downtown revitalization.”

Daher said even though the initiative was a success, paying for it to continue would not be sustainable.

“Unfortunately, just to do the cost of it, it's not sustainable on the municipal tax base, and if I was given a million dollars or so to actually do any type of initiative, I would be focusing on permanent supportive housing," he said. "That's what we need in our community.”

“We got $1.1 million for federal funding and not all of it went to this initiative. We provided some crash mats for the Downtown Mission. We also extended the hours for all three of our shelters, so that's what that funding was used for,” Daher said.

“I think it went really well,” added Rukshini Ponniah-Goulin, executive director of the Downtown Mission. “I'm really thankful that it provided opportunities for people to access some sort of shelter.”

“I think the greater win was that we were able to connect people with other services in the community, whether it be at night or during the day for ongoing support and just moving forward in life for individuals who are ready for that,” continued Ponniah-Goulin. “Obviously, we would hope that in the future that because of the success we saw this time around, and it was a very short time around from when the funds actually came to us, that hopefully next year, next winter that we would be able to see something like this happen again.”

Daher noted a potential strike at Transit Windsor prevented the initiative from launching sooner than it did.

Ponniah-Goulin said, “There were some days and weeks that it was pretty cold and it was definitely a warming bus at that time or for those nights. But yeah, absolutely. If we are able to do something like this again in the future, obviously we would hope we would be able to do it earlier.”

“It's definitely worth looking into for next year and future winters,” Ponniah-Goulin added.