Homelessness, Public Safety, and the Future of Quesnel after a Divisive Election
The signs have been taken down and the ballots counted; however, the most difficult conversation in Quesnel is far from over.
Homelessness and public safety were two major fault lines in the lead up to the election. Downtown business owners spoke out about the toll that property crime, discarded needles, and operating in an increasingly tense environment has had on them. Residents voiced genuine concern about feeling unsafe in shared public spaces. At the same time, dozens of unhoused neighbours continue to navigate the harsh realities of daily survival – searching for a dry place to rest, attempting to access stretched community services, and making the long journey towards permanent housing.
Too often these realities are framed as a zero-sum conflict: either we clean up downtown at the expense of our most vulnerable, or we support people experiencing homelessness by simply accepting disorder on our streets.
But these are not necessarily opposing goals.
A healthy community can validate the real hardships of unhoused residents while taking the frustrations of local merchants and neighbourhoods seriously. We can champion harm reduction and mental health supports while maintaining orderly, welcoming public spaces. And we can celebrate the incredible dedication of local outreach workers while acknowledging that our current housing crisis remains an urgent, unresolved challenge.
The question facing Quesnel now isn’t simply where unhoused people should go when they are asked to move. It is what real, lasting progress looks like for everyone who calls this city home.
Understanding Homelessness in Quesnel
To make meaningful progress, we have to look past assumptions and understand what homelessness actually looks like in our community. In April 2025, Quesnel’s point-in-time homeless count identified 131 people experiencing homelessness – a steady climb from 127 in 2023 and 121 in 2020.
Of those counted in 2025, 92 people were classified as experiencing unsheltered homelessness. That statistic, however, requires a closer look. In point-in-time counts, “unsheltered” doesn’t only refer to someone sleeping in an alleyway or a tent; it also includes people couch-surfing or staying temporarily with friends or family in unstable arrangements. In fact, 57% of those counted as unsheltered in Quesnel were staying temporarily with others.
What we see on the sidewalks along Reid Street or in public parks is only the most visible tip of the iceberg. Behind closed doors, many of our neighbours are bouncing between temporary couches and precarious living situations, one broken relationship or sudden conflict away from being out on the street.
The data also challenges the persistent idea that homelessness in Quesnel is primarily an imported issue. When asked about their ties to the community, an overwhelming 88% of respondents had lived in Quesnel for at least one year, 76% had lived here for five years or longer, and 44% reported having lived here their entire lives. While individual stories vary, the broader reality is clear: the people struggling on our streets are our neighbours, classmates, and long-time residents.
For most of them, this is not a short-term bump in the road. Approximately 70% of respondents reported being homeless for a year or more. When instability lasts that long, it compounds. When asked what led to their loss of housing, people cited a familiar web of overlapping factors: insufficient income, substance use, mental health struggles, and evictions. These aren’t isolated causes; they tend to trigger one another. An unexpected illness leads to lost wages, missed rent turns into an eviction, and the trauma of living on the street deepens mental health and substance-use challenges.
Because homelessness is rooted in these layered crises, no single intervention will ever be enough to solve it.
The Services Already Supporting Quesnel
It’s important to recognize that Quesnel is not starting from scratch. We have a dedicated network of housing providers, shelter operators, outreach workers, and health teams working tirelessly every day to keep people safe.
At the front line is Seasons House, operated by the Quesnel Shelter & Support Society. Beyond providing emergency shelter and warm meals, their team offers transitional housing, personalized case planning, advocacy, and referrals. For someone in crisis, a bed at Seasons House provides the immediate breathing room needed to connect with broader support systems.
Further along the housing continuum is Bridges Supportive Housing. With 28 self-contained studio apartments and four supportive recovery units, Bridges offers permanent, subsidized homes paired with individualized care. Residents have access to around-the-clock staff who help with life skills, medical appointments, and personal recovery goals. Supportive housing like Bridges demonstrates that ending homelessness requires more than just four walls; it requires ongoing, tailored support that helps people sustain their independence.
A pivotal piece of our local infrastructure is The Grace on Carson Avenue. Originally established as emergency shelter during the COVID-19 pandemic, the site continues to provide temporary accommodation while BC Housing moves forward with a permanent supportive housing development. Once completed around 2028, the proposed building will offer up to 50 studio apartments with integrated support services, providing a much-needed long-term bridge out of the shelter system.
Together, these facilities represent a practical continuum: emergency shelters offer immediate crisis relief, transitional housing bridges the gap, and supportive housing creates long-term stability. None of these models can solve the crisis alone, but each plays an indispensable role.
When winter sets in, that safety net becomes a matter of life and death. In a northern climate where freezing temperatures arrive quickly, emergency overnight shelter and daytime warming spaces are vital. Quesnel’s cold-weather response relies on close coordination between the City, BC Housing, the Quesnel Shelter & Support Society, and the Quesnel Tillicum Society Native Friendship Centre.
While debates over where to locate winter shelters have sparked difficult conversations at City Hall, the underlying reality never changes: when winter arrives, every human being in this community needs a safe, warm space to survive. The frontline workers managing these services didn’t create our housing crisis; they are simply managing its consequences within the limits of the funding and resources available to them.
The Reality for Downtown Businesses
While supporting unhoused residents is critical, the lived experience of our business community must be an equal part of the equation.
In November 2025, representatives from the Downtown, West Quesnel, and South Quesnel Business Improvement Areas, alongside the Quesnel and District Chamber of Commerce, brought their concerns directly to city council. They spoke candidly about rising property crime, open drug use, and the mounting pressure on municipal cleanup and bylaw services.
These concerns are valid and deserve genuine action. Small business owners invest their life savings and countless hours into their enterprises. Their staff deserve to feel safe coming to work, and residents should be able to walk down the street or take their children to a park without feeling intimidated. When storefronts face repeated vandalism, theft, and discarded drug paraphernalia, it threatens local livelihoods and chips away at community pride.
At the same time, we need to maintain clarity in how we talk about these challenges. Homelessness, substance use, and criminal activity are not the same thing. While they can intersect, they are distinct issues. Not everyone living without a home uses illicit drugs, not everyone dealing with addiction is unhoused, and being homeless does not make someone responsible for neighborhood crime. Sweeping generalizations only deepen stigma and make practical problem-solving harder.
It’s also worth remembering that unhoused people face severe safety risks of their own. Sleeping outdoors leaves individuals vulnerable to violence, theft, exploitation, exposure, and medical crises. Someone shivering in an alleyway is often just as frightened for their personal safety as the business owner opening their shop down the street. The circumstances are vastly different, but the fundamental need for safety is shared by all of us. Quesnel does not have to choose between protecting its local economy and treating vulnerable people with dignity; a thoughtful community strategy must do both.
Meeting People Where They Are
Securing stable housing is the ultimate goal, but for many people on the street, moving into an apartment tomorrow isn’t immediately possible. Severe trauma, acute mental illness, active addiction, deep institutional distrust, or even the lack of basic identification can create steep hurdles.
That’s why proactive outreach is so vital. Northern Peer Connections runs a mobile outreach program that delivers harm-reduction supplies, naloxone, food, peer support, and direct healthcare connections straight to where people are. Their work acknowledges an essential truth: vulnerable people don’t always walk into social service offices on their own. Building trust through consistent, compassionate outreach is often the very first step toward recovery and housing.
Harm reduction is sometimes portrayed as the opposite of treatment or recovery, but in reality, they work hand in hand. Distributing naloxone, providing safe sharps disposal, and offering basic medical care keep people alive long enough to access treatment when they are ready. Preventing a fatal overdose or treating an infected wound is a victory in itself, regardless of where someone is on their personal journey.
Programs like Quesnel’s Clean Team show how social support and community pride can reinforce each other. By hiring individuals with lived experience of homelessness or substance use to clean public spaces, the program keeps our downtown tidy while providing participants with dignity, income, and a sense of purpose. It isn’t a silver bullet for homelessness or public disorder, but it is proof that practical solutions can serve everyone.
These efforts are bolstered by essential organizations like the Quesnel Tillicum Society Native Friendship Centre, the Canadian Mental Health Association, the Quesnel Women’s Resource Centre, and local food programs. Their ongoing work helps stabilize families and individuals long before they reach the point of absolute homelessness.
The Barriers to Finding Stable Housing
One of the steepest hurdles in Quesnel is what happens after immediate crisis needs are met. A hot meal and a warm bed at a shelter save lives, but they don’t solve the underlying problem: where does someone go next?
While Quesnel’s housing market may be more accessible than major urban centres in southern B.C., that doesn’t make it universally affordable. For a single adult on provincial income assistance, the maximum monthly shelter allowance is just $500. Finding a safe, private rental unit in town for that price is extraordinarily difficult – especially for someone without recent rental references, a steady credit history, or reliable transportation.
Even when someone manages to find an apartment, staying housed requires ongoing stability. Moving off the street into four empty walls can be an isolating and overwhelming transition. Without continued access to mental health care, addiction recovery supports, and basic life-skills coaching, the risk of falling back into homelessness remains high. This is why a diverse spectrum of housing is essential. Some residents simply need a rent supplement to weather a temporary setback, while others require permanent supportive housing with staff on site.
We also cannot discuss housing in Quesnel without addressing its profound Indigenous dimension. In the 2025 homeless count, 59% of respondents identified as Indigenous – a number dramatically higher than the proportion of Indigenous residents in the broader community. This disproportionate reality is deeply tied to the ongoing legacy of colonialism, residential schools, systemic discrimination, and intergenerational trauma. Any lasting housing strategy in Quesnel must be culturally safe and developed in close partnership with Indigenous leadership.
Quesnel Has Already Identified Many of the Challenges
Fortunately, our community isn’t walking into this challenge blind. In 2024, the City received the *Service and Housing Options Review for Vulnerable Populations*, prepared by HelpSeeker Technologies.
The review offered a clear-eyed assessment of Quesnel’s housing gaps, mental health and addiction services, transit limitations, and systemic bottlenecks. Its core recommendations laid out a practical path forward: expand affordable and supportive housing, enhance local health and social services, strengthen coordination across agencies, support Indigenous-led initiatives, and eliminate unnecessary barriers to accessing aid.
These recommendations aren’t abstract theories; they reflect the on-the-ground experience of local service providers and community leaders who have been doing this work for years. The real task before us is taking those blueprints and turning them into measurable, coordinated action.
Importantly, progress cannot be judged by a single metric. Success means fewer people forced to sleep in freezing temperatures, but it also means more individuals moving into permanent homes, fewer overdose deaths, and better access to medical care. For downtown merchants and shoppers, progress will look like cleaner streets, reduced property crime, and a renewed sense of security. These goals are not in competition; when vulnerable people are supported and housed, the entire community becomes safer and more resilient.
Beyond the Election
Elections naturally amplify community frustrations. Candidates propose bold plans, residents passionately debate competing priorities, and complex social issues are sometimes boiled down to quick soundbites.
Now that the campaign is over, the hard work of governing begins. Our new city council inherits a dedicated network of service providers, business owners who need tangible relief, and vulnerable residents who still need a safe place to sleep. They also inherit years of comprehensive planning, strong local partnerships, and clear recommendations that provide a solid foundation for action.
No single municipal council, non-profit society, or policy change can end homelessness overnight. Nor should the continued presence of homelessness be seen as a failure of the people working on the front lines. The drivers of this crisis – housing shortages, healthcare gaps, systemic poverty, and addiction – cross multiple levels of government and community systems.
Solving these problems requires a shift in how we talk to one another. When public debate turns into a rigid contest between compassion and accountability, we lose sight of our shared goals. At the end of the day, almost everyone in Quesnel wants the same thing: a thriving local economy, vibrant and safe public spaces, and humane, effective support for our neighbours in crisis.
Moving forward means listening carefully to downtown merchants, backing the frontline organizations doing heavy lifting every day, and treating people with lived experience of homelessness as part of the solution. It means taking immediate steps to improve street-level safety while tackling the root causes that leave people out in the cold.
The measure of progress will not simply be whether homelessness becomes less visible. It will be whether fewer people are left without a safe place to call home—and whether the community as a whole becomes safer and more stable in the process.
Sources and further reading
- BC Housing. Quesnel — 2025 Homeless Count. https://www.bchousing.org/sites/default/files/media/documents/Homeless-Count-Quesnel-2025.pdf
- City of Quesnel. Council Highlights — November 25, 2025.
- City of Quesnel. Council Highlights — June 23, 2026.
- City of Quesnel. Cold Weather Plan.
- City of Quesnel / HelpSeeker Technologies. Service and Housing Options Review for Vulnerable Populations (2024).
- BC Housing. Quesnel — 530 Carson Avenue.
- Quesnel Shelter & Support Society. Bridges Supportive Housing and Seasons House Shelter.
- BC 211. Quesnel Shelter & Support Society — Service Listings.
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