Warming stops in Sherbrooke: January will be worth watching if the cold sets in

As the month of January begins, the coordinator of the Table itinérance de Sherbrooke, Gabriel Pallotta, expects greater traffic in the heat centers and shelters, mainly if the cold weather sets in.

Unlike the holiday season, a staffing issue could also arise, mainly during the day on the weekend, if the cold weather persists in January. This will also be an important subject on the menu of the next meeting of the Table itinérance de Sherbrooke.

It was all in all what we had planned. We weren’t overwhelmed, but the cold weather was starting there so that gave us reason to prepare for the rest of the season.he explained in an interview at the microphone of Here’s the info.

We expect greater demand towards the end of January if the cold weather sets in compared to the holiday season which went well.

People experiencing homelessness also found themselves in the emergency room of the Hôtel-Dieu de Sherbrooke during the holidays, a situation that was also observed elsewhere in Quebec.

We had a big meeting with all the partners before the winter. People who were not in the right place were more easily redirected to the appropriate services. A lot of support work with social workers was also put in place, which made it possible to reduce the issuehelp Gabriel Pallotta.

The face of requests

In the eyes of Gabriel Pallotta, in housing support services, requests are mainly made by young families. This number is growing, according to the coordinator.

There is a mix. Unfortunately there are some new faces. In emergency services, it is rather rare to see new young families appearing. On the other hand, in housing support services, even on the outskirts of Sherbrooke, this becomes the majority of requests. It’s worrying to see the needs increasinghe admits.

Gabriel Pallotta now hopes that decision-makers will provide the resources to allow services to operate at maximum capacity. He also notes a small increase in certain requests, among others, for emergency services during weekend days and weekday evenings.

We create crises by not being able to respond at any time. We would like people not to go to emergency services, so we need access to health care and services […]he explains.

We have thoughts to have on how we can act more quickly in prevention while the needs are growing in the emergency room and at discharge. What we’re doing is working. We are able to observe where the small holes are that we could plug, but we are limited by resourcessupports Gabriel Pallotta.