Nova ScotiaDrug use and violence highlighted as problems for neighbours and residents who live near the facility.Drug use and violence around the property highlighted as problemsAnjuli Patil · CBC News · Posted: Oct 04, 2025 5:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: October 4An interior view of the shelter beds at Viola’s Place from 2022. (Submitted by Lisa DeYoung)Residents in New Glasgow, N.S., say they’re concerned about violence and drug use at a downtown shelter for people facing homelessness.The community held a meeting on Oct. 1 to discuss Viola’s Place, a 20-bed shelter that helps people find housing, improve financial literacy skills and access the medical system.”There’s bigger issues around mental health and addictions and all that stuff, but members of the community … the stuff we see out our windows, like my front window. I literally see fights every day. I’m watching them get high every day. I’m watching them just cause disturbances,” Brett Gray told CBC’s Information Morning in an interview on Thursday.Gray — who attended the meeting — said his two children, ages two and five, can’t even play in front of their home or look out the front window because of the drug use from people who use the shelter.He told Information Morning he struggled with addiction and homelessness when he was younger and that he is marking 10 years sober this month.”I was in shelters on the streets here in Halifax [and] also in Edmonton, so I’ve seen both sides. And at least the shelters that I was in when that happened, there was structure,” Gray said.Meeting respectful, with some heated momentsHe said he’d like to see Viola’s Place take a “stronger approach” to enforcing the rules — including consequences for breaking them.Gray said the meeting was respectful, but there were some heated moments.”Any time somebody would try to defend Viola’s, people would groan,” Gray said.This is Nova Scotia9:23New Glasgow residents shared their concerns about violence and drug use around a downtown homeless shelterPeople who live near Viola’s Place have been complaining about a rise in open drug use and violence in the neighbourhood. That prompted the town to hold a public forum on community safety last night. We talk to one of the residents who spoke at last night’s meeting. He lives across the street from the shelter.Gray said the province seems to be taking concerns seriously. He said there was a panel at the meeting that included the police, mental health professionals, shelter representatives and New Glasgow Mayor Nancy Dicks.In a separate interview with Information Morning on Friday, Dicks said issues with the shelter began to escalate two years ago when a sex offender was accepted there.”I would say it’s the last straw for our community and it boiled over at that point,” Dicks said.Illicit drug use can’t be ignored, mayor saysShe said about 75 people attended the meeting and “their voices were loud and clear.””We’re often told we must have compassion for those that struggle — we also need compassion for the neighbours that are witnessing and enduring this on a daily basis,” Dicks said.”I think the illicit drug use is something that we can’t ignore. We need the province to give us the ability or give our police the ability to deal with that.”Homelessness more visible: Viola’s Place execBefore the meeting, Lisa Deyoung, the executive director of the Viola’s Place Society, told Information Morning that the shelter can only control whatever happens on its property. She said it’s important people contact police if they’re having issues.”Once adults leave our property, we have very little say or control over what they do. That being said, we’re always having conversations with our folks and encouraging them to be good neighbours,” Deyoung said.”But really at the end of the day, they are just human, just like you and I. And studies do show that the homeless population are more often the victim of violence than they are the ones causing violence.”Information Morning – NS8:24Viola’s Place Society responds to calls to close the New Glasgow shelterSome people in New Glasgow are asking for a local homeless shelter to be closed. They point to an increase in drug use and violence in the area. But the group that runs Viola’s Place says closing the shelter is not the answer, and may cause more harm than good.Deyoung said a majority of the people Viola’s Place helps are from Pictou County. She said the community isn’t used to seeing homelessness, which she said is due to people losing housing.”Instead of people couch-surfing, we’re seeing them on the streets more and in parks and in encampments,” Deyoung said.”I mean, homelessness has increased, but it has also become more visible. So people that have been couch-surfing, some of them are no longer couch-surfing or ones that were just going paycheque to paycheque — a lot of those folks have since become unhoused because of the financial instabilities that basically we’re all facing nowadays.”With files from Information Morning
Residents raise concerns over New Glasgow homeless shelter
