coronavirus pandemic made its impact in mid-March, the City of London paused its ban to allow homeless encampments.“We’ve always had an unsheltered population here in the city,” said Craig Cooper, the homeless prevention manager with the city.“The numbers compared to last year from this year are fairly similar.
We’ve seen a very slight uptick with the COVID-19 (pandemic).” Cooper said Friday the encampments are similar to what they’ve seen in previous years — “it’s just they’re more congregated together now.”One of the larger encampments is at Queens Park, located near Dundas Street and Quebec Street.A man, who requested only to be identified as Joe, said he felt “safe” living at the encampment in the park.“You got washrooms, people coming.