Progress or band-aid solution? Community weighs in on Guelph’s downtown drug crackdown

Businesses weigh in on downtown drug initiative Guelph Police launched a safety initiative in late October to address drug use downtown. Hannah Schmidt finds out how its going.

Downtown Guelph continues to be the focal point for concerns about drug use and its impact on local businesses.

Arun Kahyap, the owner of Wimpy’s Diner, finds it challenging to monitor the restaurant’s washrooms when they get busy.

"[People are] just going in there and injecting themselves," Kashyap explained, adding that rampant drug use in the downtown core has been palpable. "I have seen a lot of difficulty when cops and paramedics keep coming in here. And it's it obviously impacting the business and the customer is always like: ‘What is going on?'"

The city’s police force launched a safety initiative in late October to address the issue. While it resulted in over 60 arrests, criminal charges didn’t necessarily follow.

"The vast majority of those arrests, the people who were arrested had the illegal substances seized from them, and then were released without any charges being laid," explained Scott Tracey, media relations coordinator for the Guelph Police Service.

He said the initiative’s goal is to not only help restore a sense of safety within the community, but to also connect individuals with support services.

"We're still taking the substances off the street, but we're trying to get help as well for the folks that are dealing with a number of interrelated issues," Tracey explained.

Kashyap has already seen the impact of the initiative, with fewer incidents outside of his restaurant.

"Since the crackdown, the number has decreased significantly,” he said. “That's a good thing; it's more clean.”

Others in the community, however, worry the arrests will push vulnerable people further into the shadows.

"To hire more police to patrol the street – totally wrong. Hire more people that can do something, not escalate things," Rick Green, owner of the dessert café DeBAR, told CTV News. "Those patrollers actually intimidate everyone. They don't have the proper training to deal with the homeless people."

Those sentiments were echoed by MPP and Ontario Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner. He’s calling for a balanced approach that includes both public safety and social supports.

"We cannot arrest our way out of the drug crisis," he stated. "The only way we're going to solve this crisis is for the provincial government to stop failing to address the housing affordability crisis, to properly invest in community-based mental health and addiction services."

Schreiner added that with the planned closure of Guelph’s CTS site, which is among the 10 provincially funded locations slated to close by March 31, 2025, he believes the city will see more public drug use.

"The city now has had to budget an additional half a million dollars in paramedic services because, sadly, we know more people are going to die, more people are going to face overdoses and, sadly, we're going to see more public drug use because of the closure of the [CTS] site."

Schreiner added: "I'm hoping the Ford government invests in the HART Hub application that Guelph Community Health Centre has put forward and I would like to see those HART Hubs not only be properly funded with the right service and supports in place, but also the hard reduction be part of the treatment services that are available."

While enforcement has brought some short-term relief, some within the community argue that lasting solutions will require deeper investments in the social systems that support the city’s most vulnerable residents.

For now, downtown businesses and residents are watching closely, hoping for strategies that balance safety, compassion and long-term change.

"It's having the right people doing the right job,” said Green. “And there needs to be more compassion.”