THUNDER BAY - Staffing shortages at Shelter House Thunder Bay are causing some difficulties in their ability to provide services to the community, a huge issue as the facility is still battling off and on COVID-19 outbreaks.
Shelter House Thunder Bay is seeing shortages across the board, not only in full-time staff but volunteers as well which means that those who are currently working at the organization have to put in extra efforts to be able to provide quality services for those in the facility.
Cal Rankin, Executive Director, says that COVID-19 may be the biggest reason for this.
"Usually we have about 58 staff and currently we have 35. We're having a hard time attracting and maintaining staff in this environment with COVID,” he said. “People are very hesitant to come here especially when we're in an outbreak, and it makes it very difficult to staff and actually run the organization."
The staff shortage has not just affected the organization’s ability to provide services at Shelter House itself but has resulted in less use of their SOS bus which is usually on the road 8 hours a day.
"We were kind of sporadically doing maybe 2 or 4 hours because we'd have to pull people off the floor here to do SOS if there was an emergency if we were trying to provide the service and it's gotten to the point we're just unable to do it," said Rankin.
Rankin has been in his role for one month now, but previously served as executive director for a decade, finishing his first stint in 2012, and even with an extensive history such as this, the current shortage is an unprecedented challenge.
"I've never experienced where it's this hard and we're running so short, and we have supervisors are working to replace front line staff because we have no one to work," he said.
Shelter House currently has job postings out with volunteer positions available as well for anyone who would like to help.
