Visits up at Toronto's remaining consumption sites, 2 months after province forced 4 to close

Toronto's remaining supervised consumption sites say they've gotten busier in the two months since the province forced four sites to close — part of a changing picture of drug use in the city as Ontario continues its move toward an abstinence-based treatment model.

"We are seeing more people, and people are changing their behaviour," said Bill Sinclair, CEO of the Neighbourhood Group, which runs the Kensington Market Overdose Prevention Site.

Sinclair told CBC Toronto that that site has seen a 30 per cent uptick in visitors since April 1, when nine Ontario supervised drug consumption sites — four of them in Toronto — were forced to close under provincial legislation that prohibits sites from operating within 200 metres of a school or daycare.

"People are using [drugs] differently," Sinclair said.

"There's been a trend for a while of smoking rather than injecting, because of the perception that that is safer … people are doing their best to try to anticipate what a world might look like when the sites are not there."

Fred Victor charity, which operates a supervised consumption site at Queen Street E. and Jarvis Street, has also clocked between 15 and 35 per cent more weekly visits.

"It is stretching our staff to try to build the trusting relationships they've been trying to establish," said the charity's CEO Keith Hambly, adding that user numbers could go up even more after the summer months since some people are more inclined to use outdoors during warmer weather.

Casey House, which runs a supervised consumption site for registered clients only, has seen a 25 per cent increase in its use, as well as more drug use outside of its facility — prompting it to extend its hours.

Street Health on Dundas Street E. says it had 82 per cent more visits year-over-year in April, and 53 per cent more visits year-over-year in May, requiring more staff to be scheduled.

Meanwhile, Parkdale Queen West Community Health Centre says it hasn't seen a substantial increase in clientele post-closure, leading to concerns about the welfare of drug users that are no longer seeking out consumption sites.

"We know some have used the Kensington site, and we are very concerned about what is happening for others we have not seen," wrote executive director Angela Robertson in an email.

Meanwhile, people who live and work nearby what was one of the city's most scrutinized consumption sites say there's been a dramatic change since it closed.

South Riverdale Community Health Centre made headlines in July 2023, when a woman named Karolina Huebner-Makurat was killed by a stray bullet while walking by.

Since the consumption site closed, neighbour Derek Finkle — who was a vocal opponent of the site both before and after the shooting — says that the drug deals and open drug use he used to see on a regular basis has "virtually disappeared."

"I've noticed there's nobody hanging around the fronts anymore. It's gotten a lot quieter," said Allen Malloy, owner of Daniel Jewellers on Queen Street E.

"It's kind of like someone flipped a switch," said Nigel Fick, a co-owner of Culture Athletics, also on Queen.

"When the site was open our business was significantly directly impacted," Fick said. "We had over $75,000 of theft and damages, and regular occurrences of dealing with theft and harassment inside the store."

South Riverdale Community Health Centre declined a CBC News request for an interview.

As the city's drug users navigate the closure of consumption sites, there are still a number of unanswered questions as to how the new services that are available will impact drug use and overdose numbers.

Of the 10 consumption sites mandated to close under the new provincial law, nine opted to take provincial money and transition into Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment Hubs, or HART hubs.

The 10th, Kensington Market Overdose Prevention Site, chose instead to take the Ford government to court over its legislation and is currently staying open thanks to a legal injunction and "fundraising like mad" to stay afloat, said Sinclair.

The province said in a statement that all nine HART hubs were up and running by April 1, "ensuring the continuity of mental health support services" post-closure.

WATCH | Health minister defends closures:

Five supervised drug consumption sites are slated to close in Toronto after the provincial government announced a ban on such facilities near schools and child-care centres. CBC Metro Morning host Molly Thomas spoke to Health Minister Sylvia Jones about the changes.

Advocates described "mass confusion" on the ground at the centres in early April, which received start-up funding from Ontario, but, according to the Ministry of Health, have yet to nail down finalized funding agreements with the government.

Two months later, several of the HART hubs don't yet appear to have full slates of services up and running.

At Toronto Public Health's HART hub, now running temporarily on the Esplanade, only one program of 10 is operational, with the rest planned to get underway this summer or beyond.

Meanwhile, data suggests that overdoses are declining in Toronto and in Ontario more widely.

According to data from Toronto Public Health, fatal and non-fatal opioid overdose calls are down in 2025 compared to the previous two years and continued to fall over the month of April.

Hayley Thompson, the managing director of Toronto's Drug Tracking Service housed within St. Michael's Hospital, speculated in April that the decrease could be attributed to a decrease of the amount of fentanyl in the drug supply.