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City's Peter St. shelter finally opens
By SUE-ANN LEVY, City Hall Columnist
Last Updated: October 29, 2010 8:06pm

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Some 40 long months and $11.5-million later, the Homeless Hilton on Peter St. finally opened its doors for business Thursday night.
Phil Brown, the city’s general manager of shelter, support and housing, said Friday some 13 homeless clients have been through the 40-bed shelter and assessment centre since the doors opened at 6 p.m. Thursday night.
He said they’re not yet operating 24-7 but once they are, there will be five services offered out of the Peter St. building, including a 24-hour “respite” service for street people, overnight assistance for those seeking to be referred to a shelter and “outreach” for any business in the Entertainment District that has an issue with a homeless person or a panhandler.
He said the 40 beds will be called “transition to housing beds” to fit with the city’s Streets to Homes mandate.
“It’s all about ending street homelessness and helping to get people into homes,” Brown said, referring to private apartments or publicly-funded affordable housing.
The shelter and assessment and referral centre — which went more than 100% over budget — was the subject of a highly critical report by Toronto’s auditor general, Jeff Griffiths, released in late June.
Griffiths’ report intimated that everything that could go wrong did go wrong with the Peter St. project.
He indicated when the report was released that no clear city official was in charge of the project.
Almost $1-million was spent for the building’s rooftop smoking area, garden and solar “flowers”.
A $789,000 elevator proposed for the shelter has yet to be installed.