Municipalities across the country are seeking upgrades to growth strategies, particularly in light of the current housing crisis.

That was the key message St. John’s Deputy Mayor Sheilagh O’Leary took away from recent Federation of Canadian Municipalities meetings in Ottawa.

Delegates met with MPs of all stripes during last week’s advocacy days, urging them to prioritize a new municipal framework to meet the new and emerging challenges faced by cities and towns across the country.

Chief among them, notes O’Leary, is housing, especially with the recent establishment of a tent city in St. John’s.

Asked about the plan to deal with that, and issues such as lack of access to public bathrooms, O’Leary deferred to the boss.

“(Mayor Danny Breen) is going to be speaking to that very imminently so I’ll leave that in his hands, but you can be guaranteed that the city is working very hard to try to resolve these issues,” she said. “The most important thing is that we collaborate. It’s not finger-pointing, it’s our jurisdiction, your jurisdiction, we have to work together to solve these problems. We’re all very seriously addressing it.”

A briefing by the city on the encampment in the Bannerman Park area is expected some time today.