A Winnipeg church is looking for help to fight homelessness.

All Saints’ Anglican Church in West Broadway is experiencing a spike in people setting up tents and makeshift shelters in its yard.

The church doesn't want people to stay, but it also doesn't want to tell them to leave; now, it’s not sure where or who to turn to next.

"In the last three weeks we've seen a huge increase in people,” said Reverend Brent Neumann. "And we're not sure how to respond. The issues are so diverse and so complex.”

“We've got people who have drug issues, we've got people who are homeless, we've got people who've got mental health issues."

Neumann said people have slept in the church yard before but never this many at once.

Parishioners coming to Sunday services have been greeted by tents, makeshift shelters and used needles.

"We're in that tension between how do we continue to care for these people and at the same time, we've got a property that's being vandalized and damaged to a substantial amount," said Neumann. "It's a really complex, complicated issue and we're really feeling rather overwhelmed by the whole thing.”

People staying in the camp approached by CTV Winnipeg asked not to be recorded but those who spoke with us off camera listed addiction and a lack of housing as reasons for staying here.

Tents in churchyard

Josh Brandon with the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg said it highlights the need for more affordable housing.

"Unfortunately we have a large number of people in Winnipeg who are experiencing homelessness," said Brandon.

He said people don't feel safe staying in rooming houses or single room occupancy hotels.

"The living conditions aren't good,” he said. “You've got problems with bugs, other pests. You have very close proximity to people and so overcrowding and sometimes there’s violence. People don’t always feel safe in those environments.”

The church has turned to the area’s city councillor Jenny Gerbasi and the NDP MLA for Wolseley Rob Altemeyer for assistance.

In an email, Gerbasi said the problems in West Broadway have been getting worse over the past two years.

She said it's an issue all levels of government need to address and any disruption to the community connected to drug use should be dealt with by police.

Altemeyer said it’s a sign more needs to be done to help people get off the street.

“We’re going to keep seeing the problem until we solve it and right now that’s not happening,” said Altemeyer.

The Manitoba government said it's continuing to develop a provincial housing strategy and has recently signed on to a multilateral framework with the federal government focusing on affordable housing.

Brent Neumann said police are helping, but he can't wait much longer for a long-term solution.

"I've had people tell me, one woman saying, it's the only place where she feels safe to sleep at night,” he said. “That's a really difficult thing to say ‘get lost’ because then what am I doing? I'm putting her at risk out on the street."

He said he's been asking people to move along but not forcing them to leave.