Homelessness must be addressed
It was hot and sunny and my two fave preteens and I were playing tourists in the ByWard Market. We were walking down Rideau Street, trying to avoid the anti-vaccine protest, when I suddenly realized the kids weren't near me. They'd noticed people sitting on the sidewalk and promptly gave them the money they had for shopping. Kids get it, you know. People who are unhoused need help now. Would that campaigning politicians understood.
Homelessness, you might be surprised to hear, is a new phenomenon, according to Kaite Burkholder Harris, executive director of the Alliance to End Homelessness. “Mass homelessness the way we're seeing it didn't exist pre-1980s. And it was literally when the federal government stopped investing in affordable housing and social housing,” that it began to grow — and did not stop.
Nowadays, it's families who are either unhoused or at risk of homelessness, due to a shortage in family-sized affordable units and the housing crisis in general.
Affordable housing, by the way, is a home that does not cost you more than 30 per cent of your gross family income. A family of five with a pre-deductions income of $7,000 a month (or $84,000 a year) should not spend more than $2,100 a month on housing.
Good luck finding a four-bedroom apartment for that price in this city. Or a bank willing to lend this family what a modest home not far from the core would cost (upwards of $700,000), especially if their credit rating isn't stellar and they don't have much of it in cash.
And this is a family with a reasonable income we're talking about. Now imagine a personal support worker single-parenting two kids on half that. Or someone who has struggled to work at all during the pandemic.
What causes homelessness, Somerset Ward Coun. Catherine McKenney says, is poverty. We forget how fast one can go from OK to poor. We shouldn't.
McKenney, who uses the pronouns they/ them, wants to see federal politicians implement universal basic income to alleviate housing but also food insecurity.
“We learned through the pandemic that a basic income is a net benefit to individuals but also to keeping the economy strong,” they said.
Flash quiz: How many federal parties are proposing such a thing?
One and a half, sort of. The Greens do. And the NDP promises to try to implement it for seniors and people living with disabilities.
Parties are much more interested in giving building contracts to developers. The Liberals promise to build 1.4 million homes over four years. The Conservatives say one million homes in three years. The NDP commits to 500,000 affordable rental units in 10 years. At least that party uses the word “affordable.”
As for the chronically homeless — about 15 per cent of the unhoused population, according to Burkholder Harris — they're once again being ignored. Only the Greens mention them, promising “a culturally sensitive Housing First approach.”
Housing First is a policy that gives people a safe place to live with no conditions. Sure, it costs money. But not as much as mass homelessness does. Finland was the first country to implement it nationwide, and they're on their way to eradicating homelessness by 2027.
Housing is a human right. Being safe is a basic need. What happens when people's basic needs are not met is a lot of pain and misery, at a huge social and financial cost to society. Ensuring the basic needs of Canadians are met is not charity, it's a minimum standard of responsible leadership.
It's simple enough: When someone is in need, we have to help. Poverty causes homelessness and precarious housing situations. In a city like Ottawa, you're “poor” when it comes to housing unless your family income is in the six figures. That's not just, or fair, or sustainable. It's a crisis, and one federal parties should get serious about addressing. It's the responsible thing to do.