New program aims to ease transition for asylum seekers in Hamilton
Social-service agencies look to fill gaps and take some pressure off shelters
As Kelvin Martins Aichie pieces together a new life in Hamilton, he holds fast to a personal philosophy that guides him through challenges.
“I have a policy that if you don’t give, you cannot take,” Aichie says when asked about leaving Nigeria and claiming refugee status last fall.
And with that outlook, he has managed to stay afloat while navigating the complex waters of housing and employment in a new land.
Aichie stayed in homeless shelters before securing a room in a shared rental home.
He works overnight shifts on weekends taking care of an older adult while he waits to take his final exam to become a personal support worker.
There have been setbacks and pitfalls, but the 34-year-old’s resolve remains strong.
“Because the greatest glory is not in never falling,” he says, “but when you fall, you rise again.”
With $1.8 million in city funding, a team of local social-service agencies aims to make it easier for asylum seekers to overcome obstacles as they settle into new lives in Hamilton.
The goal is that 40 new transitional-housing spaces and co-ordinated services will not only set the newcomers up for success, but also take a load off an already stretched emergency shelter system.
Wesley will handle 30 of those beds for men, women, couples and families. Good Shepherd is operating 10 beds for women.
Refuge Newcomer Health’s role involves mobile referral and co-ordination services during the yearlong initiative.
Wesley already supports government-assisted refugees at its Main Street East location, but the new program is focused on asylum seekers, who haven’t yet made refugee claims and lack basic services.
“The more we invest in the beginning in doing it right,” CEO Rashed Afif told The Spectator, “the less people we see on the street.”
Last summer, hundreds of asylum seekers arrived in Toronto, mostly from Kenya but also from Uganda — both countries with hostile antiLGBTQ laws.
Many of them later wound up in
other cities, including Hamilton. The wave of newcomers hit local shelters, occupying 24 per cent to 36 per cent of beds each week between September and January, according to a city report, which sparked the need for a remedy.
“We welcome and celebrate the fact that these folks are joining our community but really recognize that they need some targeted and specific supports to help them make a fairly rapid and solid transition into community living,” Katherine Kalinowski, Good Shepherd’s chief operating officer, said in a previous interview.
“And at the same time … we know that there is a homelessness crisis in this community that is of epic proportions and that our emergency shelters are operating at or over capacity virtually every night of the year.”
For asylum seekers, the process to permanent housing can involve “many steps,” Afif points out.
Before submitting refugee claims, people aren’t eligible for Ontario Works. Along the way, they need help opening bank accounts, applying for health cards, obtaining social insurance numbers, finding jobs, getting children into school.
“Do we have that capacity within our shelter system? And if we ask our shelter to take all their time to do all these things, you are taking it away from people who need it,” Afif explains. “And the shelter remains full.”
Wesley plans to offer the new beds in June. Each room has a washroom, television, microwave, refrigerator and closet, as well as a door that locks.
“If you want people to move away from homelessness, you need to give them a little bit of privacy,” Afif says during a tour. “At least they can sleep at night.”
For Aichie, the restrictive hours of shelters were tough. With his weekend overnight work in Grimsby, he ran the risk of losing his shelter bed due to not making curfew. But he rolled the dice, bouncing from one shelter to another in the process.
A room in a shared private rental home solved that problem. But travelling from central Hamilton to Grimsby was another obstacle. That’s where Trinity United Church in Grimsby came in.
“The church adopted me,” says Aichie, a man of faith who calls his Hamilton journey a “divine arrangement.”
He sought out the church on foot after paying about $40 for an Uber ride to work. In response, the sexton took him in. Then, a support network of congregants formed around him, giving him rides and places to rest between shifts.
“And now it’s like he’s part of our community,” Rev. Donalee Williams says.
Meanwhile, helping Aichie has helped fill a need for local elder care, Williams points out.
“It has been just an absolute gift to get to know Kelvin. He’s an inspiration to me. He’s wonderful.”
Wesley CEO Afif, who came to Canada as a refugee from Afghanistan in 2009, encourages that spirit, noting how Hamilton extended a warm embrace to Ukrainians fleeing war.
“We do need community support. We cannot take the load alone.”
Afif is confident that, with the right services in place, this cohort of asylum seekers — and future ones — will find their bearings in a matter of months.
“We have highly motivated individuals who are ready to work … at a time that we are really suffering from lack of labour in a lot of industries. The first thing they always say: ‘When can I work?’”
Refuge executive director Terri Bedminster also sees that drive to succeed.
“We have folks who have landed jobs and started working as soon as they got their work permits.”
The key to successful support is collaboration and co-ordination of services, Bedminster emphasizes.
Aichie, who in Nigeria worked in IT, prefers to keep the circumstances of his departure private.
But through metaphor, he describes what led to his decision to leave.
“My case was like a frog in water and the temperature began to change,” he says. “You have to jump out. At that point, you don’t mind where you are jumping to. Do you understand?”
His next goals are passing his final exam, lining up full-time work and finding a better place to live.
For others who might be following in his footsteps, Aichie offers this advice:
“I just encourage whoever is in my shoes to be strong because you will meet challenges.”