Region aims to reduce homelessness by 20 per cent
Success stories of pilot project show fewer people are living on the street
The man had been homeless for almost 500 days, said Niagara Region homelessness services manager Maggie Penca.
The unidentified senior, a client of Niagara’s homelessness services department, had not seen a doctor for more than 20 years, while suffering from schizophrenia and self-medicating to deal with his mental-health issues.
Penca said he had no identification and had no social or family connections.
But during the three and a half months he spent at the Region’s 14bed housing focused pilot project established in June, staff at the facility and their partners worked to change the man’s life.
The man received dentures allowing him to again eat solid food, as well as support to help him overcome his addictions. Staff helped him with ba
sic life skills, and through the supportive housing program he was able to secure permanent housing.
“We’re happy to say he’s still in his home,” Penca said, updating members of the Region’s public health and social services committee Tuesday.
She said the client told the homelessness services workers: “I finally feel like people treat me like I am human.”
St. Catharines Mayor Walter Send
zik called it part of a “tremendous effort ... that will change people’s lives.”
“We are one of only a handful — 30 plus communities in Canada — that have reached this milestone and the results are starting to show themselves,” Sendzik said, referring to municipalities across the country that are participating in the Built for Zero program.
“We will get to a functional zero on chronic homelessness. That is something. In a year when we don’t have a lot to celebrate, we should be acknowledging this because quite honestly there are a lot of folks out there who like to point their finger and say you’re not doing anything for homelessness and this shows proof point that we are doing something about homelessness.”
The client Penca spoke of was one of 27 people so far selected for the pilot program after they spent an average of 318 days homeless in the past year and 639 days homeless in the past three years.
Niagara’s co-ordinated access program analyst, Nicole Cortese, said since the start of the pilot project 13 people were placed in permanent housing and nine remain successfully housed.
The Region has kept tabs on clients that were not successfully housed.
“We have some individuals that it’s 20-plus years that they haven’t had a home. We’re not expecting them to be successful the first go-around. There’s a lot of help, a lot of support that’s needed,” Cortese said.
“If people weren’t successful the first time around, we’re going to bring them back into the pilot.”
Cortese said the Region has also completed its by-name list as part of the Built for Zero program, currently identifying 320 people as chronically homeless.
As of Oct. 31, she said 320 people were identified as being chronically homeless. Of those, she said 52 individuals have so far been housed.
Cortese said the by-name list provides “quality data to really build a system that has solutions for some of the most complex cases in the region.”
“It means we can understand who is becoming homeless and focus on prevention efforts,” she said. “It means we can provide person-specific resources as priorities for people based on the housing supports available and it means now we can understand how people end their journey of homelessness and the supports that wrap around them at the end of the day.”
Niagara homelessness services director Cathy Cousins said the pilot project will continue into 2021, as new ideas are adapted and regional staff continue to learn.
“We’re actually expanding the pilot, increasing the number of beds in the next week or so based on the experience we’ve had,” she said.
She said the Region is also working with the province to develop plans to transform the pilot project into a permanent solution in 2022.
Cortese said the Region has set a goal of reducing chronic homelessness by 20 per cent by April.
“We know it’s an ambitious goal, but we’re going to work really hard along with some of our other goals that we have set out … to work on prevention and diversion and common assessment to ensure we get as close to that goal as we can,” she said.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to cause significant problems placing “a lot of people not in great positions as we move forward,” Lincoln Coun. Rob Foster is concerned about the long-term prognosis for the homelessness efforts.
“Are we seeing another flood of potential people within these categories in the future?”
Cousins said the region will have to “wait and see” how people are affected by the pandemic’s economic impact.
“At this point social assistance has remained fairly stable and we have not seen significant fluctuations in the homelessness system,” she said. “But we will need to understand what the long-term prognosis is for COVID and what the recovery time is for the sectors and employment in Niagara.”
St. Catharines Coun. Tim Rigby called it “really gratifying” to hear about successes “resolving many of the issues that we’ve been faced with for some time with homelessness.”