Family breakup top cause of homelessness

During ICountPtbo at least 259 people were identified as experiencing homelessness

Disintegration of families is putting people on the streets with nowhere to go.

“This is the second time we’ve done the count and both times the top reason was family breakdown,” says Dorothy Olver, manager of homelessness and addictions services with the city’s social services division.

“If we can try to get at some of the family stuff earlier on and try to prevent the breakdown, that would be great.”

However, Olver admits doing that is a tricky thing.

The revelation about the reasons was made following the Peterborough United Way-organized ICountPtbo initiative in March.

A comprehensive, 62-page report was released this week detailing results of the 200 surveys that were completed by homeless people in Peterborough city and county.

Early results of the surveys were released in April.

More than 80 volunteers fanned out between March 20 to 23 to find the homeless in an effort to compile data to come up with solutions to end the problem.

During ICountPtbo at least 259 people were identified as experiencing homelessness, with 142 of those people identified as absolute homeless meaning they are staying in shelters or outside.

For 30 per cent of those people, the top reason was family breakdown, a similar finding to the homelessness count done by the United Way in 2016.

According to the report, the second reason for homelessness in the region is unsafe housing. Twenty two per cent of those surveyed cited that as the reason they didn’t have a place to live.

“It’s really challenging because we have a one-per-cent vacancy rate right now. For a lot of people who have low incomes they are in a spot where they sometimes have to take whatever they can get because there is nothing else available and a lot of those places are not necessarily safe places. They may be rooming houses … or other rental places with safety concerns,” Olver said.

“As much as we try to encourage people to stay where they are, we wouldn’t try to encourage them if it’s a really unsafe location; we would encourage them to leave and do what we can to support them.”

The third reason for homelessness in the Peterborough region is addiction/substance abuse. Olver said this often relates to a childhood trauma.

“They’ve had some childhood experiences that led them to where they are. Everyone has a story,” Olver said.

The enumeration report, titled A Roof Over My Head, goes into great detail, dissecting the numbers and responses of those surveyed. The idea is to come up with recommendations to drive toward Ontario’s goal of ending chronic homelessness by 2025.

Lisa Smith, director of philanthropic impact with the United Way Peterborough and District, says the first step is creating a co-ordinated entry system with a “by-name” list of homeless people.

“It’s really about knowing everyone by name and knowing what their issue is and really working with them as an individual to get them what they need when they need it,” Smith said.

From there, those people and their individual needs will be matched with services currently available in the region.

“It’s an ongoing thing. If we can get this right we can get to something called functional zero meaning that even if someone comes into the city, even if someone loses their housing they don’t stay homeless for longer than a 48-hour period,” Smith said.

“We’re picking them up right away and finding out who they are and what they need.”

NOTE: View the full A Roof Over My Head report at www.thepeterboroughexaminer.com.