Apathy will worsen the shelter crisis

Re Toronto’s current strategy is to ignore the shelter crisis, Opinion, Oct. 9 Jessica Hales rightfully calls the lack of shelter space in Toronto a crisis. I would take it one step further and say that it is an active emergency waiting to expand its reaches, through political and general societal indifference.

The vast majority of people are one or two paycheques away from having to utilize a shelter. If you’re on disability or earning minimum wage, or even up to $15 an hour, you have enough to pay the bills, but nothing left over for personal debt reduction, perhaps paying only interest and rarely reducing the principal debt.

The rising costs of food and rent make living in the city a daunting, if not impossible, task if one earns under $30,000 a year. Living hand to mouth, even while working, never mind when one lives on the street or in a shelter, is not living; it is existing.

If the current sitting council is unable to respond effectively and adequately by creating a policy that meaningfully impacts the situation, it leaves one wondering who is responsible for the response if the need becomes even greater?

Unfortunately, while politicians manoeuvre themselves for the forthcoming elections, the voices that need to be heard will be lost in the shuffle. Promises will be made and half-truths sold to benefit maintenance of the status quo. This is how it has always been, and it will continue to be so until the little guy says “Enough.”

Until then, our friends, family and neighbours are sleeping on shelter floors, hoping for a bed that will probably never materialize. Having been homeless in my youth and often without a bed for the night, I can state emphatically that indifference only contributes to the advancement of poverty. Troy J. Young, Toronto