Good and bad news in report card on homelessness in city,
City creates affordable units but housing still too expensive for many
All the usual suspects were at the annual news conference on homelessness in Ottawa on Tuesday: social service providers, academics, community advocates, and reporters. Then there was Everdeen Wright.
Everdeen was a quiet figure in the front row of the meeting room at the Salvation Army Booth Centre. Outside the George Street shelter, men stood in clusters, smoking cigarettes and shivering in the drizzle. Inside, Everdeen sat patiently through the announcement that, for the second year in a row, Ottawa has earned grades ranging from A down to F on its efforts to eliminate homelessness. She didn’t make a peep as various officials with the Alliance to End Homelessness gave kudos to the City of Ottawa for investing $14 million a year in creating new, affordable housing since 2011 and chastised the federal and provincial governments for appearing to do much but in fact doing little to help people hang on to their homes.
But once the facts were read and points were made, fivemonth-old Everdeen became the main event. Journalists clustered around the infant as her young mother recounted the story of how their family of six recently tumbled into — and climbed their way out of — homelessness. With her fluffy brown hair and her little hands stuffed into socks (to keep her from scratching the sore patches of eczema on her cheeks), Everdeen is a living, breathing example of the good news/bad news theme of the report card: while some progress is being made toward eliminating homelessness in Ottawa, there’s not enough of it, it’s not happening fast enough, and families are paying the price, according to the Alliance, a coalition of local agencies working on housing issues.
The Alliance has issued a report card on homelessness for the past nine years, and sees signs of hope. The overall number of homeless people was relatively unchanged from 2011 and might be stabilizing. The City of Ottawa added 1,219 housing units over the past nine years, 139 of them last year, largely because of the city’s commitment in 2011 to invest $14 million a year in housing. More low-income individuals and families are getting help paying their rent.
But the underlying problem of the persistently high cost of housing prompted the Alliance to give Ottawa as a community an F for affordability.
Canada Mortgage and Housing says individuals should not pay more than 30 per cent of their income on housing, but the rent for a bachelor apartment in Ottawa currently costs a person earning minimum wage an average of 46 per cent of his or her income. That figure rises to 124 per cent of monthly income for a person on Ontario Works. Also, the number of families using shelters increased from 840 to 848, and the average length of time families stayed in those shelters also increased, from 82 days to 88 days. As a result, the Alliance is launching a social media campaign called #raiseyourvoicecanada to encourage Canadians to speak up about homelessness.
“On the one hand I’m buoyed by the demonstration here in Ottawa that spending a bit more can achieve a great deal,” said Lynne Brown, executive director of the Alliance. “But it’s not acceptable to me that the contribution from the federal and provincial governments is at a level that only maintains the status quo for communities dealing with homelessness. The province needs to improve the support rates for Ontario Works and ODSP, and the federal government needs to step up its investment in building affordable housing. We’re not meeting the needs of low-income families.”
Everdeen Wright and her family spent a few days this winter in a motel room provided by the city after being evicted from their apartment in January. Her mother, Cassandra Wright, told of bunking at her mother’s home for a bit, then at the motel shelter and later at a friend’s place while they tried to find a new apartment they could afford on her husband’s wage as a baker at Tim Horton’s. They receive some help from the provincial and federal governments, but Wright says it’s not nearly enough to cover their expenses. Her husband’s bus pass alone costs more than the $83 each month from Ontario Works. The Wrights owe thousands of dollar s to their previous landlord, and if nothing changes, they might end up deeper in debt or worse, back on the street.
Wright’s voice cracked as she talked about the emotional toll of being homeless. While some relatives have helped as much as they can, others have refused to get involved. Her three-year-old daughter doesn’t sleep well any more. Her six-year-old son is acting out in school, getting in trouble and hitting other kids.
“It’s not like him,” Wright said. “I didn’t raise him to be this way. I’m sure it’s because of what’s been going on.”
After the third or fourth telling of their story, Everdeen closed her big brown eyes and drifted off to sleep on her mother’s lap. “I thought my kids were safe and I could give them the life that I never had,” said Wright. “I don’t want to see another family go through what I’ve gone through.”