‘Anything we ask for — they (staff) go above and beyond’
Forty-seven people are living in modular cabins in the Rehill lot
Three months after the 50 modular cabins for people without homes opened in the city’s Rehill parking lot, one resident says, “It’s beautiful here — we get treated very well.”
“Anything we ask for — they (staff) go above and beyond,” the woman said.
“They’ve supported me all through my treatment, getting off drugs, whenever I needed a hand to hold. And I’ve definitely needed a hand … Couldn’t ask for much more than what these guys have given to us.”
The woman — who didn’t give her name, for safety reasons — was interviewed Monday, in the Rehill lot, on a special tour arranged for reporters by the city.
She’s among the first 50 people without homes who’d been living in tents before city council bought and arranged for installation of 50 modular cabins as a replacement for a tent encampment in the municipal Rehill lot.
On the tour Monday, the cabins were fully occupied: there are 47 people living in them, with three cabins being used as makeshift staff offices (since the main city-owned building on the property, a former municipal office building at 210 Wolfe Street next door to the Rehill lot, is still being renovated into offices, as well as a communal kitchen and laundry services for residents).
The grouping of cabins is managed by the social agency Elizabeth Fry Society.
Claire Belding, the manager of client services for Elizabeth Fry Society, said there are rules on the property.
For example, guests are allowed but must check in with the security guards and must leave for the night by 10 p.m. (though residents are free to come and go from the property, 24-7).
Just like in anyone’s private home, Belding said, people do consume
alcohol or drugs in the cabins (there are syringe disposal containers, on the property).
“We want to meet people where they’re at,” Belding said, adding that some residents ask the staff to check on them in their cabins, if they’re using drugs, which the staff does: “We want to keep people safe.”
Meanwhile, six residents have been kicked out so far, though Belding said “the last thing we want to do is evict people.”
For five of the six residents, Belding said, the eviction “revolved around violence” (she declined to offer details, or to say what happened, with the sixth person).
“There is zero tolerance for that (violence),” Belding said.
There had been violence in the tent encampment: in June, there was a shooting death there of a 36-year-old mother who had been visiting the encampment. Peterborough Police made an arrest, six days later.
Meanwhile a cabin doesn’t come free: people do pay to live there, explained Jocelyn Blazey, homelessness and data program manager for the city, and Jessica Penner, the Rehill lot project manager for the city.
Blazey said residents who are employed (and E. Fry’s Belding told reporters there are some full-time workers, living in cabins) pay 30 per cent of their income as rent.
Penner said those who receive social assistance — Ontario Works, or Ontario Disability Support Program — pay the portion of their assistance money that’s meant to cover shelter (it adds up to roughly $397 monthly for those receiving OW, and about $500 for ODSP).
This money goes toward operating costs, Blazey and Penner said, though it’s unclear exactly how much the city’s paying to offer the cabins.
Costs such as staffing, security, electricity and meals (residents get one daily meal delivered) haven’t been disclosed by the city yet (though a city staff report is expected soon, Blazey and Penner said).
Only one cost has ever been disclosed: each of the 50 cabins cost the city $21,150.
Meantime the cabins aren’t expected to stay in the Rehill lot for long: city council said it’s a temporary measure, meant to be available for a maximum of two years.
Penner said residents get help from Elizabeth Fry workers to come up with goals for themselves — including trying to find permanent housing — and that the staff helps people implement those goals.
Residents are encouraged to seek help from local agencies and to go meet with those agencies, she said, so they have connections and support in the community once they find housing away from the Rehill lot.
Renovations on the main building at 210 Wolfe Street are expected done soon, and when that happens there will be space for more programs, Blazey said — potentially programs to help people find jobs, for instance.
The woman resident who said was interviewed is 45; she said she raised five kids, she said, and has cut hair for pay.
She said her kids range in age from 17 to 27, and none of them wanted to open their home to her while she was still using drugs.
But she said in her interview she’s decreased her drug use so significantly that she expects to be drug-free in about a week.
“I’m just about there.”