This article by Aubry, Farrell, Hwang and Calhoun starts to unpack those numbers, particularly in finding three clusters of shelter use: 1) Temporary (few, short stays); 2) Episodic (many, short stays); 3) Long-stay (few, long stays).  At first blush, the numbers demonstrate what we have long known, that homelessness for most is a temporary situation – with those in the temporary shelter stay cluster accounting for 88-94%.  However, this is a representation of total shelter users over time.  A snapshot of a shelter at a moment in time shows that between 25-40% of current residents are in the Long-stay cluster.

So, although the temporary group represents that most individuals who will have any shelter use, the episodic and long-stay groups will occupy far more of the beds on any given night.  This leads us to consider how best to free up shelter beds?

I would predict that those in the long-stay group are the same individuals identified as needing more support in our work on medical respite: those with the most complex health and social challenges, namely concurrent addictions and mental health challenges.  These individuals require the most supports to be successfully housed, and therefore are more likely to be ‘stuck’ in shelters.  Putting the pressure solely on shelters to move these people out negates that wrap-around supports that are required.

I like the concept of undermining a brand in such a novel way, and I am always for finding ways to assist those experiencing homelessness with accessing the basic necessities of live, but I’m not sold on the delivery here.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I donate a lot of clothes to local agencies serving people experiencing homelessness.  And I always encourage those who ask to do the same, donating directly to the agencies versus for-profit chains like Value Village.  But have a look at the reactions of the people he interacts with; this lady is scared:

This lady is confused:

And this guy just wants to be left alone:

People who are experiencing homelessness aren’t just sitting around hoping strangers will give them some clothing.  There’s a certain pretentiousness to using homeless people like props to make a point against a brand.  My fear is that others will do the same and unwittingly harass people experiencing homelessness.  Instead, look closely at Greg’s suggestions for how to help.  I agree, we should “Fitch the Homeless Shelter”, not people experiencing homelessness directly unless you already have a relationship of respect with them.

A key symbolized more than a place of one’s own, it also means:

• Safety, particularly for women escaping violence
• Control, I will let in or keep out who I want
• Hope, I am no longer labelled ‘homeless’
• Self-worth, I deserve my own space in the world
• Dignity, I no longer have to live out private functions in a public venue

This last point came up frequently in the interviews I conducted for my doctoral dissertation.  People spoke to having no place to live out intimate relationships, struggle with substance use, catch up on rest, feel down or ill, that wasn’t public and exposed.  Then in living out these human functions they would be punished, deemed inappropriate for public spaces.

There is so much power of a key.

The video ends with a poignant quote from a woman living in housing first, when asked what housing first is: “It’s everything. Without home it’s, it’s nothing.”

Framing Housing First from Calgary Homeless Foundation on Vimeo.

Much of the preliminary work on health and housing was on linking housing as a determinant of health and therefore demonstrating a relationship between these.  This has led to a plethora of studies stating, for example, that homelessness is bad for one’s health.  Newer working (refreshingly, for those who are tired of reading of the same correlations) is digging into intervention studies, and in particular housing as a health intervention.  The report “Housing and Health: Examining the Links” from the Wellesley Institute does exactly this, breaking down the various housing interventions that offer some promise in terms of improved health.

Most interesting to me in the report is the ongoing refinement of the differentiation between a Continuum Model of housing versus a Housing First Model.  In a Continuum Model, the individual is expected to advance along a progression of demonstrated capacity to demonstrate ability to move towards independent, market-rent housing.  In Housing First, housing is provided up-front, and supports to the appropriate degree are attached to the housing.  I personally see the most promise in the Housing First model, as this recognizes that for many, advancement along a continuum is not in the perceivable future.  This is not to give up on people, but to recognize for many, recovery simply looks like survival.

The primary recommendation in the report with regards to staff is to ensure that they are well trained.  This of course means individuals with an educational background in human services, such as social work or social service worker training, as well as supplemental certification, and of course work experience.  There are so many individuals that I have had the privilege of working with in social services in London who would fit all of these requirements.  However, organizations face two very real challenges: 1) staff cost, and 2) finding the right people.

Cost is of course a challenge as social services face limited access to funds at all sources of government.  In the context of housing, it may be possible to find funds for capital, but then operations costs of the ‘with supports’ component may be harder to fund. Of course, agencies would be happy to fill their staff compliment with those with a Master’s of Social Work (MSW) degree and 15 years experience, but this comes at a price.  There is often a temptation/pressure to decrease your expectations to meet the realities of your budget.

The other challenge is finding the right people; having an MSW degree does not mean you are good at each and every social service position.  And, there are many great individuals coming out of various social service programs who would be great in an organization but don’t have the years of work experience on their resume.  This is where the suggestion from the report on integrating student placements comes into play to solve both of the concerns I have brought up here.  Students can provide service with no cost as part of placement hours.  Also, having students in can be a great way to get to know people who might be good for you organization.

However, the primary warning is that students require adequate and appropriate supervision.  They are not able to fill in a gap in terms of staffing, but rather can compliment existing staff.  So, rather than thinking of student placements as a core solution to staffing, they should be considered a nice supplement, allowing you to provide the full range of services you might otherwise not be able to fund.  In this way, no proposal for housing with supports should be dependent on placements to be viable.

Mayor Fontana,

I wanted to take a moment to thank you for your decision shared in the budget discussion last night to relinquish the pursuit of the 0% tax increase.  In my mind, the service cuts required to get there were too great a price to pay, and I believe that the public participation around the budget shows I’m not alone in this.  Thank you for hearing us.  I know that budgets are very contentious and citizen feedback pulls in all directions.  Thank you for making the decision that clearly was supported by the majority of Council to provide City departments with the funds they need to do an excellent job.

Have a great weekend.

The most likely target to find $5.6 million is reserve funds.  You can find out all about what reserve funds are and the state of London’s reserves in this handy link from City staff.  I had the privilege to sit down and discuss reserve funds with the Director of Finance, Martin Hayward, and there were a few key points I learned:

Firstly, reserve funds are more like chequing accounts than savings accounts.  When we hear ‘reserve funds’ we often think of rainy day funds, like you and I may have some money in savings in case of a financial crisis.  However, reserve funds are all for anticipated costs, they are very specific, and there is no money in there unless we plan on using it.  Reserves are the money we have available to us for day-to-day business of the City, be it today’s spending or next year’s, or next decade’s.  If we didn’t have this money, we would have to take on debt to run the city.

Secondly, building on the first point, reserves are indicative of a plan, and if you change the reserves, you change the plan.  Take for example the graph below that represents a hypothetical reserve fund that is built over time to replace city vehicles.  We put in as much money as we exactly anticipate we need for the number of vehicles we plan to replace.  If we change the contribution, then we are actually changing the number of vehicles, which changes our ability to deliver services:

Thirdly, reserve funds act as the key buffer against debt in terms of determining our municipal credit rating.  Debt is the number one determinant, and you can see in this post how debt is set to go up.  However, having healthy reserves is used to mitigate against debt in making the calculation.  That said, for all the glowing talk of having more in reserves than ever (which of course makes sense as we continue to grow as a city), we still fall below the municipal average of reserves against debt.

All-in-all, decreasing our planned reserve fund contributions today means a plan for service cuts tomorrow.  So, if the public is rejecting service cuts now, lets also reject future cuts.

A number of new programs have come into place with promise to improve our standing on child and family poverty, including:

• Full implementation of all-day kindergarten, which it is worth reminding ourselves is primarily a poverty reduction strategy, rather than an educational one; and it’s effective.
• Enhanced access to child care programs.
• After school programming.
• Targeted programs for at risk communities, schools, and youth

At the same time, there have been decisions that have halted or reversed progress:

• Social assistance increases at rates lower than inflation
• Delay in child benefit increases
• Decreased spending on the full envelope of homelessness programs

I quickly noticed two things: much of the achievements in the 2012 report were the same as those listed in 2010, and anticipated rates of people to be served in programs introduced in the 2010 report are much higher than the real rates reported in 2014.  And then there are the graphs:

It took me a while to find the gains for 2011-12, but they are there, in the one indicator for educational progress.  There is no doubt about it, the educational measures are on a strong and consistent upward trend.  But the most important image in my opinion is the measure of income:

You will notice that although the exact dollar value of the family earnings is the same for 2010 and 2012, the percentage of the poverty line (represented hear as the LIM) has actually decreased.  This is because the LIM has increased with inflation, where real wages have stayed the same (or decreased in ‘real’ dollars).  This is a clear sign of Ontario falling behind on our commitment to poverty reduction.

Going forward, we need to hold the line on what were very incredible poverty reduction goals and strategies laid out by the Ontario Government, and not relinquish them at budget time under the auspices of austerity.  I’m all for reducing deficits, but not at the cost of increasing poverty.  Let’s renew our commitments and see the rate of children experiencing poverty in Ontario decreased by 25%.