Councillor tells feds, province to 'write a cheque' to help region support people who are homeless
'Money is what we need,' Coun. Jim Erb says
A regional councillor says the provincial and federal level of governments have to step up to help the municipality deal with homelessness as a new point-in-time count reveals there are more than 2,300 people living on the streets in this community.
"The first thing they could do is write a cheque," regional Coun. Jim Erb said Wednesday morning in an interview with host Craig Norris on CBC Kitchener-Waterloo's The Morning Edition, a day after the new point-in-time count results were released. Erb also chairs the regional council's community and health services committee.
"Money is what we need because so many of these issues, health, mental health, drug addictions, are healthcare issues which are the responsibility of the upper levels of government," he added.
"The only way the municipality has to support homelessness is the tax levy and the tax levy was never intended for that."
He noted in other provinces, the provincial governments pay "a much, much bigger share" of the budget necessary to handle housing and homelessness issues. He said the region continues to try to work with both levels of government to get increased funding.
"I think our hope is that as these point-in-time counts become more public across the country, that perhaps the provincial and federal governments will recognize the crisis that municipalities are feeling and respond with some adequate funding," Erb said.
New count says 2,371 people are homeless
A point-in-time count completed on Oct. 22 found 2,371 individuals said they were experiencing homelessness in Waterloo region.
That's up from 1,085 people who were homeless when a point-in-time count was done in September 2021.
The numbers are in a report that is part of the agenda for the region's community services committee meeting set to be held next Tuesday.
The report notes chronic homelessness in the region has been increasing at an average growth rate of 28 per cent year-over-year since 2020.
Groups helped region do count
The report says the fourth point-in-time count took place over a 24-hour period and was completed by regional staff and with help from more than 40 community agencies.
That includes the YWCA of Cambridge. Sara Escobar works for the organization and told CBC K-W in October that they had concerns the number of people would increase significantly and that could "sound really scary." But, she said, people can't panic.
"We have to be able to just slow down. Rational thinking has to lead at which point we have to just look at the gaps in those services and try to figure out how to fill those gaps so that folks can get the things that they need to get," she said.
"There are lots of folks that we know are just a bit on the surface and new to experiencing homelessness, especially when we talk families, that there's a lot of work that we can do there."
WATCH | Volunteers around the region are counting the number of women experiencing homelessness:
David Alton, who is the lived expertise facilitator for the Social Development Centre Waterloo Region, was also part of the team helping with the point-in-time count.
They said while the count is a good thing, it really only shows part of the whole picture.
"Everyone should treat any number around homelessness as underweight," Alton said.
"As a culture, we haven't fully grasped how awful our housing system is. And so, it's impossible for our data collection process like the point-in-time counts to fully grasp the full scale of the issue."
Alton says the group will now work with the region to expand on the numbers to better understand the scope of the issue so the people counted are more than just a number.
"Doing these interviews was really eye opening and just the scale of the issues that are going on when we remove people's access to housing instability, we expose them to so many other layers of harm," Alton said.
"When people experience homelessness, it's not just the loss of a house, it's also the loss of a sense of stability and a sense of self."
Region needs funding and local help
In a statement, regional Chair Karen Redman said the count shows "what many of us know, that there are people in our community who are struggling and more individuals than ever are experiencing homelessness."
Redman said she was thankful to the community partners who helped complete the count.
"The region has invested significantly in affordable housing and supports and we are committed to working with partners and other levels of government to address this growing challenge," Redman's statement said.
Erb said regional councillors have supported a plan to end chronic homelessness, with an aim to eliminate it by 2030.
But it comes with a massive price tag: $400 million over the next six years.
"We need to have the other levels of government come to the table because that kind of money is not available locally," Erb said.
In the coming months, he said the region is looking to add more shelter beds for winter, including at the former YW building in downtown Kitchener and a shelter space on University Avenue in Waterloo.
But he said if any local groups have space, the region would be open to talking about being able to use them. As well, the region plans to open some warming centres to help people get out of the cold during daytime hours, he said.
"There's a challenge, there's no question about that. The way the numbers are going and the inability of our staff to find adequate spaces to house these people," he said.
"We need a partnership with the community and with the other municipalities in the region to help us identify local locations where we can house these people so that they remain safe."
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With files from Cameron Mahler, Joe Pavia