'Epidemic' of people living out of shopping carts: Winnipeg advocate
Homelessness becoming 'more visible' in West Broadway neighbourhood
Winnipeg's West Broadway neighbourhood has what Todd Donohue calls a "shopping cart epidemic."
"In the last year I've seen a noticeable increase," said Donohue, an advocate and mentor at West Broadway Community Services.
A 20-year-old woman who has lived out of a shopping cart in the West Broadway area since July told CBC that for her, homelessness began when an employment and income assistance cheque came late.
"Our landlord evicted us and illegally locked us out of our home, threw out everything we owned and sent our cats to animal control," said the woman, whom CBC agreed not to name.
Since then, a Safeway cart has carried all her possessions.
The young woman walks for 14 hours on a typical day, she said. When she's not on the move, she's figuring out where to go next. At night, she sleeps under a bridge with a 19-year-old man, a friend and ally she met on the street.
They watch out for each other but often she's afraid, she said.
"We wake up with things missing, and people standing there, and people fighting," she said.
"Without the buddy system, a lot of us would end up dead," her friend said.
West Broadway magnet for homelessness
"We see and hear those stories every day," Donohue said.
Many homeless people are drawn to West Broadway because there are a lot of resources in the area, he said.
Donohue would like the federal and provincial governments create more affordable housing in the area. Right now, the vacancy rate is around one per cent, he said.
"There's been studies done all over the place: Ontario, Quebec, B.C., Winnipeg … They've studied homelessness to death," he said. "Housing is key. Once you have a stable roof over your head, you feel secure. Other things are easy to deal with — mental health, addictions, all the other things."
Landlords don't take chances
The young homeless woman said open-mindedness would go a long way to helping her find a stable home.
"Landlords need to understand that we can't always be clean. Sometimes we have a bunch of stuff that we have to bring to viewings," she said. "People don't want to rent to someone who's homeless."
Her friend said the same goes for employers. He's stuck in a "vicious cycle" because getting a job is nearly impossible when you "wake up and you stink and you're wearing dirty clothes," he said.
Donohue hopes for an attitude change, because most people are one paycheque away from being homeless, he said.
"Giving someone a smile, stopping to see and meet them and talk to them," Donohue said. "They are people just like everybody else."