Last week, I was in Yellowknife, where I released results of new research on affordable housing in the Northwest Territories (NWT). The research project was sponsored by the Social Economy Research Network of Northern Canada, and was a collaboration with the Centre for Northern Families.

Research findings include the following:

• Housing indicators suggest that the state of housing in the NWT (especially in small communities) is much worse than in the rest of Canada. While 2% of Canadians report living in “crowded conditions,” that figure is 8% for rural NWT. And while 8% of Canadian households report living in housing that requires major repairs, the figure is 22% for rural NWT.


• Housing is more expensive to both build and maintain in the NWT than in the rest of Canada, and there are three main reasons for this.  First, building costs are higher in most parts of the North, especially areas that do not have road access; building costs on the Arctic Coast are roughly $300 per square foot, which is roughly double the cost in some other parts of the NWT.  Second, utility costs (i.e. electricity, fuel, water) in the NWT, for the average household, are more than double the Canadian average. Third, there is a considerable amount of poverty in the NWT, especially in small communities, meaning that a large proportion of households in the NWT require public housing, which is a relatively expensive form of government-assisted housing. (Public housing requires a very deep subsidy–i.e. as much as $20,000 per unit, per year, in the NWT–for the operation and maintenance of that unit. Among other things, this subsidy covers fuel, power and water.)


• Due to many of the above factors, the Government of the NWT pays considerably more on housing than a ‘typical Canadian province.’ While the average province pays $61 per capita on housing, the Government of the NWT pays $1,672. Ergo: the Government of the NWT pays more than 25 times per capita on housing than what is the norm for a Canadian province.


• In light of the above, the NWT is very reliant on federal funding for the building, operation and maintenance of housing. But across Canada, federal funding agreements for housing (most of which began in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, and which typically last between 35 and 50 years) are starting to expire.  In the NWT, all federal funding commitments of this nature will completely expire by 2038. In the NWT, in the absence of new agreements with the federal government, roughly half of all public housing units will disappear by 2038. Put differently, the issue of expiring operating agreements is very significant throughout Canada, including in Toronto, but even more pressing in the NWT.


• The research results, which appear as a chapter in the 2011-2012 edition of How Ottawa Spends, suggest that a long-term, permanent commitment is required by the federal government in order to sustain housing in the NWT.  The chapter argues that it’s more cost effective for the federal government to reinvest the savings it accrues (as current agreements run out) into fixing already-existing housing, than it would be to allow current units to disappear completely and to then rebuild from scratch. (This general argument has been made before by Steve Pomeroy in the following report, commissioned by the Canadian Housing and Renewal Association.)

All of the information relating to last week’s launch of the research can be found here, including a PowerPoint presentation I gave in Yellowknife on Thursday, and plain-language summaries of both my chapter and that of Dr. Frances Abele (who supervised this research and has a chapter of her own in the same publication on the federal government’s northern strategy).

This post originally appeared in The Progressive Economics Forum

Nick Falvo is a PhD Candidate at Carleton University’s School of Public Policy and Administration. He also teaches a course on affordable housing and homelessness at Carleton's School of Social Work. His research interests include homelessness, affordable housing, social assistance, social development in Canada's North and post-secondary education. Under the supervision of Dr. Frances Abele, he is currently the main researcher on two studies looking at affordable housing in Canada's North—one looks at the Northwest Territories and is a partnership with the Centre for Northern Families, the other focuses on the Yukon and is a partnership with the Yukon Anti-Poverty Coalition.  Prior to his doctoral studies, Nick worked for 10 years as a front-line community worker with homeless persons in Toronto.

Homelessness continues to be a visible problem in most Canadian cities.  I would say most Canadians, when they think about how we respond to homelessness, would consider emergency shelters, drop-ins and soup kitchens – charitable programs set up to shelter and protect people while they are homeless – as central to our response.

But what about policing and law enforcement?  What about the issuing of tickets and fines for panhandling or sleeping in parks?  Such practices, which essentially criminalize homelessness, are every bit as central to our response.

At a time when the growing divide between rich and poor is in the spotlight, how we choose to deal with society’s most vulnerable – the people who occupy our streets not by choice but by necessity – is important to consider.  The criminalization of homelessness runs counter to the “Canadian way.” It is out of line with our principles as a just and civilized society.

Two reports that highlight the downside of criminalizing homelessness in Canada have been released this week.  “Can I See Your ID?  The Policing of Youth Homelessness in Toronto” (Bill O’Grady, Stephen Gaetz, Kristy Buccieri) and “La judiciarisation des personnes en situation d’itinérance à Québec : point de vue des acteurs socio-judiciaires et analyse du phénomène” (Dominique Bernier, Céline Bellot, Marie-Eve Sylvestre, Catherine Chesnay) both explore the impact of policing on homelessness. The first report, Can I See Your ID, reveals that despite strong evidence that panhandling and squeegeeing have declined over the past ten years, the amount of tickets issued under Ontario’s Safe Streets Act has increased exponentially, rising from 780 issued in 2000, to over 15,000 in 2010.  All this has left homeless people with an accumulated debt of over $4 million dollars.

Interviews with street youth reveal that they receive a huge amount of attention from police, not only in the form of tickets, but also through regular ‘stop and searches’. This attention is not limited to those who are criminally involved – the evidence is clear, street youth are being subject to social profiling.  In particular, being young, male and visibly homeless in downtown Toronto means you are very likely to have regular encounters with police.  The second report also documents consistent practices of criminalizing homelessness across seven Canadian cities (Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Quebec, and Halifax).

How does any of this make sense?  Issuing fines to people with little or no money does not help them move forward with their lives. It alienates and traumatizes an already marginalized population and makes moving out of homelessness that much more difficult.  Ample research from the United States highlights the negative impact of criminalizing homelessness (Culhane 2010; Ruddick, 1996; NLCHP, 2006; 2009).  While we often consider the use of law enforcement – including both policing and incarceration – as a characteristically ‘American’ response to poverty, we need to accept and realize that we do the same thing in Canada (Hermer & Mosher, 2002; Sommers, 2005; Sylvestre, 2010).  Whether this means creating new laws that target homeless persons, (banning panhandling or sleeping in parks), or simply using existing laws in a disproportionate or discriminatory manner, (tickets for drinking in public, jaywalking etc.), the goal is to harass people who are homeless so they stay away from public places – spaces that we are all entitled to use.  The outcome of all this is debt, a greater likelihood of going to jail, and the outright violation of the rights of Canadian citizens.

In recent years, several Canadian studies have highlighted the bidirectional relationship between homelessness and prison (Gaetz & O’Grady, 2006, 2009; Novac, Hermer, Paradis and Kellen, 2007; Kellen et al., 2010).  That is, being homeless means you are more likely to go to prison, and prisoners – unless they receive effective discharge planning and supports, are more likely to become homeless.

All of this raises important questions. If people are afraid of those who are homeless, should the police intervene?  The answer is no.  One might be afraid of someone because of the way they look, their second hand clothes, their ethnic background, or the colour of their skin, but that doesn’t mean they actually pose a real threat.  Using police intervention to respond to public fear that is based on stereotypes and prejudice is unacceptable.  Then why don’t we object when this happens to people who are homeless?

If the general public, business owners and politicians find homeless people annoying or unseemly and don’t want to see them on their streets or sidewalks, is there an obligation for the State to act?  Perhaps there IS an obligation  . . .  but doesn’t it make more sense to address homelessness by ensuring there are the necessary resources and supports (including an adequate supply of affordable housing) to prevent homelessness in the first place or to help people move into permanent housing?  Let’s stop treating the symptom through punishment, and instead let’s go for the cure! 

To read the full reports, visit: 

Can I See Your ID?  The Policing of Youth Homelessness in Toronto 

La judiciarisation des personnes en situation d’itinérance à Québec : point de vue des acteurs socio-judiciaires et analyse du phénomène

The minority Liberal government voters elected on October 6 provides a political opportunity for Ontario to realize a long-overdue and much-needed four-point affordable housing plan. The province’s last two minority governments delivered robust housing initiatives: In 1975, the province’s first rent regulation and tenant protection laws, which grew more substantial and effective until they were significantly dismantled in 1998; and Ontario’s first major affordable housing programs in 1985, which were successfully increased until they were shut down in 1995.

The signs of Ontario’s province-wide housing distress are clear: one in every three Ontario renter households are in core housing need – the federal government’s definition of precarious housing. Approximately 1.3 million provincial households pay 30 percent or more of their income on housing, the official definition of unaffordable housing. There are more than 152,000 households on affordable housing waiting lists across Ontario. Housing is not only the single biggest expense in the monthly budget of low and moderate-income households, but the high cost of housing is one of the biggest factors driving people to food banks because they don’t have enough money to pay the rent, and cover other basics such as food, energy, transportation and child care. Housing is also one of the most important fundamentals for good health for individuals and for the entire population. However, federal and provincial investments in affordable housing are set to drop sharply this year, and continue to decline after 2014.

A four-point housing agenda for the new minority Ontario government would include the following:

New affordable homes: Most parts of Ontario urgently need more affordable homes to accommodate people that are homeless or in grossly substandard and over-crowded housing, and also to deal with population growth. A provincial inclusionary housing policy that authorizes municipalities to introduce planning rules that would require affordable housing in all new developments is one important measure, but it needs to be combined with a long-term affordable housing supply initiative that includes committed funding. In recent years, most affordable housing development dollars in Ontario have come from the federal government, with some of these dollars matched by the province. But the federal housing investments are eroding ($1.2 billion in housing cuts this year alone), and Ontario has no plan to deal with the federal withdrawal.

Affordability measures: A universal housing benefit that would help cover the gap between household income and housing costs is long overdue. The Ontario government has dabbled in various housing supplements over the years, but – as the auditor-general noted in 2009 – none have been particularly well designed. With conventional ownership housing increasingly out of reach for low, moderate and even middle-income households, and the federal government committed to tightening mortgage eligibility rules even more, the pressure is building on the province’s private rental and social housing stock. But vacancies are low, and rents are rising in private rental markets throughout the province.

Rent regulation / rental housing protection: For almost a quarter of a century, Ontario had increasingly effective rent regulation and rental housing protection laws. In 1998, the provincial government of the day introduced “vacancy decontrol,” which allows landlords to charge any rent they want on a vacant unit. This has allowed rents to increase significantly, often much higher than the mandated provincial guideline. In addition, rent regulation is waived for newly constructed buildings. The gaps in rent regulation laws need to be patched. Ontario used to have a law that slowed the demolition or conversion of private rental housing. Although the province’s population is increasing, and there is a growing need for new rental homes, the private rental housing universe has been stagnant or declining in most parts of the province. The previous law required landlords seeking to take private rental housing off the market to ensure that the tenants were re-housed. Rent regulation and rental housing protection are key components of a critically important enhancement of tenant protection laws.

Ending homelessness / linking with supports: Ontario is lagging behind other provinces, including Alberta, in making a commitment – and backing it with a solid plan and funding – to end homelessness. The province’s so-called long-term affordable housing strategy does contain some useful measures, including a commitment to work with municipalities to create more flexibility among a variety of disjointed provincial homelessness and housing programs, but a specific provincial plan with adequate funding is lacking. A key to preventing and ending homelessness is an effective strategy that links health and social supports with housing through a “housing first” approach – successfully used in a growing number of US and Canadian jurisdictions. Ontario’s supportive housing policies have not kept pace with innovative developments in Canada and internationally.

Reprinted with permission from the Wellesley Institute

Michael Shapcott is Director, Affordable Housing and Social Innovation at the Wellesley Institute, an independent, non-profit research and policy dedicated to advancing urban health. Michael has worked extensively in Toronto, in many parts of Canada, nationally and internationally on social innovation, the non-profit sector, civic engagement, housing and housing rights, poverty, social exclusion, urban health and health equity. He is recognized as one of Canada’s leading community-based housing and homelessness experts.

Calgary launches its Plan to End Youth Homelessness

I think it’s time to change the way we respond to youth homelessness in Canada.  I began working with homeless youth in the early 1990s at Shout Clinic in Toronto.  At that time, the youth homelessness population was exploding, and communities were scrambling to develop emergency services to meet the immediate needs of vulnerable young people who found themselves on the street.   Today, many years later, we still address youth homelessness primarily through the provision of emergency services, such as shelters, drop-ins and clinics.  Yet for me, the longer I am  involved with the issue of homelessness, the more frustrated I get by the fact that we think this is OK – that it is reasonable to have young people languish in emergency services with limited opportunities, without access to school and with seemingly irrevocable breaches with family.  Our recent report, Family Matters, asks for a radical shift in how we address youth homelessness. 

So, where is the innovation?  Who is going to take the first step?

The Calgary Homeless Foundation just released its “Plan to End Homelessness in Calgary”.  Those interested in what an effective and humane response to youth homelessness could look like should really check this out.  There is no doubt that this is the most innovative plan to address youth homelessness in Canada, and if implemented well, will drastically reduce youth homelessness and give many young people a better chance of growing into adulthood in a safe way, with appropriate supports and opportunities. The basic tenets of the plan weren’t simply pulled from thin air.  They are drawn from a grounded understanding of effective responses to youth homelessness, particularly from the UK and Australia.  Here is what I like about the plan:

Making the case for an investment in youth homelessness

Many places in Canada have few - if any – supports for homeless youth.  In other places, there are designated services, but these do not always recognitize that the causes of youth homelessness (and thus, the solutions) are distinct from those that characterize the adult population.  Communities need to recognize that there is need for a strategic, coordinated and integrated response to youth homelessness based on the developmental needs of young people.

Focus on prevention

The Calgary plan goes farther than any other Canadian community I know of in investing in the prevention of youth homelessness.  Drawing heavily on really creative ideas from the United Kingdom and Australia, this plan demonstrates how you can make prevention work, by: a) putting systems in place that identify young people at risk of homelessness, and giving them and their families the supports they need, b) adopting a policy that ends the institutional practice (child protection services, corrections, mental health) of discharging young people into homelessness, c) recasting the role of emergency shelters and outreach services, and d) encouraging the development of innovative, coordinated and targeted initiatives that stop young people from falling into homelessness, or conversely, to help them transition into independence in a safe and planned way.

Housing for young people

One cannot address youth homelessness if there is not an adequate supply of affordable and supportive housing options.  Recognizing that young people moving into independent living have special needs distinct from adults (most youth have no experience running their own home), the plan includes innovative approaches to housing young people who can no longer return home, or who have no home to go to. 

Case Management and a Common Assessment Framework

An effective response to youth homelessness does not rely on young people figuring things out themselves (I wouldn’t want that for my children).  Rather, there is need for a really good case management approach that prevents young people from slipping through the cracks and in the shelter system for years.  The development and adoption of a ‘common assessment framework’ (widely used in the UK) will allow for effective client-centred planning and programming.

Role of research and data collection

The Calgary plan that draws heavily on what we know about the causes of youth homelessness, but also effective solutions.  It is a strong example of how we can make research matter.  At the same time, the plan calls for effective implementation of a data management system, so that progress can be tracked, systems evaluated and improvements made.

Community engagement

The process by which this plan was developed relied heavily on engagement with community members including service providers in the sector, but more importantly, young people who have experienced homelessness. 

The Calgary plan’s strength lies in its systems level approach that focuses on stopping youth homelessness before it starts and on helping those who do become homeless to successfully move into independent living as soon as possible and with the necessary supports, so that they can grow into adulthood and achieve the promise that we want for all young people.

This is the best plan to address youth homelessness in Canada right now, and CHRA and Eva’s Initiatives are preparing to launch their responses to youth homelessness in short order.  Things are beginning to change after all.

In Florida, people are being arrested for giving food to people who are homeless. That’s right, for providing food to malnourished people. The City of Orlando has been targeting Food not Bombs, a community group that, twice a week for the past 5 years, has been providing meals to homeless people in parks. By June 15th of this year, 15 people had been arrested. The penalty for violating the Orlando ordinance is 60 days in jail, a $500 fine, or both. This kind of ridiculous policy and practice raises a couple of issues for me. 



First, we have to address the criminalization of homelessness as a serious problem. Most people don’t consider law enforcement when thinking about our response to homeless. Shelters and day programs are usually what come to mind. But, criminalization of homelessness isn’t just an American issue; we’re equally good at this in Canada. Ontario, for instance, legislated the Safe Streets Act over ten years ago to address panhandling and squeegeeing (many communities across Canada have followed suit), and in Toronto police continue to issue thousands of Safe Streets act tickets (not to mention tickets for other misdemeanors) to people who are homeless and without means to pay the fines. In response to this, there is a growing body of research on ticketing and the use of law enforcement to address homelessness, and the bidirectional relationship between homelessness and prison, that attests to the highly problematic (and unethical) nature of this ‘response’ to homelessness. 



The second issue to consider is the nutritional vulnerability of people who are homeless. While many of us may believe that the nutritional needs of homeless people are met through charitable food services, the reality is quite different. In fact, Val Tarasuk’s research on youth homelessness and nutritional vulnerability shows that it doesn’t matter whether young people get all their food in agencies, or from the proceeds of panhandling, they are quite likely to be malnourished, and this at a time when they are growing and really need appropriate and adequate food. 



A new report from Victoria highlights the link between homelessness and nutritional vulnerability. More than this, the report reminds us that a person’s lack of food isn’t solved once they become housed. In fact, when homeless people do become housed, a large number continue to live in extreme poverty, and after the rent, utilities and other necessities are paid, there is often very little left for food. The use of food banks in Victoria and other communities continues to rise. 



If we want to support people who are homeless in an ethical and humane way, we need to begin by treating them as people. Criminalizing homelessness, and failing to address nutritional needs of particularly vulnerable people is no solution, and this is something no one should be proud of.

The headline in the Saturday Globe was disturbing enough: Residents of Toronto public housing four times more likely to be murder victims.

But I found myself equally rattled by the 285 on-line comments that followed. There were vitriolic references to “welfare bums,” the “psychiatrically deranged,” “gang-bangers, drug dealers, crack whores and other miscreants.” But if I looked past the mean-spiritedness, I could see a consensus opinion that even progressives might share: that social housing is simply unworkable, and that low-income neighbourhoods – especially those with black majorities -- will inevitably be breeding grounds for crime.

Earlier this year, I read a book that challenged this view. It is the tantalizingly-entitled When Public Housing was Paradise, J.S. Fuerst's compilation of 79 first-person accounts from people who lived or worked in Chicago’s public housing in the 1940s to 1970s.

The communities created by the Chicago Housing Authority were all, by current wisdom, destined to fail. The new-built estates were large and isolated – Regent Park-style low-rises punctuated with high-rise towers. They were overwhelmingly black communities, drawn from the tenements on Chicago’s South Side and migrants from the southern US. They were not mixed-income communities either. The CHA selected families – one third of them women-led -- exclusively from the bottom third of the income scale.

An incubator for leadership

Yet Fuerst credits public housing for creating Chicago’s black middle class, providing an “incubator for leadership” for African Americans. Account after account describes the children of stockyard workers and unemployed widows who are now lawyers, teachers, business leaders, police officers and senior public officials.

What made Chicago Housing Authority a launching pad to success?  The tenants’ stories are filled with praise for the clean, well-managed buildings and grounds, where prizes were given for the best gardens. They spoke about housing managers who knew everyone’s name, encouraged local initiatives, and found jobs for teenagers. They spoke about the schools, churches, clubs, sports teams, and womens’ associations that were integral to the community’s strength.  And they talked about the community itself, where everyone would look out for local children, and did not hesitate to pick up the phone if they spotted trouble.

Paradise lost

Today, public housing in Chicago and elsewhere is seen as anything but paradise. What went wrong?

The answers offered by the CHA’s former residents and staff will induce squirms in Toronto’s right- and left-wing readers alike.  Here they are:

Abandoning tenant screening.

In CHA’s early days, preference was given to applicants with the lowest incomes in the worst housing conditions. But only those prepared to pay their rent, keep their homes clean, and supervise their children were accepted.

Once in the housing, the management strictly enforced standards, and so did other tenants. As one tenant recalled, “We kids cleaned those halls. And if somebody messed up our hall, we were quick to tell them, ‘Get that paper off that floor. Don’t you do that on my stairs, cause I got to clean it Saturday.’”

By the 1970s, federal rules forced CHA to give preference to the poorest of the poor, with no other screening. Today, tenants and former tenants quoted in the book say that “destructive and dangerous” tenants – anywhere from 10 - 30 per cent of tenants – need to be evicted to allow a return to healthy community life. Draconian as this move is, they argue it would be less disruptive than Chicago’s current practice of evicting all tenants to demolish entire buildings.

The introduction of income limits.

Public housing originally offered affordable rents for working families. But when a rent-geared-to-income system was introduced in the late 1960s, working families received a rent hike with each pay increase, and the most successful families moved out. Public housing was transformed from successful working class communities to the “people left behind.”

The loss of visionary leadership.

The Chicago Housing Authority’s first Executive Director, Elizabeth Wood, gathered around her an energetic team of the “brightest and best.” But in 1954, she was dismissed, ostensibly for “management inefficiency,” but more likely because her anti-segragation convictions put her at odds with her board.

After her departure, the most talented staff became demoralized and drifted away. To return to its former success, says Fuerst, public housing would need a cadre of employees with the same dedication, competence and sense of mission as the early staff.

What about us?

Chicago in 1950 is not Toronto in 2011. Yet we have too have a contingent of striving families, many of them immigrants, who are poorly-housed with very low incomes. We too have seen the decline of stable working class neighbourhoods into “the housing of last resort”  – quite possibly for the same policy reasons that led to decline in Chicago’s public housing.

So what if . . .?

What if we explicitly designed public housing to vault low-income families into middle-class success?

• What rent polices would we set? How would we create opportunities to build savings?
• What institutions would provide the “incubators for leadership?”
• Would we be prepared to favour “strivers” (to use Fuerst’s term)? And if we did, what about those who don’t make the cut? Could we accept that private rental housing, or shelters, or the couches of family and friends, would become the real “housing of last resort?”

Well, what do you think?

Joy Connelly started working in social housing 30 years ago doing street outreach in downtown Toronto. Since then she has managed a housing co-op, developed new co-ops, and acted as the communications manager for the Ontario Non-Profit Housing Association. Over the past ten years, Joy has worked as an independent consultant on over 130 projects for federal, provincial and municipal agencies and many social housing providers. Joy's blog, Opening the Window, provides fresh ideas for social housing in Ontario.

I'm in Yellowknife this week for the launch of a policy report on homelessness.  It's the first of several publications coming out of a multi-year research project that looks at affordable housing and homelessness in the Northwest Territories.  The research is being supervised by Dr. Frances Abele (Carleton University) and our community partner is Arlene Haché (Centre for Northern Families).

Here are the top 10 things I learned while preparing this report:

10. Local stakeholders should lead. 

• This project started with Arlene Haché, Executive Director of the Centre for Northern Families and recent recipient of the Order of Canada.  She wanted to see more research done on homelessness in Yellowknife.

9. Researchers work best when they work together. 

• Arlene’s first step was to approach Chris Southcott, a Principal Investigator with the Social Economy Research Network of Northern Canada (SERRNoCa).  They had a team of researchers in place who had already laid the groundwork for a multi-year, multidisciplinary research project in Canada’s North.  They asked me to join the effort.

8. Learn your history!  

• My supervisor on this project, Dr. Frances Abele, made it clear to me from the get-go that, in addition to the present-day analysis, I would also be involved in writing a historical article on government-assisted housing in the Northwest Territories.  No ifs, ands or buts!  You can’t understand the present if you don’t know how we got here.  Stay tuned for news on the release of the historical article, likely next year.

7. In Canada’s North, get a research license! 

• In any of Canada’s territories, even if a researcher has clearance from their university’s research ethics board, they are still required to obtain a “research license” from one of the three research licensing bodies.  In the case of the NWT, this is done through the Aurora Research Institute.  Part of the process involved in obtaining a license includes consultation with the local community, including Aboriginal groups, NGOs and municipalities.

6. Disseminate research in multiple formats.

• A full-length policy report isn’t for everyone.  That’s why my supervisor instructed me to ask Mary McCreadie, formerly of the NWT Literacy Council, to write a plain-language summary of the report.  The summary is longer than the report’s executive summary, shorter than the policy report, and a more straightforward read than either of them.

5. Work with local NGOs. 

• The Yellowknife Homelessness Coalition has provided us with invaluable assistance in planning the public launch of this research, including the booking of Yellowknife City Hall Council Chambers.  And all of the media work around the launch of this report has been coordinated by Alternatives North, a highly-respected social justice organization based in Yellowknife.  Without the assistance of these NGOs, I wouldn’t have the slightest clue about how to get the message out.

4. Engage with government.

• Well before the public launch of this report, Arlene and I requested a meeting with the NWT’s Minister Responsible for Homelessness, along with his Deputy Minister.  That means that by the time this report reaches the media, the Minister will know everything he wants to about it.  The report was also sent to relevant territorial departments for feedback; again, this means there will be no surprises when bureaucrats hear about the results through the media. 

3. Defer to local stakeholders. 

• Once the research findings have been presented, it’s time for local stakeholders to take over the debate.  After Arlene and I present our findings, there will be a panel discussion involving the co-chair of the Yellowknife Homelessness Coalition, a member of the NWT Legislative Assembly, a local ER physician and a senior bureaucrat in the NWT government. 

2. Use the Internet. 

• The role of the folks at the Homeless Hub has been invaluable.  You wouldn’t be reading about any of this if it weren’t for them!  What’s more, the public launch of this report is being recorded by a member of the SERRNoCa research team; and everyone speaking on the panel will be asked to sign consent forms.  The video recording will then be uploaded to the Internet.

And, the number 1 thing I’ve learned about research through this effort is…

Don’t compete with other researchers. 

• It just so happens that another PhD student Julia Christensen (a Trudeau Scholar no less!) is actively engaged with homelessness research in the NWT.  Rather than compete, Julia and I hope to one day collaborate together on a journal article that brings together two (non-competing) perspectives.

To access the full report, see: Homelessness in Yellowknife: An Emerging Social Challenge

Nick Falvo is a PhD Candidate at Carleton University’s School of Public Policy and Administration. He also teaches a course on affordable housing and homelessness at Carleton's School of Social Work. His research interests include homelessness, affordable housing, social assistance, social development in Canada's North and post-secondary education. Under the supervision of Dr. Frances Abele, he is currently the main researcher on a three-year study looking at homelessness and affordable housing in the Northwest Territories—a partnership with the Centre for Northern Families. Prior to his doctoral studies, Nick worked for 10 years as a front-line community worker with homeless persons in Toronto.

So, what do you think of when you see a kid on the street? What crosses your mind? Is he or she a runaway? A dropout? A kid looking for kicks? Is it a young person fleeing abuse at home? Usually, when we think of teenagers, we also think of them in relation to family. They’re young, so they must have parents, brothers and sisters, grandparents, right? But in that moment of contact when you see them sitting on the sidewalk often looking unkept, cold and hungry, family is nowhere to be seen. What comes to my mind when I encounter a homeless youth is that they must be running away from something; something that has clearly gone very wrong.

As a mother, my instinct is that they are vulnerable and need care, and I often wonder how they ended up on the street. I think about whether there is any possibility of reconciling with their families and going home. I also wonder how agencies that serve street youth support them, and what if any efforts are made to help young people reconnect with families? I say this fully cognizant of the fact that many young people are forced to leave very difficult home lives characterized by violence and abuse, and going back may not even be possible.

Our new report, Family Matters (co-authored by Stephen Gaetz and Tara Patton), looks at the experiences of homeless youth and the efforts of Family Reconnect, a unique program delivered through Eva’s Initiatives. Through assessment, counseling and help that allows young people to access appropriate services and supports, the Family Reconnect team work to help young people address underlying conflicts within their families, and hopefully improve relationships to the point that they are able to return home, or move into the community, ideally with family support. Family reconnection can mean making contact with a mom or dad, but also an uncle, aunt, sibling or grandparent. If contact is not possible or desired by a young person, Family Reconnect counselors can help youth come to terms with this reality and move forward with their lives in a healthy and productive way.

Our research demonstrates that for many homeless youth and those at risk of homelessness, family does matter. We have found that not only do youth express the desire to improve relations with family, but that often the problems that forced these kids to leave home have more to do with family member’s struggles with mental health, abuse, poverty and/or addictions, rather than with the problems of the youth themselves. We also found that in many cases, family members couldn’t cope with the challenges of undiagnosed learning or mental health issues of youth, and this can often lead to youth homelessness.

Providing youth and their families with needed support and counseling can lead to the early identification of underlying issues and challenges. From there, the necessary supports can lay the foundation for potential reconciliation with family or community, or allow the young person to move towards independent living in a safe and planned way.

The report also highlights the importance of prevention as a key strategy to addressing youth homelessness. In countries like Australia and the United Kingdom, their response to youth homelessness stresses preventive strategies, including programs in schools to help identify and support young people at risk, early intervention programs that include family mediation, counseling and support, and respite housing to give young people and their families a ‘time out’ period in the midst of a heated conflict. This preventive orientation makes a lot of sense and appears to be very effective in providing young people and their families with the supports they need.

Unfortunately in Canada, preventive programs like Family Reconnect are the exception rather than the rule. More often than not, our response to youth homelessness is characterized by the provision of emergency services such as shelters and day programs. As good as many of these programs are, they tend to focus on helping young people become self-sufficient instead of considering the benefits of helping young people reconnect with family. That is, from this perspective, the family is seen only as part of a young person’s past, not as part of their future. In this report, we propose a radical rethinking of the way we respond to youth homelessness in Canada; one that places prevention and family reconnection at the centre of our response. This is not a cynical appeal to ‘family values’. Rather, it is a call to consider the role that family reconnection can play in helping young people avoid homelessness, and support those who are homeless in moving off the streets as quickly as possible. Have a look at the report. Now what will come to mind the next you cross paths with a homeless youth? Don’t you agree that this kind of reform is necessary?

To access the full report, see:  Family Matters: Homeless Youth & Eva's Initiative's Family Reconnect Program

Daphne Winland is Associate Professor and Graduate Program Director for the Department of Anthropology at York University.

Many jurisdictions in Canada have begun to recognize the value of harm reduction and have developed innovative and effective programs to deal with the harms of substance use and addiction.  For example, there are over 30 studies that support the effectiveness of Insite, Vancouver’s supervised injection site, as reducing the harm associated with injection drug use.  Harm reduction works because it gives people choice, counters stigma associated with drug use, acknowledges that drug use is part of our history as a society, and that reducing harms instead of eliminating use can make people and communities safer and healthier.  Recognizing the value of harm reduction can be seen in the inclusion of harm reduction in strategies related to mental health promotion and addictions care as well as public health programs and services oriented to preventing the harms of substance use. However, there has not been much discussion of the role harm reduction plays in ending homelessness. 

Harm reduction is a key principle of Housing First programs.  Housing First separates the right to housing from conditions such as acceptance of treatment or sobriety.  Recently, the Greater Victoria Coalition to End Homelessness contracted Scientists at Centre for Addictions Research of British Columbia to develop a paper that outlines the role of harm reduction as part of a strategic plan to end homelessness.  The cornerstones of this policy framework are social inclusion and the provision of permanent affordable housing.  Permanent housing is essential to reducing the harms of homelessness and substance use. For example, lack of housing increases the harms of substance use including the risk of blood borne diseases and premature death.  The need for permanent affordable housing and policies of client inclusion in the development of policies and programs are complemented by a series of six other strategic directions that outline the necessary elements of a housing and harm reduction strategy. 

This framework recognizes that ‘one size does not fit all’ and that a variety of approaches are needed in the provision of housing and supports.  A housing and harm reduction policy framework includes a range of housing options that place client choice at the center. The proposed policy framework widens the range of housing options to include  low barrier housing where drugs and alcohol are tolerated  to living in buildings where alcohol and drug use is prohibited. Low-barrier housing has the same requirements of tenants in any other rental situation: pay the rent, don’t destroy property and don’t behave in ways that will harm or disturb other tenants. The framework recommends a number of options for integrating housing and harm reduction. For example: the Dr. Peter Centre in Vancouver has  integrated harm reduction philosophy and services such as supervised injection into the provision of housing and supports for people with HIV/AIDS and injecting drug use. Community harm reduction services are important for those living in market housing. 

The strategies recommended in the frame work are consistent with current evidence and have been shown in other cities to reduce the harms of drug use as well as health and social costs. For example, the provision of low barrier housing to people with long term chronic homelessness and alcohol problems significantly reduced, health, policing, social service and justice costs in Seattle. A policy framework is an initial first step and it plays a role in bringing people together around new understandings of what we ought to do. The next step is doing the right things for citizens and communities.

To access the full policy framework, see: Housing and Harm Reduction: A Policy Framework for Greater Victoria

Bernie Pauly RN, Ph.D is an Associate Professor in the School of Nursing and a Scientist in the Centre for Addictions Research of BC at the University of Victoria.

In recent years, "housing first" has emerged as a key response to homelessness in North America. With its growing popularity in Canada comes increasing interest in understanding how the approach works, different program models and its effectiveness for specific populations. One key factor that undoubtedly shapes the success of any housing first program is the nature and supply of affordable housing.

The basic underlying principle of housing first, pioneered by Sam Tsembaris at the Pathways to Housing project in New York in the 1990s, is that people do better moving forward with their lives if they are first housed. This is as true for homeless people and those with mental health and addiction issues as it is for anyone. According to Pathways to Housing, "The Housing First model is simple: provide housing first, and then combine that housing with supportive treatment services in the areas of mental and physical health, substance abuse, education, and employment." This approach differs from what has been (and arguably still is) the orthodoxy of our Canadian response to homelessness; in that "treatment first" approach, people who are homeless should be placed in emergency services until they are "ready" for housing (having received access to health care or treatment) or until housing is available.

Research quite convincingly demonstrates the general effectiveness of housing first over treatment first. In a 2000 study, Tsembaris and Eisenberg demonstrated that 90 per cent of people in the Pathways program remained housed five years later. A growing body of research shows that people with mental health and addiction issues do very well with a housing first approach, spend fewer days in hospital and are cheaper to support. (To see the research, visit www.homelesshub.ca/housingfirst.)

Housing first is most effective when, first, people are rehoused rapidly, minimizing time spent on emergency services. Because resources are scarce, priority should be given to high-needs clients, including families and those with mental health and addiction challenges. Second, ongoing and appropriate support must be provided for those who need them (and many don't). Those with addiction issues should have access to harm reduction-based housing, if that is what they prefer. Finally, where possible, clients should have input into the kind and location of their housing. While providing shelter and supports is central to housing first, the approach works best when it helps people nurture supportive relationships and become meaningfully engaged in their communities.

As housing first grows in popularity, it is applied in new ways and in different contexts. One challenge of implementing the approach is the ability to deliver appropriate housing support in the context of a housing shortage. I have often wondered what would have happened if the City of Toronto had attempted to implement its Streets to Homes program in the late 1990s, when rental vacancy rates were routinely below one per cent, compared to the last five years, when vacancy rates have hovered between three and four per cent.

In a tight rental market, one of the first things to go is the notion of consumer choice. One criticism of housing first is that people are often given housing in remote areas of town, far removed from services, poorly served by transit, and where people struggle to connect. Women fleeing violence may be placed in neighbourhoods that are not safe. The outcome is often isolation, continued marginalization and a compromised ability to accesses necessary services and supports. In the long run, this can undermine stability and security of tenure.

Different approaches to housing first take on the challenge of affordable housing supply in distinct ways. In Montreal, all levels of government working with the non-profit sector have sought to address the supply problem with an ongoing investment in social housing, with pathways to that housing for people who are homeless. The Streets to Homes program in Toronto relies almost exclusively on the private market, and rather than use rent subsidies, it has developed a system to fast track people so they can access other government benefits and supports. With a waiting list of more than 75,000 for social housing and with modest targets for expanding its affordable housing supply (up to 1,000 new units annually--though these targets are not being met), Toronto relies on the private rental market, making its housing first program vulnerable if the affordable housing supply shrinks.

In Calgary, the affordable housing supply has shrunk drastically over the past 10 years, while rents have skyrocketed. In rolling out its housing first model, the Calgary Homeless Foundation takes a systems approach, coupling its adaption of housing first with an investment in affordable housing (3,000 units built over the past three years) and with rent supports for people living -- or choosing to live -- in the private rental market.

The best approach to housing first, then, is to treat it not as a program or service tied to an agency, but rather, as part of a broader and more strategic response to homelessness; one that focuses on prevention by ensuring an investment in an affordable housing supply, and by requiring other sectors (mental health and corrections come to mind) to play their part in diverting people from homelessness through more effective discharge planning strategies. It is only by ensuring a sufficient supply of affordable housing that one of the central tenets of housing first -- consumer choice -- is protected.

Reprinted with permission from CAMH.