The 10 year plan to end Homelessness: Just smoke & Mirrors?

It is a question that needs to be asked within the confines of the 10 year plan to end homelessness. I have contacted MLA’s to no avail in discovering the answer to a serious question:

What is the recidivism rate for those exiting homelessness?

There seems to be an ignorance within agencies of the PTSD an individual suffers from when exiting this barbaric form of institutional life that is the wearhouse style shelter system in Calgary. A system that many participants (staff or clients) akin to a jail system for the poorest of the poor.

We in Alberta have a Ten Year Plan read here.

The City of Calgary has amassed some decent research to be read here.

And information from the Alberta Secretariat for Action on Homelessness can be read here.

Much like PDD funding for the differently abled, funds for ending homelessness are directed to one funding stream, The Calgary Homeless Foundation .

The smoke and mirrors is that by all accounts from the Governmental end the “Plan” is on track, and as such shelters should begin closing shortly. Yet then we hear this in the media http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/story/2012/12/23/calgary-homeless-shelter-full.html?cmp=rss, that this winter shelters are once more nearing capacity and that this is normal for this time of year.

What is not reported, which has been confirmed by anonymous sources is that the capacity almost reached is not what the building is zoned (funded) for. The capacity is the second capacity number issued as the true capacity of the building is to be filled to when a “state of emergency” is declared by the province. No such decree has come out this winter, as the state of emergency is declared when there is an eminent risk to human life.

Yet these same sources have revealed to Musings, that this capacity quandries the shelters have been experiencing since late spring/early summer. A traditional time when shelters are running drastically under capacity.

So the question is, what is actually happening with this Ten Year Plan?

There is quite a bit of political shell gaming going on, millions of dollars being invested to turn service providers into landlords, year or more of financial support being given to individuals with case workers to support housing, but once supports are gone people are once again entering the poverty cycle.

What are the stats on re-lost homes to be re-housed?

What is the field doing to make shelters less traumatic for individuals and more healthy communities? This will aid the individual in then seeking healthy community (essentially how are shelters becoming places for healing instead of abuse).

Seriously, ending homelessness is a great theory. The theory though has challenges upon implementation when our leadership is a sound bite culture that just wants to throw money at the symptoms of the issue, instead of investing in true societial change that elements the cancer we know as homelessness and poverty.

The question that needs to be answered at first, is the question I would pose when I taught at Mount Royal University: In the wealthiest province in Canada, what level should our poor be expected to live at?

Write your MLA (Find MLA here), demand answers. Demand accountability. Demand an Alberta where all citizens are housed and cared for and where OUR OIL MONEY is spent ON US!

Let’s shatter the mirrors, and blow the smoke away. Let Premier Redford, Opposition Leaders Danielle Smith; Raj Sherman, and Brian Mason and all their caucuses’ know that as Albertans we demand more than soundbites…we demand an end to the cancer of poverty within this province.

For a society is judged not upon how the healthiest and wealthiest live, but rather on how we as a society care for the elderly, the poor and the sick. Looking at our province currently, we as a society are ill and dysfunctional. Let us rise up and change that.

Let us demand the government of vision to continue building Alberta as the best place in Canada to live.

One Person, one vote, one letter. Writer today (MLA INFO HERE)

Related articles

• Calgary homeless shelters reaching capacity (cbc.ca)
• Calgary’s homeless shelters even busier in 2012 (calgaryherald.com)
• Homes for the homeless: a smart investment in dignity (csmonitor.com)
• Hived off or helped out? (lfpress.com)
• Can Calgary still end homelessness? City’s 10-year plan verges on halfway point (metronews.ca)
• Area shelters add beds to combat cold (gazette.com)
• New Data Reveals Why Poverty Is Up, But Homelessness Is Down (businessinsider.com)
• Demand grows at Fort Worth homeless shelters as temps drop (khou.com)
• Young homeless veterans doubled in 2 years (upi.com)
• Unity takes to the streets to protect homeless from cold (wwltv.com)