Year in Review: City struggles to support homeless

Kelowna’s struggle with frighteningly low vacancy rates this year brought into stark focus an issue that has been plaguing the city for years: there are way too many people without homes.

As rent prices soared in 2017 and it became harder and harder to find a place to live, the number of people living on the streets seemed to grow - or at least became more obvious to more people.

While not-for-profit support groups had been ringing the alarm bell for years, by 2015 Kelowna’s politicians had already started taking steps to try and address the problem, hiring a dedicated staff member in mid-2015 to coordinate agencies and try to get a handle on the problem.

By the time spring rolled around community groups had begun implementing their own programs to try and address the problem.

After receiving almost $150,000 from the federal government, The Canadian Mental Health Association launched its Housing First initiative.

Through the initiative, CMHA aimed to take people who are chronically, or episodically, homeless, and do everything they can (engaging landlords, supporting clients’ mental health, etc.) to get them into some kind of permanent housing.

By July they were already seeing some early success, but homelessness remained an issue in the city.

Early in the year a group of volunteers hit the streets to survey as best they could the city’s homeless population. Fifty volunteers spread out across the city over a single night attempting to talk to every single person on the street.

In total, they counted at least 233 people in the city experiencing homelessness. As the organizers pointed out, that number was just a snapshot of a single night, meaning it missed many more who were couch surfing or just temporarily off the streets.

Meanwhile, the Kelowna Gospel Mission was serving record numbers of clients in 2016.

The volunteer survey found that, in addition to the 233 homeless on the streets, 273 individuals were living in temporary system-supported housing.

The survey also contained valuable data on what exactly caused many of the people to end up homeless, with most saying they were evicted.

A big hit the the city’s homeless came in June, when the “Metro Central” community centre was forced to close thanks to a new development.

According to the church’s lead pastor, Laurence East, anywhere from 100-200 people would frequent the centre each day, taking advantage of the art and music studios, cafe, bakery and meeting with friends.

Having that close down meant the loss of a fair amount of support and community for the city’s vulnerable populations. (Thankfully, the church found a new home for its community centre late this year, and its already back up and running.)

But what really vaulted the city’s struggle to find housing for all its residents into the public consciousness this year was council’s decision to extend a bylaw making it illegal to rest on sidewalks overnight.

Mayor Colin Basran said the decision was primarily about preventing people from obstructing sidewalks and hindering accessibility for residents.

“I want to be abundantly clear that the City of Kelowna is not targeting people sleeping on our streets with the purpose of harassing or incarcerating our most vulnerable residents,” he said.

But many didn’t see it that way. A group of protesters gathered outside city hall the day council passed the bylaw change, expressing their disappointment with actions they said sent the message that the city cares more about its businesses than its vulnerable populations.

“I think that, despite whatever efforts the city is making in a more comprehensive strategy, when they make this bylaw a priority they send a message that the comfort of people accessing business and restaurants is more important that the lives of the people who are sitting on the sidewalks,” Katrina Plamondon said at the time.

While the sidewalk bylaw remains in effect, Kelowna City Council made a final move this month to address homelessness, voting in a new Homeless-Serving Systems Strategy.

The hope is that the strategy will bring local social agencies together to tackle homelessness and help improve lives in the community.

That strategy will be rolled out over the next 16-18 months. KelownaNow, and many others in the city, will be watching closely to see what happens.