Category Archives: Homeless

Homeless

Down and out in our backyards

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By Christina Toth – Staff reporter

By allowing a dozen or so people to camp temporarily on an undeveloped city park – Compassion Camp – Abbotsford Mayor George Ferguson has officially acknowledged his homeless constituents. By meeting with Fraser Valley Regional District mayors to seek workable solutions last week, and by having city staff meet with housing and homeless advocates, Ferguson and the other mayors are saying they have a responsibility to help the poorest of their residents. He is saying this is a community problem, not solely for provincial and federal governments.

What can we do to help the 430 or more people who are homeless? For starters we can turn up our compassion and turn down our fear – by several degrees. The “homeless” are not baby-eaters and monsters lurking in our backyards. We are talking about real people with heart and brains whose burdens have overwhelmed them. Their pain and shame is only deepened when you and I look down our noses at them and call them losers who have chosen this “lifestyle.”
Some may resort to petty crime, but let’s not forget there are criminals in every strata of society.

Now, let’s meet Diane. Four years ago she was a stay-at-home mom to three children and regularly volunteered at her kids’ school. Today, at 50, she sleeps in doorways when she’s used her 10-day-per-month limit at the Salvation Army emergency shelter. She says when her marriage fell apart, she hung out with her neighbours, who introduced her to crack cocaine. She began an eight-month “trip to hell,” and when it was over, her ex-husband had the kids and she lost all she had. Diane has been clean for more than two years but she can’t find her way home from the streets. “It’s very easy to fall, but it’s so hard to get back up,” she said. She hasn’t seen her children for a year. Her heart is breaking, but it’s not something she can talk about with her current friends. “Most of us are parents or grandparents, but we don’t talk about our kids. It’s a silent rule – it’s too heart-breaking.” Diane didn’t want her real name and photo used. “I don’t want my kids ashamed of their mom. Moms aren’t supposed to do things like this.” Huddled under a blanket the day I met her, worried about where she’d be sleeping that night, Diane never in her wildest dreams never thought she’d be homeless. “We used to be just like them,” she said, pointing up to the nearby houses.

Kevin Ellis, who sometimes stays at the camp, is wrapped up in a green sleeping bag, trying to get comfortable on two plastic chairs. The sleeping bag heaves with his breathing. Turns out he has COPD, or emphysema. He used to work at the Mission Raceway until the COPD sapped his strength. He can’t walk far. “Sometimes I fall asleep at the side of the road,” he said. “I get tired, I can’t help it. Then someone will call the cops on me.” Kevin has been homeless since Aug. 22, when he and 30 others were evicted from the Fraser Valley Inn. He stays at the Army’s shelter sometimes, but because he coughs so much, he says he’s also been asked to leave. The cough makes it difficult to share a place with someone. Kevin, 46, has spent two weeks on and off at the hospital recently. “I need an oxygen tank, but I can’t have one out here,” he said, labouring for breath. Is there enough warmth in his tent? “No, but I’ve got no choice, eh?”

James is a bright, articulate soul, a trained accountant and he lives in his car. Like Diane, he tumbled from middle-class comfort, in his case due to the depression that descended into his life and dissolved everything he had. Being homeless has given him a cruel insight to how our agencies and you and I treat the down and out. He shares his views and experience on his remarkable blog, www.homelessinabbotsford.com. To maintain some kind of balance, he volunteers at a local pool with special-needs kids on the weekends.

A few weeks ago Lawrence E. Smith hopped on a bus in Prince George and landed in Abbotsford without a penny. Lawrence, 59, had a head injury and was very much lost in the world. When he didn’t receive care at the local hospital, Compassion Camp resident Kerry Pakarinen took in “Yogi,” as he was nicknamed, fed him and sheltered him until he found some help from local churches. “Yogi” was put back on a bus to Prince George, where we presume his mental health workers have found secure housing for him.

Kerry, 44, was working and had an apartment until he broke his ankle while working as a construction labourer in winter. He has grown children in university. He didn’t want to talk about them, but did say rather proudly they are strong-willed and intelligent. Kerry has some problems: aches and pains, epilepsy and maybe the depression that dogs people who are homeless. But he has faith that God is helping out. “That’s why all of this is happening,” he said in reference to the community action plan for the homeless. Kerry took a risk exposing the camp. I asked him why he doesn’t just look after himself. “That wouldn’t be me. I enjoy giving a hand, I like to see people’s eyes light up when you help them.”

Homeless, Municipal

Follow Up?

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With a little forethought and patience the city is emptying Compassion Park of inhabitants quietly, without a confrontation for the media. Getting the people of the Park onto Social Assistance has given these homeless the ability/option of finding a roommate (with the unrealistic provincial shelter rates you NEED a roommate) so as to have accommodation. Having been together in the Park and on the streets will hopefully allow them to find a roommate they can live with – at least long enough for both people to get onto their feet. Helping the few percent of the homeless that were camping in the Park still leaves the vast majority (96 – 98%) of the homeless on the street and outdoors. However, having reminded the reader, that so far only a tiny portion of the homeless on the streets of Abbotsford have been helped, there is another very important issue connected to the process of helping that needs addressing. FOLLOW UP.

What happens now with those the city has succeeded in helping these people, this one small group of homeless, in getting onto assistance and (hopefully) into shelter? Most have, at one time or several times, been on assistance before. Being on assistance and in accommodation did not stop them from ending up on the streets homeless. Which is were (with high probability) they will end up again if all the help they get is to get them onto assistance, into some form of shelter – and incidently, out of the Park and the city’s hair. Which begs the question: Was the city’s purpose to merely get them out of the Park quietly OR was it to help them get life together?

As I stress the homeless are not one single thing, but I also stress the need to be realistic in addressing the issue of the homeless. Being realistic, if you have ended up homeless and on the streets, there is a strong likelihood that one has barriers other than just the need to get onto social assistance and into shelter. If those who would help do not acknowledge and plan for the need to address these underlying barriers they have, in the mid to longer term, accomplished nothing as those in need of non-existant support slide back down and back out onto the streets. I have all to often watched people come out of treatment and back into the same circumstances that they were in before they sought treatment. Slowly they slip back into their old habits and behaviours, then back into their addictions. In the same way, merely getting those in the Park into housing is only the begining of getting them back onto their feet and into mainstream society. If we do not establish some system to – get them help in addressing any barriers, help in making better choices, help in establishing a support system for the rough patches, help in finding employment, getting them engaged with ‘normal’ people and activities and some touchback system to maintain contact so that if there is a need it can be (one hopes) addressed before they crash and burn; what will help them to avoid landing on the streets once more?

Getting them onto assistance, into shelter and off the streets (or out of the Park) is the easy part. Getting together and delivering the support needed to aid them to make the lifestyle changes needed to get on with life and to not slip back down and out onto the streets of Abbotsford is complex, tricky and hard. It is also the the most important aspect to success in aiding the homeless.

Federal, Homeless, Municipal, Provincial

Re: News letters of April 29, 2006

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To Mr. Hoekstra:

I must point out that it would have made it easier to understand and appreciate his problems if he had told us what business he was managing and its location (if necessary). I heartily agree that “Our focus show be on treating our ill citizens not expecting them to camp out in the rain.” Unfortunately the problem has been ignored by both the politicians and citizens, such as Mr. Hoekstra, until it has reached the point where it has become such a large problem that it can no longer be ignored. The difficultly with the approach of ignoring the problem until it becomes ‘in your face’ in size is that there is nothing in place to address the issue. As a homeless person myself I regret the need for compassion park. But until the politicians and citizens get their act together and start to get the needed co-ordination, programs and access to facilities in place the people of Abbotsford are going to have to endure compassion park and the other problems associated with having allowed the homeless. It is the price society pays for sitting on its a** with its head in the sand on an issue it wanted to ignore because it had no neat, comfortable 100% successful solutions, until it reached the size it could not be ignored. I do feel insulted Mr. Hoekstra paints us all with the same brush, many of the homeless are extremely honest and honorable. At the same time I acknowledge his difficulties and the difficulties that others can have. But, if you chose to ignore a problem until it blows up in your face, you have to deal with the mess it makes as well as the original problem. Oh, as a final point, you might want to worry about the type of customers you have if you need to worry about them “accidentally” driving over people.

To Mr. Pihowich:

I can only say: get a dictionary. It is clear from your letter you have no understanding of what the word solution means. Solution: a. The method or process of solving a problem. b. The answer to or disposition of a problem. A solution requires solving the problem of the homeless. Spreading the homeless and their tents throughout the city in backyards solves nothing. Of course it would hide the problem so it could be ignored again. At least until it reached truly gigantic problems. Of course ignoring the problem is how it reached its present state and size, but then if you cannot understand what a solution involves it is hardly surprising you cannot understand the consequences of continuing to avoid addressing the homeless situation. As to those Barbecues, you might want to ask Councilor Lowen as I understand that one of them was his originally. But generousity is probably in the class of ‘solution’, that class of ideas and concepts you cannot grasp.

Addiction

Re: “Spud” Murphy letter, Times April 28

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submitted April 28th

Mr. Murphy certainly has the correct nickname. “after all, these people need alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, crystal meth, heroin etc.” It is apparent from this statement that “Spud” has his head buried deep in the earth. This serves to explain his inability to see the real world around him. As one of “these people” I need affordable housing (or an adjustment in the $325.00 shelter allowance to a realistic level; $325.00 for a place in Abbotsford?), food, showers, laundry, a phone, transportation, employment and a helping hand. I have no need of mind-altering substances.

Although given “Lord High Commissioner, sheriff of the forest and Robin Hood and his merry band” one could wonder just what mind altering substances old “Spud” is doing. Plus, use of mind-altering substances would explain “Spud’s” altered view of reality vis-à-vis the true nature and needs of “these people” such as I.

Addiction

Ready vs. Not Ready

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Ready? Not Ready? For what? To make a change, to embrace making the change with all your heart and mind, since if you are not totally committed to making the change you will fail. This is why the experts say not to make New Year’s resolutions and expect to turn over a new leaf on January 1st. Rather, they say, you should begin whatever it is you want to do when you are mentally ready to change your behaviour and work hard to achieve your goals. Why is this important to realize and take into consideration? Because it is as true for an addiction as it is for starting an exercise program or quitting smoking. It is why it is so crucial to have the facilities (detox, treatment or recovery) available RIGHT THEN, at the point in time when the addict is ready to change from addiction to recovery.

I grew up in an addiction (alcoholic) household which resulted in me having ways of thinking and acting that are the same as if I had and addiction myself. In dealing with these bad mental habits I have learned just how powerful a disease it is. To me it is a disease since it can be passed to others even if they have no addictions. As someone said to me “It is a disease all right, with its own special brand of insanity. Who would choose to live life in the manner of an addict if they were sane.”

Life experience has given me an appreciation of just how powerful addiction is. Empathy and sympathy mean that instead of running you maintain friendships and acquaintances over time, seeing what is happening in people’s lives as a result of their addiction. It is also what causes anger at the lack of resources. You watch someone destroying themselves until they reach a point they can and are ready to make a choice, a choice only they can make for themselves. They reach a point where they want to get out of the cycle of addiction, begin to recover and get on with living. They choose to seek and except help. If they are lucky, there is a spot open and they begin their journey of recovery. To often they are scheduled for a ‘spot’ not available for a week or two weeks. You see them on the day they were scheduled to enter treatment … and they are high and totally in thrall to their addiction again. Any help for this person will have to wait until they themselves cycle to a point they are ready to make a choice and commit to the hard work of recovery.

Addiction is not like cosmetic surgery where one can schedule the procedure when convenient and surgeon and facilities are available. Addiction is more akin to the deadly bacterial infection I picked up at the end of January. In order to survive and live I needed to begin antibiotics immediately. Fortunately the resources for me to live and recover from the bacterial infection were available immediately. This is why facilities and resources need to be available – NOW. If this does not result the most efficient scheduling and use of facilities … to bad, we are talking about saving lives – NOW.