Part II of VI

According to Mayor Braun the $400,989 in federal funding will be used to create a new intake and referral system for the homeless in Abbotsford that is anticipated to be a key component in Abbotsford’s housing-first approach to homelessness.

 

Let’s contrast this Abbotsford centric worldview of implementing housing first in Abbotsford with how Housing First has been effectively implemented everywhere else in the world.

Housing-first is a concept that focuses on getting homeless people under a roof as soon as possible, providing stability before addressing other potential issues such as mental health or drug use.

Wrong. Housing First is not about simply slapping the homeless into housing because without providing supports and services to help them stay housed they quickly fall out of their housing and recycle back to being homeless.

Choose any recent year and total up the number of homeless housed. Then add the total number of homeless who went to treatment during that year.

Add the number of homeless in Abbotsford at the beginning of the year to the number of homeless who arrived in Abbotsford during the year.

From [the number of homeless at the beginning of the year + the number of homeless arriving during the year] subtract [the number of homeless housed + the number of homeless who went to treatment] to get the number of homeless that should be on the streets in Abbotsford at the end of the year.

The result will show Abbotsford’s homeless population as being a negative number. .

A result which implies that not only would there be no homeless in Abbotsford but that hundreds of homeless could come to Abbotsford and in some fashion be magically housed.

The process of homeless people coming to Abbotsford, setting foot onto the soil of Abbotsford and being housed via some metaphysical process would continue until the negative ‘number of homeless in Abbotsford’ was reduced to zero.

Talk about a unique to Abbotsford homeless solution. Sadly, as improbable as a metaphysical mechanism that houses the homeless is – it is more probable than the City of Abbotsford implementing an effective Housing First program.

Obviously getting a negative value is impossible. You get a negative number because getting the homeless into housing or treatment is quite doable. The homeless, mentally ill and those using substances maintaining housing is not something doable.

Effective Housing First would never house the homeless before the supports and services to allow them to maintain their housing were in place. It is why the person responsible for housing during the five years the federal funded research study was under way in Vancouver began his work months before the intake of a single client into the Vancouver based portion of the Housing First research study.

The intake system is anticipated to be a key component in Abbotsford’s housing-first approach to homelessness.

I had thought to note this as wrong but re-reading the statement drew my attention to the fact that the intake system was referred to as a key component in Abbotsford’s housing-first approach to homelessness. The statement makes no reference to the intake system as a key component in an effective Housing First program.

Research and experience predicts the City of Abbotsford’s intake and referral will be as ineffectual as the other actions and behaviours of the City of Abbotsford in addressing homelessness in Abbotsford. This approach will, in a Business as Usual Only in Abbotsford way, prevent the creation and implementation of an effective Housing First Action Plan in Abbotsford.

The effectiveness of Housing First is neither the intake procedure nor having one overriding intake system. Research and experience have demonstrated that who or how or how many organizations perform intake has no significant impact on the effectiveness of Housing First in reducing homeless numbers.

The key to Housing First’s ability to reduce the number of homeless is its provision of supports and services that enable the homeless to maintain housing and progress to the point those supports and services are no longer necessary to maintain housing.

Which brings us to the point that effective Housing First is not, cannot be achieved by a piecemeal approach

That is why the Mental Health Commission of Canada used the research and experience gained in conducting the Canadian government’s 5 year $110 million dollar research study of Housing First to create an online toolbox.

The toolbox isn’t simply a list of the wide variety of techniques used to deliver the supports and services needed by the homeless to remain housed and thrive.

The toolbox serves as a template, a prompt, to ensure the Housing First plan you are creating for your community contains all the elements, all the components to provide the supports and services necessary if Housing First is to be effective in meeting the needs of the homeless, the mentally ill and those challenged by substance use.

So, in giving the City of Abbotsford the $400,989 Conservative MP Ed Fast and the federal Conservative government are saying the $110 million dollars spent on the 5 year research study was a waste of those millions of dollars and 5 years of time. Because, if the research study wis valid and valuable, why did the federal Conservative government award $400,989 to the City of Abbotsford to spend on actions and behaviours that are opposed to the findings of the research study? Why is the federal Conservative government providing funding to the City of Abbotsford for actions and behaviours that will, if the research study is valid, fail and waste the $400,989?

It is clear from their behaviours the City of Abbotsford has not felt it necessary to do even the most basic research as to what Housing First is and why Housing First is effective in housing the homeless for the long term. Yet the federal Conservative government awarded them $400,989 anyway, suggesting that governments do not care about having an understanding of the needs of the homeless, substance users or the mentally ill.

Governments are about appearance, perception, measurables that suggest something useful was accomplished even when nothing was. About pushing the homeless into housing and reporting that you have housed x number of homeless, when in fact the homeless have not been housed. Falling out of housing after 1 – 3 months means they have simply been recycled through the system again.

A reality which, while excellent for those in the Business of Poverty or the Business of Charity], is another disaster, another barrier erected for the homeless, mentally ill and those struggling with substance use.

End Part II of VI

Next – Part III: Hypothetically