Just the Facts Ma’am.

Maple Ridge Mayor Nicole Read stated “….the city believes a different [shelter] provider would have more success.”

The dictionary defines believe as: to have confidence in the truth of something without proof that one is right in doing so; give credence to; to have confidence in the assertion; to suppose or assume.

I consulted a dictionary for the definition of believe because Mayor Read and Maple Ridge are basing their actions, actions whose consequences will have a significant and long term effect on the city of Maple Ridge, on what the mayor and Maple Ridge believes.

“Preconceived, fixed notions can be more damaging than cannon.”  Barbara W. Tuchman

The more significant the consequences a decision or course of action will have, the longer the period of time that decision or course of action will affect, the more cost not making the right decision will inflict.

Homelessness, its’ companions mental health and substance use, are a significant – and growing – issue/problem/challenge in Canadian cities because actions to address homelessness are based on what is believed, on what Mark Twain spoke of as “……“what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”  

For the last twenty years the provincial and municipal governments have, year after year after year, irrationally repeated the same actions and behaviours that, year after year, failed to slow the growth, much less reduce, homelessness.

Mayor Read and Maple Ridge believe the solution is to continue with the actions and behaviours that have proved futile but to have a different organization perform those actions and behaviours.

Mayor Read and Maple Ridge believe it is not necessary to change to an organization unconnected to the debacle of homelessness, just an organization whose contribution to the debacle of homelessness occurred somewhere other than Maple Ridge.

Given the realities of current and future municipal and provincial budgets and the costs and consequences of continuing a course of fumbling ineffectiveness it is time to try a radical new approach to addressing homelessness and other issues and challenges we face.

I propose abandoning belief; ‘what we know’; politics and capricious  public opinion as the drivers of our action. I advocate we stay focused on the endgame – the goal of ending homelessness; get the facts, what is not what we want to be; ask the right questions; achieve an understanding of what is needed to enable the homeless, and those with substance use or mental health challenges, to maintain housing; commit to doing what is necessary and pursuing the course of necessary action – whether we like it or not.

If you make unfounded assumptions before choosing your path, you’re blindly sauntering along,”      Aulie Ice

If you do not know what you are doing, you will not accomplish what is needed to achieve the outcome you are seeking. Only the use of facts enable you to gain the understanding necessary to know – not assume – the course of action that will result in the outcome, the goal, you seek.

Fairy tales run on belief, the real world runs on fact.

Mayor Read, Maple Ridge, Mayor Braun, city council, Abbotsford, municipal and provincial politicians, citizens need to set aside the comfort, ease and instant, magical solutions of fairy tales and embrace the facts, hard work and sustained effort of the real world.

Caveat:          The comments, ideas and opinions expressed above are based on the assumption that the goal of BC’s provincial and municipal governments is to eliminate [to the extent achievable] homelessness.

At the time of writing the actions and behaviours of BC’s provincial and municipal governments provide no evidence that the goal of BC’s provincial and municipal governments is to eliminate homelessness.