Blog on pandemic planning in relation to homelessness services by Org-Code consultants
General article on the vulnerability of homeless people to preventable early death
Across Canada, large and small urban centres are confronted with growing numbers of homeless individuals and a decreasing supply of affordable housing. Indigenous peoples in particular are disproportionately represented amongst urban homeless and in terms of the difficulty they experience trying to secure affordable and appropriate rental accommodations. Adding to this complexity, urban Indigenous populations occupy a policy vacuum characterized by variability in policy formulation, overlap and gaps in policy areas in different cities, and a mismatch between policy areas and community needs (Hanselmann 2001). Urban Indigenous housing concerns consequently remain a rarely and poorly addressed policy concern by both provincial and federal government officials, trends that are increasingly evident at local government levels. Developing findings that speak to possible intervention strategies is therefore this research project’s primary goal.
This project is a partnership between the Aboriginal Standing Committee on Housing and Homelessness (ASCHH) and the primary researcher located at the University of Lethbridge. Formed in 1999, the ASCHH brings a voice to the urban Indigenous peoples of Calgary who experience, or who are at-risk, of homelessness, and remains dedicated to building real and sustainable solutions to housing and homelessness among Indigenous people in Calgary. This research project helps us better identify and understand the barriers that align with goal 1.1 identified in the ASCHH plan. That is, we intend to develop strategies to establish housing prevention strategies targeting “Aboriginal individuals and/or families living on or below LICO (Low Income Cut-Off) … who should be a main target group for receiving services and holistic supports.”
Sara Mayer’s youngest child often asks: “Mum, how many days will we stay here?” Each time, she tells him they won’t have to move again, but so far she has been unable to keep her promise. In 2013, Mayer fled her abusive husband and went to the UK from mainland Europe with her two children, but he found them. The family moved and tried to settle somewhere new, but time and again he tracked them down.
In 2018, he locked himself in the house with his teenage daughter, who only escaped when Mayer arrived with the police. He then texted his daughter repeatedly saying he would kill her mother. Six months later, when Mayer turned up at school bloodied and accompanied by police, her daughter stopped speaking to her. For the fourth time in five years, they had to uproot their lives: moving town, changing school, and leaving their friends.
Like many in their situation, the family was in danger of ending up on the streets. Domestic violence is a major cause of homelessness. Government figures show that in the year to June 2019, almost 24,000 people were made homeless in England directly because of domestic abuse.
For those fleeing, it is increasingly difficult to find a space in a refuge, which offers temporary accommodation and intensive support. Councils cut funding for domestic violence refuges by almost a quarter between 2010 and 2017, and last year, Women’s Aid found that 64% of all referrals to refuges were declined. Its 2018 study showed 45% of people fleeing domestic abuse end up sofa surfing, and almost 12% sleep rough while waiting for a space to become free.
Short-term lettings through Airbnb and other online platforms are “growing out of control” in London with up to one in 50 of all homes now estimated to be available, town hall bosses have claimed.
The spread of short term lets is encouraging antisocial behaviour and criminality with residents increasingly complaining about them being used as party houses and for prostitution and drug dealing, councils in the capital said. They believe it is pushing up rents and reducing the availability of homes for the rising number of households who are temporarily homeless, which in England hit 56,280 last year – the highest level since 2010.
Westminster city council said recent problems include a property in Knightsbridge being used as a brothel, a mansion block near Hyde Park where more than a 100 of the 530 flats are thought to be in use as short-term rentals and a mews house in Marylebone rented on Airbnb for five people where police had to shut down a party for 50.
How do you know if your local housing market is providing affordable housing options for households on the lowest incomes? We’ve heard that this is a pain point for many Councils across Australia. Many want to have access to this sort of information to assist in their advocacy activities, and for negotiating with developers – showing that affordable supply is limited and asking for a contribution of affordable dwellings is a valid request.
Median house and unit prices, and median rents are potentially an answer to this question, but they don’t give you an idea of the number of listings at a given price point, and often the median housing costs are not affordable for lower-income households.
Every urban housing market in New Zealand is regarded as “severely” unaffordable, a major report has found, despite efforts by the government to address skyrocketing property prices.
The Demographia international housing affordability survey studied more than 300 urban housing markets in eight countries and found housing in New Zealand was now more than seven times the median income, making it out of reach for most.
The country’s housing crisis – which has seen the homeless population grow, and the waiting list for a state house reach record highs – has spread to the provinces, the Act party’s leader, David Seymour, said.
“The effect of this is that even well-paid, professional Kiwis are unable to buy homes in the cities where they work,” he said. “This is a serious threat to productivity, the main driver of our living standards.
As homeless encampments continue to get shut down or swept up, some local lawmakers are looking at the 37MLK camp as a model.
A miniature white picket fence lines the entryway into the homeless encampment of 37MLK in Oakland, where tents sit in neat rows, fairy lights glow overhead and chickens cluck around the grounds.
At least four homeless encampments sit along the mile of boulevard leading up to 37MLK from the city’s downtown, but where the other camps are shrouded in darkness after sunset, lawn lanterns provide light along paths at 37MLK. Whorls of decorative fake ivy dangle over the chain-link fence, mixing in with potted plants and splashes of art, adding beauty to the ugliest of situations. “Welcome to our home,” read a small paper heart near the entrance, before the winter rains washed it away.
With California’s housing crisis culminating in a surge in homelessness unseen in recent history, the question of home has been increasingly met with answers of desperation. Wait lists for temporary shelter beds total in the thousands in some jurisdictions. Overpacked vehicles and RVs, out of which a growing number now live, line certain streets in cities across the state. In Oakland, where rapid gentrification has led to the widespread displacement of black residents, there are more encampments within city limits than there are square miles in the city – 90 sites versus about 78 sq miles – according to the most conservative estimates.
The artists Gilbert & George have said they are risking their reputation “as horrid people” with a philanthropic initiative to sell crockery glazed with their own works to raise money to feed the homeless.
The collaborative duo have been shunned by what they describe as “intolerant liberals” for their Conservative-supporting pro-Brexit politics but claim they are “the artists of the disenfranchised”. Now they have provided artworks to be transferred on to dinner plates that will be sold by a social enterprise near their home in the East End of London for £125.
The plates feature images of works from their latest exhibition, Paradisical Pictures, which has been touring globally and is currently showing in Los Angeles, where they visited the Skid Row homeless enclave. One of the works, On the Bench, shows the pair slumped on a bench in a cemetery, apparently asleep or passed out.
“We are the tramps,” said Gilbert Prousch, 76. “Waiting for Godot.”
Domestic violence is a key cause of women experiencing homelessness – and cuts mean services to protect them have been destroyed.
I first came across Sharron Maasz in January this year when I watched her being interviewed on a number of videos on YouTube. I discovered them after hearing that a woman had died in accommodation designated for women experiencing homelessness in my home city of Oxford. Sharron was 44 years old.
She was popular and, according to those who knew her, warm, kind, compassionate and loving. Sharron was a mother and a grandmother. She died after a long period of experiencing homelessness in Oxford, the city where we were both born and raised, and which we both called home. Later, through devastated mutual friends, I learned that we attended the same school; our paths never crossed as she was older than me, and we ended up living very different lives.
Over the past two years, however, I’ve had a lot of direct contact with people experiencing homelessness in my own city and across the country as co-founder of the Labour Homelessness Campaign. I discovered that domestic violence triggered the loss of Sharron’s job, home and child custody – just some of the factors that led to her spiralling into drink and addiction.
Sharron, talking directly to the camera in one of the videos, describes in detail the mental pain from a former abusive relationship. “Just because you are on the streets doesn’t mean you are a piece of rubbish,” she says. “Nobody knows the stories everyone I know has been through … It just breaks my heart.”