‘We’re still people’: As winter sets in, unhoused people in Halifax call for change | 24CA News

This is Part 1 of a two-part collection on homelessness in Halifax. Part 2, which can embody interviews with provincial and municipal officers, shall be out Tuesday.

Kyle simply needs a protected, inexpensive place to name dwelling.

The 25-year-old lives in a tent in a wooded space of a chosen tenting website in Halifax, one of many few locations the place unhoused individuals can stay with some certainty that they received’t be hassled by police or metropolis officers.

“You don’t really know how each day’s going to pan out,” Kyle mentioned of residing on the website. “But you’re alive at the end of the day.”

Global News has agreed to make use of his first identify solely, because of the stigma individuals within the homeless neighborhood can face.

As the climate grows colder, Kyle retains heat by going to libraries or fast-food eating places when he’s capable of get a present card. He additionally makes use of a small propane lantern for warmth.

His tent is waterproof, so he can no less than keep dry.

“It’s pretty good,” he mentioned. “The tent sometimes freezes, but hey, that’s to be expected with a tent in the winter.”

Kyle has been residing outdoors for about 10 years. Finding employment has been tough, he mentioned – attributable to each being out and in of correctional amenities and former work-related accidents.

He’s tried to entry the emergency shelter system, however these stays are few and much between.

“They’re all full,” he mentioned. “It’s pretty hard to get into a shelter in the city.”

‘They don’t need to admit what is occurring’

In the summer time, Halifax regional council designated 4 websites the place unhoused individuals may tent. A fifth website has since been established within the Sackville space.

This coincided with the clearing of Meagher Park, often known as People’s Park – an space the place unhoused individuals and volunteers constructed a neighborhood within the aftermath of the police-led encampment evictions in August 2021.

At the time, town mentioned these staying at Meagher Park must vacate “following deteriorating health and safety conditions at the park” – however those self same situations at the moment are plaguing the websites the place unhoused individuals have been despatched as an alternative.

While Kyle as soon as had neighbours, most of them have since left attributable to a rat infestation. During his interview with Global, rats could possibly be heard rustling within the bushes close by.

Kyle mentioned nothing has been executed to enhance situations on the website and he questions why town designated the websites within the first place in the event that they aren’t being stored liveable.

“They just don’t want to really look at what’s happening. They don’t want to admit what is happening,” he mentioned.

“They just want to hide all the homeless people into certain encampments that they claim that they’re going to keep maintained, but they’re rarely maintained.”

Kyle mentioned if individuals go away these designated websites attributable to poor situations, they then run the chance of “being charged, or tents being removed and torn down by the city or by police … all because we do not feel safe in the sites that they sanctioned, that are deemed safe and fit for the homeless.”

Nathan Doucet, an outreach employee with Out of the Cold Community Association, mentioned transferring unhoused individuals into the few designated tenting websites contributes to their “invisibilization” – the place they’re pushed out of the general public eye and made to bear the burden of homelessness on their very own.

With these websites now coping with the identical points town used as a cause to close down Meagher Park, unhoused individuals must make the tough choice to both stay with rats or take their possibilities in an unsanctioned website.

“People quite literally can’t come here unless they engage in something very, very uncomfortable and kind of scary for a lot of people, meaning that they can’t come together and help each other organize,” Doucet mentioned.

“It creates a lot of precarity for the people living outside, when there’s not an ability to group together and take care of one another, or share resources … which just leaves you more vulnerable in general.”

For Kyle, this invisibilization feels “pretty sh–tty.”

“Even though I say we’re homeless, we’re still people. We still have humanitarian rights,” he mentioned.

“If we don’t feel safe here, if we go to another park that is fully safe … why does the city have to come and involve police or involve tearing down our tents and stuff?”

‘Winter is here’

Doucet, who additionally used to work outreach in Toronto, mentioned he’s involved for the protection of unhoused individuals because the coldest season units in.

“Winter is here. The ground is cold, the ground is frozen. I know folks in Toronto and here that have lost their limbs, that have lost their toes,” he mentioned.

“I’m worried that we’re going to see loss of life. I’m worried that we’re going to see loss of limbs.”

He mentioned he and different outreach employees give out sleeping luggage, tents, sleeping mats, lanterns, butane, stoves and emergency blankets – however “people need way more than the basic supports that we can provide for survival.”

“You’re still dealing with the chaos of what it means to live outside. People need mental health supports, they need harm reduction supports, they need all these things to help them create a foundation for themselves,” he mentioned.

“But … just the sheer urgency of it all means people are living in a state where them being unhoused is all that can be focused on.”

Kyle agreed. His largest barrier in bettering his state of affairs, he mentioned, is that every one of his time and power is targeted on survival.

“It’s too cold, you’re freezing outside … so it’s just kind of hard,” he mentioned.

Doucet loves his job, however says it’s tough to not be capable to get individuals what they honestly want – housing.

“It’s completely infuriating. I am frustrated constantly, because what we’re doing is acting out of a specific mode of care, but it’s not enough,” he mentioned.

“We’re all worn thin. We’re all worried as heck and we’re super frustrated that people are obviously getting left behind without the supports that they need, but yet we’re sort of thrust into this position – a stop-gap in a housing crisis to provide basic supports that are ultimately just a Band-Aid solution.”

Doucet mentioned with the rising value of residing, there are various extra individuals this yr who’re experiencing homelessness for the primary time.

According to the newest numbers from the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia, there at the moment are greater than 700 unhoused individuals within the Halifax space alone – 200 greater than there have been a yr in the past.

What’s wanted, he mentioned, is extra housing with lease geared to revenue to assist low-wage employees and folks on fastened incomes keep off the road.

“We’re seeing condo developments and a lot of development across the city going up, but there’s nothing being instituted … for rent-geared-to-income housing only,” he mentioned.

“It is absolutely what is needed if we’re going to provide reasonable, sustainable housing for people, especially those living outside.”

The difficulty, mentioned Doucet, is that the individuals making choices about homelessness and housing don’t have a full understanding of what unhoused individuals have to undergo on daily basis simply to outlive.

“There’s such a disparity between those who are making the decisions and those who are actually going through it,” he mentioned.

“And here we are, moving into another winter. There’s more people living outside than ever. The basic supports don’t exist and rent-geared-to-income housing doesn’t exist.

“And rarely do we see in those moments people actually coming into the parks to meet with people and to find out what they actually need.”

Homelessness ‘growing and growing’

In one other designated Halifax tenting website, an unhoused man who didn’t need to be recognized lives in a tent along with his canine.

He mentioned he had been residing there for about three months after getting kicked out of his earlier place, however he’s been homeless on and off for years.

Living there may be “not so bad,” he mentioned, although he needs there was some kind of energy hookup to cost his telephone and make it simpler to prepare dinner. He mentioned he bundles up and makes use of candles to warmth himself throughout the colder months.

“It is what it is, I guess. Make do with what you got,” he mentioned.

The man mentioned it’s been tough for him to entry housing due to affordability and challenges along with his psychological well being, in addition to an absence of pet-friendly locations.

His canine means he’s additionally unable to entry shelters. He mentioned he want to see extra assets for unhoused individuals who have pets.

“When you get kicked out of a place or something, you don’t want to give up your best friend,” he mentioned. “He keeps me going, basically.… I’m not going to get rid of him.”

Eric Jonsson works as a road navigator with town. His job includes travelling across the metropolis’s downtown core, in search of out individuals fighting homelessness and serving to them in any approach he can.

In the final yr alone, he mentioned the variety of individuals on the road has grown considerably.

“There’s just more people who are homeless,” he mentioned.

“It seems like for every person we get off the street, two more people show up the next week and it keeps growing and growing.”

He mentioned the designated tenting websites are working “as intended” in that occupants don’t have to fret about being kicked out by police or town, however mentioned there are nonetheless challenges. For occasion, individuals don’t have entry to energy and their bottles of water freeze within the winter.

While the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia homelessness estimate of 700 consists of individuals utilizing shelters, lodge rooms and transition homes, Jonsson estimated there are greater than 100 individuals sleeping outdoors within the Halifax space on any given night time.

He mentioned he counted 85 individuals a few weeks in the past, however there are possible many extra.

Jonsson mentioned the housing and homelessness disaster has been a very long time coming.

“It’s just a slow-moving disaster that (everybody) who pays attention to homelessness and housing could see coming, and it just finally catches up to us. And I don’t think there’s much of a plan to make it better any time soon,” he mentioned.

“There’s a lot of really cool organizations doing really good work, but they’re all just chipping away at the problem. There’s no kind of overarching strategy, there’s no kind of big plan to get those numbers back down and to get people off the streets.”

Jonsson agreed the province must construct extra non-public and non-market housing, noting that the largest barrier for many individuals in looking for housing is just getting their foot within the door.

“I really don’t think the private market is the answer for a lot of people,” he mentioned.

Jonsson mentioned his program is funded higher than ever earlier than, however he can solely achieve this a lot.

“I spend hundreds to thousands of dollars on tents a year, and it just seems so silly when that money should be spent on rent,” he mentioned.

“A lot of times, the budget for my program would be enough to put a down payment on somebody’s house. So why can’t we just build houses or buy houses and give them to people who really need them instead of funding these really Band-Aid, temporary solutions?

“Which isn’t to say my work isn’t important … but every year, it’s like, how many thousands of dollars are we going to spend on tents instead of actually housing people?”

— with recordsdata from Alicia Draus