Advocates call for targeted solutions to address homelessness in Saskatoon
CBC
As homelessness continues to be an issue in Saskatoon, advocates say action is needed more than words.
Shirley Isbister, president at Central Urban Métis Federation Inc., says a complex web of factors contributes to the issue, including addiction, mental health challenges and the ongoing effects of the residential school system.
"There's all of these things that come together to cause the homelessness that we're facing," she said.
She stressed the need for a personalized approach to deal with the issues, pointing out that while some affordable housing is available in the city, the absence of essential supports creates a significant barrier in providing care for people.
Isbister called for specialized housing for individuals with addictions and those with mental health challenges and emphasized the importance of outreach teams to provide ongoing assistance once people are housed.
She also talked about the role of colonialism and intergenerational trauma in the crisis.
According to a snapshot of homelessness in Saskatoon on one day in April 2022, 90 per cent of those who are homeless in the city are Indigenous, and 53 per cent experienced residential school and/or intergenerational trauma.
"In my family, my mother-in-law and her siblings were in residential school, so my husband is a descendant; our children are descendants and our grandchildren are descendants," she said. "That's a lot of people within one family that you're trying to work through trauma."
Isbister said that changes to Saskatchewan's social assistance program are a major setback to people trying to get out of homelessness.
The Saskatchewan Income Support program was framed as making people more self-sufficient but advocates say it's left many people scrambling for help.
Rather than having rent cheques paid directly to their landlords, the new program gives people a monthly cheque to pay their utilities, food and rent bills.
Joanne Denis, a social worker at Possibilities Recovery Centre, says rental housing in Saskatoon costs too much for people on social assistance. She's calling for affordable and safe housing, along with essential supports and programs.
"It certainly implies that the people who are struggling with a poor socioeconomic status are not valued in the same light that other people are valued in," Denis said. "It's shocking and it's saddening for myself as a social worker."
Denis also wants to see better transit services that would allow people to get to the places they need to access services like medical appointments and treatment programs.
A man in Saskatoon is in hospital after being shot by police as officers executed a warrant late Friday night.
RCMP say a man who was reported missing near Key First Nation has been found deceased.
Christy Morin says life was never the same in Alberta Avenue after the fires began.
It's small things, like a cigarette or a pair of clean socks, Rachel Montour says, that can go a long way to make you feel more human when you’re out on the street.
Several dozen members of Windsor's Chaldean community and its supporters celebrated in the cold at the corner of Marentette Avenue and Wyandotte Street East Friday, as city officials gave a secondary name to the section of Marentette between Wyandotte and Tuscarora Street: Chaldean Way.
Allison Hill says she tries to make people’s experience at the Thunder Bay Food Bank “as pleasant as possible.”
Two years after a man went missing in Scarborough, Toronto police are renewing the investigation in hopes that the public will bring forward more information.
A musical instrument created in Guelph, Ont., has been thrust onto the international stage — or rather, screen.
More than 1,000 Maritime Electric customers are without power after high winds blew across the Island Friday night into Saturday.
The Supreme Court of Canada is deliberating a case that could shape the way sentences are handed down in cases where both the offender and victim are Indigenous, which some Nunavut lawyers say could have ramifications for the Inuit-majority territory.
A man barricaded in a former church in Welland, Ont., was taken into custody early Saturday, nearly 24 hours into a standoff that began over a fence dispute.
Peel police are investigating after a Friday night shooting in Mississauga left one person dead, police said.
Another busy construction season has come to an end in London, and the city is already looking ahead to next spring when a slew of new projects are expected to begin.