Montague homelessness meeting triggers mixed reactions
Service providers from 13 Island organizations joined forces to discuss how to better coordinate supports for unhoused Kings County residents at a recent meeting in Montague.
The workshop, hosted by the John Howard Society in partnership with the province and attended by nearly 50 participants triggered mixed reactions.
“It was energizing,” said Teresa MacKinnon, community access worker with ResourceAbilities. She appreciated sharing perspectives with other organizations.
ResourceAbilities works with individuals who struggle to find affordable and accessible housing, however unhoused individuals aren’t often among her clientele, she said.
“I was disappointed,” said Norma Dingwell, manager of the Montague Food Bank and a member of a new self-started Kings County Steering Committee on Housing.
She presented on what homelessness looks like in the area. She said Minister of Housing and Communities Rob Lantz provided his opening remarks and then left without hearing from others.
She urges the province to start listening and to kick start substantial efforts to address known Kings County issues.
She said sending a provincial housing navigator to the area some of the time and allocating a new John Howard outreach worker to Kings County are positive, but these workers are only starting to build relationships.
“I’ve been advocating for homelessness for three years,” she said noting she has yet to see a significant response.
Reports of unhoused individuals in Kings County popped into the Island’s legislative debates in 2021 when Montague-Kilmur MLA, Cory Deagle, proposed government support local temporary or emergency shelter beds. In response, government said decisions could be informed by a formal needs assessment. It was published two years later in July 2023, providing 14 recommendations.
The first was three pronged and to be completed short-term.
The province still hasn’t acted on the recommendation to launch a request for proposal to identify a partner to fill and confirm needs in the area. This could help plan longer term facilities and services that are appropriately sized, according to the report.
“It’s paralysis by analysis,” said Mike Redmond with a new non-profit called the Equality Project. “We need to start acting.”
“Try some pilot projects,” the former NDP leader and Charlottetown shelter manager said.
Through his ongoing work with unhoused individuals, he sees a lack of adequate housing in the region as a major issue.
Whether an individual is fleeing a violent relationship, a family is living in substandard conditions or an individual is looking for a healthier future after rehab or release from incarceration - units are nearly impossible to secure, he said.
He also sees a need for more service provider boots on the ground.
Allison Ritcey is a Montague based peer support worker for the Canadian Mental Health Association.
“It was great to put faces to names,” she said about meeting members of neighbouring organizations. Her clientele is typically housed, she noted.
Following the workshop’s two presentations by John Howard Society, she is considering if she could be better equipped to support clients struggling with housing by participating in Coordinated Access initiatives.
Coordinated Access is a method for allocating and managing housing resources and supports for unhoused people. It’s central to the federal government’s Homelessness Strategy and builds on housing first principles, according to Government of Canada resources. Communities and organizations who use Coordinated Access methods, assessment tools and data systems become more eligible for more federal funding.
On PEI, the John Howard Society has worked as a lead, supporting implementation of the methods and tools across organizations.
Josh Constantino program coordinator said, developing partnerships and knowledge about how it works will help build local capacity to identify and meet needs of unhoused individuals.
He noted this capacity building ties into the province’s work to meet the first recommendation of the needs assessment report.
Minister Lantz declined multiple requests for an interview.
Rachel Collier, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, The Eastern Graphic
