Homelessness Financial News

letter to his city colleagues, Shawn Lewis highlighted municipal data that shows 319 people arriving from outside the city in the first half of 2023 seeking homelessness support services have been sent back to communities “where they have a natural support network.”Of those 319 individuals, more than 25 per cent were initially “sent here against their will, or under false pretenses, by various individuals and organizations from outside London.”“That represents almost one person every other day,” Lewis explained in his letter.He did not identify the individuals and or organizations allegedly sending people to London for the city’s homeless resources. But he did confirm to Global News that they are aware of some locations these people are coming from.“I don’t think that it’s an organized effort on behalf of a municipal service provider, in any community, and I’m not even convinced that they’re intentionally trying to make the problem somebody else’s,” he said in an interview.“I think in some cases, these may be organizations or individuals with really good intentions.

Nova Scotia Health (NSH) Community Transitions director Wendy McVeigh.According to NSH, there is currently one client support worker (CSW) on the health floor working alongside continuing care assistants (CCA).Five CSW’s are required to fill the 24/7 schedule for the floor to operate fully — meaning 21 out of the 28 rooms on the floor are currently unoccupied.“Empty rooms going and people are freezing, I don’t understand this,” said Richard Young.He’s been living in a tent at Grand Parade in front of City Hall and lives rough on the daily.The thought of empty rooms that could otherwise provide shelter doesn’t make sense to Young.“It was minus four the other night, some people didn’t have sleeping bags,” Young recalled “We don’t have heaters, we have summer tents, so it’s just like putting a thin sheet over you — you’re freezing.”While space may exist on the health floor, Nova Scotia’s Department of Community Services (DCS) says The Bridge is typically at 95-100 per cent capacity.There are 152 rooms available for clients, not including the health floor, but the numbers of clients served may be higher as some people share rooms with partners or siblings.Even though NSH are working on the staffing shortage to get CSW’s on its floor, medical staff at The Bridge have been kept busy — serving the entire building rather than just the designated floor.“The early stage of this was, ‘we needed a health floor,’ but as we’re evolving it’s not a health floor because the health services go wherever the person is,” said McVeigh.She says it’s about wraparound coordination of services for clients: health, housing and social supports.“We have health services throughout the building now, we have the health clinic operational seven days a

By Name List, there are 1,012 people experiencing homelessness in HRM, an almost 60 per cent increase since August of last year and an approximately 500 per cent increase since 2018.While those numbers don’t include people who may be sheltering in rural HRM, sleeping in their car or staying at a friend or family member’s house.“We’re forgotten, you know, everybody forgets about us,” said Tanner.

Two years ago, Scott Hutchins was on his way to work in Halifax when his bus unexpectedly stopped. He hopped off to find traffic blocked by a commotion in a downtown park — there were police, protesters and the buzz of a chainsaw.

Authorities in eastern Ukraine fear up to 60 people were killed when Russian forced bombed a school where they were taking shelter in the village of Bilohorivka.