Our homes are important to us not only because of the equity they provide financially, but because they are places where we feel safe and where we find joy in building a nurturing space for our loved ones. If, through some catastrophic event such as an earthquake, our houses should disappear, we would feel devastated, lost and forlorn.
As a recent editorial in the Times Colonist made note, this catastrophic event has already happened to hundreds of youth in our community who are either homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. Most are living precariously by couch-surfing or crowding into an overpriced apartment or living in a car. They might be escaping some form of abuse; they might have been abandoned; they might be involved in an intractable family conflict.
To be homeless, something has gone wrong in their young lives and they are running scared while trying to put on a brave face. Most had no control over the situations that pushed them into homelessness.
The numbers speak for themselves. In the last two years, the Threshold Housing Society, which supplies long-term transitional housing to at-risk youth between the ages of 16 to 24, averaged 140 referrals per year for the 30 beds or units it has to offer. A 2008 report by the Community Social Planning Council estimated a total of 616 youth were in need of immediate housing in the region.
The total number of units or beds in Greater Victoria available to at-risk youth would hardly cover a tenth of this number.
In its 2015 study Youth Pathways: In and Out of Homelessness in the Capital Region, the Greater Victoria Coalition to End Homelessness called the situation a crisis, especially dire for youths 19 to 24. The report points to the lack of progress in the region in addressing the issues that drive youth homelessness.
This lack of progress is disappointing, given the years of work that have gone into addressing adult homelessness. It might be surprising to some to learn that two of the larger agencies that deal with the adult homeless population do not allow youth under 19 years on their premises.
This crisis is upon us because of the misunderstanding that homeless youth are the same as homeless adults. They are not. Homeless youth do not line the streets; their demographic is “hidden.” They are trying to finish school, hold a minimum-wage job and find a safe place to live.
Most do not self-identify as homeless. The last thing an emerging adolescent wants is to be labelled “homeless,” “destitute” or “vagrant.”
Victoria is behind where other municipalities have gone in terms of youth homelessness. Cities such as Calgary, Kamloops and Kingston, Ont., have embarked on dynamic plans to end youth homelessness in their communities.
These plans are visionary, based on two principles. First, if you end youth homelessness, you are much further ahead in ending adult homelessness.
It is a well-established fact that the fastest-growing segment of the homeless population nationally is age 16 to 24 years. Instead of putting resources into quick fixes such as shelters — even though shelters have their place in terms of harm reduction — more has to be done in the community to prevent youth from edging toward homelessness.
Second, youth have a marvelous resiliency to bounce back after the trauma they have suffered. If this ability can be engaged and encouraged, it will allow them to use their own resources to move ahead, embrace their potential and eventually become contributing members of this community.
In other words, if at-risk youth are appropriately engaged, they will become their own best advocates. They don’t want to be wards of the state. They don’t want to be warehoused. They don’t want a handout, they want a hand up. They want to prove themselves and grow up to live normal lives.
But at this point in their lives, they indeed need a hand up.
Andrew Wynn-Williams, executive director of the GVCEH, stated recently that any movement on such problems cannot be made by a single non-profit organization. The community must collaborate more vigorously. More important, various levels of government, especially the provincial and federal governments, must take leading roles in preventing homelessness before it happens. The place to start is with youth at risk of becoming homeless.
The youth we leave behind today become the homeless adults of tomorrow. No youth should be left behind.
Mark Muldoon is executive director of the Threshold Housing Society.
