Connection are Critical to Human Relationships. When a person needs help, where can they go to get it? Family and friends may not always be available for many people living in poverty, especially when also faced with multiple barriers created by disability, mental illness, and addiction. These barriers not only impede their sense of inclusion, but also to advocate for themselves to gain access to available services.

My colleague, Emily Shoff, has been exploring Ottawa for her Engage Ottawa project,where she is exploring the services that cater to those who are facing these realities and are vulnerable to poverty. These organizations do important work for those in need, but are unable to stretch their budget further to pay for advertising. Making sure the organizations can connect with their intended clientele can be problematic.

The Ottawa Mission, which assists homeless and impoverished men in downtown Ottawa, has a campaign of OC Transpo bus ads that feature an opportunity for members of the public to donate to the Mission by text message. This type of advertising could also reach men on the street that see these ads as the bus goes by, and furthermore can learn about the Mission and thus seek help. Once out of the downtown core, people in suburban and rural areas must rely on phone books, web presence, storefronts, and word-of-mouth to find out what help exists.

There are many other social service agencies that help people with specific issues, and several are networked, but how does their message reach the people they target, or even just the general population? When those who need help look up information, where can they find these resources?

The frequent fall-back is to go online, for those with access and capacity. Information offered online is immense, but scattered and overwhelming, and it can be difficult to find agency networks that make it simple for a person who is struggling to find help locally. Workers in one agency may not have information about other organizations or services offered in different areas. The results are the system cracks that are so commonly referred to when lamenting those who have suffered from inadequate or absent help. Once in the cracks, it is even harder to see solutions or to have your voice heard.

Those living in poverty are rarely heard from because their participation level in the public sphere is limited by the life circumstances surrounding them. In the case of creating effective networks, programs, and policies, the lack of connection with and participation of those in poverty means a greater likelihood of poverty remaining with us. By connecting people who live in poverty with programs and resources and resources that can help reduce the impacts, the possibility for hope and change is created.

The United Way has a service called Canada 211, a free phone service that allows more than half of the country to get in touch with a centralized referral network. It is available by phone or online in several regions across Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia, Alberta, and by 2013, Nova Scotia. 211 provides confidential, multilingual access to information about the full range of community, social, health and government services for non-emergency needs. Another resource, for those in Ottawa and surrounding areas (see the directory on the website), is the Community Information Centre of Ottawa. This online resource is also available in print form at most community resource and health service centres. More networks and connections these would help allow all Canadians to be as involved and participatory as they want and the eradication of poverty will be that much more a reality.

Between 150,000 – 300,000 people are  homeless in Canada, and up to another 900,000 are part of the ‘hidden homeless’ (poor living conditions, overcrowded housing) according to a 2010 report by the Wellesley Institute titled Precarious Housing in Canada.  This doesn’t account for the 3.1 million who are in core housing need (paying more than 30% of their income on shelter). To live in inadequate housing is to be unstable, be more likely to get sick, or feel cash strapped because you have to choose between food and rent.  It is unacceptable that millions of Canadians are struggling with such housing issues.

Canada Without Poverty applauds the re-introduction of Bill C-400 and supports its passing in the House of Commons.  We encourage all Members of Parliament to read the Bill, visit houses that are inadequate and speak to families that are struggling.  This way MPs will come face to face with what it feels like to be housing insecure.

Canada remains the only G8 country without a national housing strategy (our former strategy was removed in 1993).  In a country that promotes respect for human rights and that has the wealth to assist all Canadians, we believe that a housing strategy is well within federal responsibility and feasibility.

A housing strategy is a key component of a poverty elimination plan.  This is the first step that the government should take to ensure all Canadians have a life of dignity.

Based out of the Centretown United Church and the Centretown Churches Social Action Committee, CEFC supplies emergency food baskets on the basis of providing three to four days worth of groceries.  Individuals and families are able to access this service once a month.  Service-users line up and out the door between the two-two and half hours four days a week.   Serving between 30-80 people a day, CEFC is a much needed service and has been since its inception in the early 1970s.

After speaking with the director, dedicated compassionate volunteers and students, I too put on my volunteer cap and got down to work.  Meeting with the individuals and families, the importance of food banks like CEFC is crucial.  Food banks may offer a “band-aid” solution to poverty but are an important source to addressing it.  I learned something I had never thought about before – how important these food banks are to helping one’s life.  Think about it.  Food is a staple to survival.  It is essential.  It is a human right. When an individual is on the brink of impoverishment, a food bank can be one of the first or last sources of assistance.  With this, volunteers sit down with individuals and families, checking off which foods are needed while identifying root causes that can further be addressed by referrals to organizations in close proximity.

In general, food banks have been in service for decades seeing a revolution in clients over time.  When CEFC first started in the early 1970s, majority of the clients were classified as the ‘working poor’.  In the ‘80s the centre saw a shift to the single, unemployed, due to a change in employment.  The 1980s also saw a switch in servicing more to the mental health population as it was no longer legal to institutionalize a mentally ill person.  In the past couple of decades there has been an increase in service to families and the working poor.

The next week I returned to the Centretown United Church to check out one of CEFC’s partners who also work at the surface of poverty: Centre 507.  Located above CEFC, Centre 507 utilizes its partnership and key location to provide programs and services varying from rooming house tenant support, life management skills to supportive listening and counselling offered by certified individuals.

Established in 1983, Centre 507 has created a safe, friendly and supportive environment.  Viewing their clients as worthy and capable individuals, Centre 507 acknowledges the whole integrity of a person.  Their services cater to a mosaic of individuals and families as well as their changing needs.

The Rooming House Tenant Support Services is part of the Centre’s programming that addresses the challenges faced in rooming houses, educating individuals of their tenant rights as well as assisting and advocating to avoid eviction.  Along with the various services available at Centre 507, the environment of the drop-in has developed a safe space for its clientele.  Its inviting presence boasts a sense of security and warmth to those who lack this in their lives.  It is a place of good energy.  Whether clients are in need of immediate resources, such as housing or whether they are looking to play a game of chess to cure their loneliness, Centre 507 has it.

A community lives here.

Working in perfect unison, CEFC and Centre 507 have for decades addressed the needs of those who are struggling to make ends meet.  It is here that I saw poverty in all shapes and sizes.  It came in singles; some employed others who must put their health before their job.  It came in doubles; young and old.  It came in threes, fours and fives; families who are living the detriments of the recession and the newly-immersed immigrant families yet to fully succeed in this country. 

These are the people Canada Without Poverty works for.  We work on behalf of all Canadians, encompassing every gender, age, race and size.   Capturing the needs of CEFC’s and Centre 507’s clientele, CWP advocates and offers solutions on the policy level that attempt to secure basic needs for individuals. The goal is to ensure everyone can live with dignity.  Together, CEFC, Centre 507 and CWP work to underline the shared struggles in this diverse country.

“Growing up in a large family in suburban B.C. was difficult.  My father was a factory worker, while my mother stayed at home to raise the kids. Money was always tight, as the manufacturing climate was weak.  I remember coming home from school and asking what was for dinner, only to be told that it was potatoes, meatloaf and powdered milk, yet again.  Clothes were usually from second hand stores, and there were many times when I could hear my parents in the other room, trying to figure out which bills were going to be paid and which ones they would have to leave for next time.

“The bright light was that my parents placed a premium on education, and were serious about ensuring that their 6 children did the best they could in school.  As I grew older, I recognized that getting a good education was my ticket out of poverty. Now at 30 years old, I hold a Master’s degree and have committed my own professional life to helping end the cycle of poverty in Canada.

“Growing up in a family where poverty was hidden, where we were the working poor, has challenged me to consider how many of our social structures continue to accept poverty as a ‘fact of life’, as something that will never go away.  In some circumstances, social structures are set up to perpetuate poverty for the benefit of those who are not poor.  Challenging these social structures has formed the basis of my political and social activism. From serving on the Board of Directors of Supportive Housing of Waterloo to helping out at the local Out of the Cold homeless shelter, to my new role as Development Coordinator for the student nutrition programs administered by The Children’s Foundation of Guelph and Wellington, I have made fighting poverty a personal, professional and political priority.  I am pleased now to work with the Canada Without Poverty team in pursuit of our mission of a poverty-free Canada.”

Across Canada calls for action on poverty are growing as provinces and territories develop and implement provincial and territorial poverty strategies.  Currently, three provinces (British Columbia, Alberta and Saskatchewan) are trailing the rest of the country as they have failed to develop, or implement a plan.  Organizations in Alberta hoping to change this have offered compelling evidence in favour of the shift.

Today, Vibrant Communities Calgary and Action to End Poverty in Alberta released “Poverty Costs: An Economic Case for a Preventative Poverty Reduction Strategy in Alberta”, which points to the billions of dollars spent on maintaining poverty versus the billions that could be saved if plans to prevent and reduce poverty were put in place.

 Approximately 400,000 Albertans are living in poverty, of which 73,000 children, with 34,000 below the age of six.  Poverty is costing the provincial government between $7.1 – $9.5 billion annually. The fourth report of its kind in Canada, “Poverty Costs” breaks down the total amount governments spend on the current system, and includes the economic losses from taxes and potential income:

• $1.2 billion in health care costs
• $560 million in costs attributable to crime
• $473 million – $591 million in intergenerational costs
• $4.8 billion – $7.2 billion in opportunity costs

Similar to welfare in other regions, Alberta’s income assistance structure puts the onus on the individual to pull themselves out of poverty.  But poverty is not the result of poor choices, as many people seem to think; rather it is a systemic issue that requires policy change,

“This means that poverty persists regardless of individual behaviours, attitudes, and choices. It means that as a society we have created systems that perpetuate poverty and hence allow poverty to persist.”

For example, welfare rates in Alberta are well below the unofficial federal poverty line (Low-Income Cut-Off After Tax), which leaves little money available for the necessities of life: food, clothing, shelter.  Rising costs exacerbate the situation and many individuals are forced to make difficult choices about paying the rent or buying food.

One policy related to welfare is seen as a good practice for a poverty strategy – allowing individuals to hold assets up to $5,000 in the bank while on welfare.  In other provinces where this policy is not in place a person will scrape by below the poverty-line with no opportunity to save. How can people be expected to move forward when welfare polices deplete them of all of their resources?  This results in a perpetual need for income support programs such as welfare.

The working poor are also mentioned in the report along with growing inequality the province. While Alberta is rich in resources, it is also home to the most financially vulnerable with many households maintaining a higher debt-to-income ratio than the Canadian average (143% versus 127% nationally).  As many people struggle to stay on their feet and off of the welfare system, they find themselves sinking further into a financial hole.  This is not the recipe for a prosperous and healthy society.

The report offers an economic basis from which to develop a poverty strategy.  While the focus is on the role of the province, the report states that all levels of government need to be involved.  Poverty reduction requires a long-term approach with multiple stakeholders involved.  The economic evidence to take immediate action speaks loud and clear, and is supported by other reports in British Columbia and Ontario.  A statement at the beginning of the document sums up the overall message: “The conclusions are clear: investing in poverty prevention would be much less costly in the long run than spending to alleviate poverty in perpetuity.”

Spiked by public attention to the Occupy phenomenon, 2011 was the year in which the issue of income and wealth inequality mainstreamed in Canada. Witness: Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney called the Occupy demonstrations “entirely constructive.” Jeffrey Simpson, perhaps the land’s top newspaper columnist, wrote about inequality. The Conference Board of Canada released a significant report.

On January 6, Jeffrey Simpson wrote further to say that, “it’s imperative that political actors put the issue front and centre on the national agenda.” The NDP leadership race, at least, is embracing the challenge, for example Brian Topp’s plan for federal tax reform.

So let’s herald a little good news: Inequality is on the public and political radar.

And let’s review a few facts:

• Between 1976 and 2009 only the richest 20 per cent of Canadians increased their share of national income.
• At a finer scale, in 2008 the average income of the top 10 per cent ($103,500) was 10 times higher than that of the bottom 10 per cent ($10,260), representing an increase from an eight to one inequality gap in the early 1990s.
• At a finer scale still, the top one percent (the rage of Occupy) — some 246,000 individuals whose average income is $405,000 — raked in almost a third (32 per cent) of all growth in incomes between 1997 and 2007.
• At the very top, the richest 0.1 per cent — an estimated 24,600 Canadians with minimum income of $621,300 and an average income of $1.49 million — held 5.5 per cent of total income in Canada, up from less than 2 per cent between the 1940s and 1970s.

And so, in her accompanying message to the Conference Board’s report, their President, Anne Golden rightly asked: “What does income inequality say about our values? In short, is it fair?”

To read the full blog post go to the Huffington Post Canada website.

Image courtesy of the Salvation Army Ottawa

*Intern Emily Shoff “Engage’s Ottawa” on poverty issues

The journey has begun.  Phase 1: start to rid the stereotypes associated with poverty and understand why they exist.  The Salvation Army (SA), an organization dedicated to assisting vulnerable individuals and families, will help us with this task.

What does a home provide?  A sense of security, safety, warmth, independence, dignity, trust, the list goes on.  To live in the comfort of our very own home enables us to live life. Period.

Living without a permanent residence is classified as homelessness.  Not only does it mean to live without a home, it means to live on the streets, in a shelter, an inhabitable location or to couch surf (living with friends or family for a temporary period of time).  This definition immediately broadens the number of people who are struggling.

SA confronts homelessness and the issues that have accompanied it since 1865.  The particular location in which myself and Kizzy, a Canada Without Poverty colleague, visited was the Emergency Shelter downtown Ottawa that offers shelter to homeless men specifically.  Here, the SA emphasizes a ‘housing first approach’ with both their Outreach Street Services and Housing Response Team.

What a ‘housing first approach’ theorizes is that by providing a home, aka, a sense of security, independence, will power, etc. is a crucial step and furthermore one of the first to aiding mental health, addictions and helping to improve employment and educational attainment.

Outreach Street Services helps to counter the shelter’s stereotype.  The Outreach Van “meets clients where they are, both physically and mentally”.   The service operates 7 days a week from 11am-3am and in extreme weather conditions 24/7.  The primary role of the Outreach Van is to provide transportation to safe shelter.  Individuals are also given a choice.  If one refuses transportation, the Outreach Van will offer basic necessities such as socks, water, sleeping bags and more to align with a ‘harm-reduction approach’, which is empowerment centred.

Standing in the foyer of SA, waiting to meet with the Co-ordinator of Outreach Services, men of all ages are entering and exiting the emergency shelter.  This is extreme poverty.  The emergency shelter holds 150-180 men, some who need special care and might reside at the shelter for the remainder of their lives and some who need “a place of new beginnings”, one of SA’s mottos.  As Kizzy and I listen to the un-told stories, it becomes clear that poverty has become an immediate side effect of what many homeless people have experienced: trauma.

Unfortunately with the pronounced stereotypes of the “lazy bum” and the “drunk” we have brainwashed our own beliefs while creating an environment where our natural reaction is cause people who are homeless to feel shame.  These false impressions of laziness further deteriorates an individual’s self-esteem and thus keeps them from receiving support from organizations like SA because they are too embarrassed to ask for help.  And so the organizations that intend to assist the homeless can be associated with an image of desperation and worthlessness.

It takes a lot of will power to admit you need help.  It especially takes a lot of will power to admit yourself into an emergency shelter – almost a wake-up call that life has become so unbearable you must depend on an organization to aid you.  It may seem like an easy decision to receive aid from those who offer it, but in a world that places shame on these individuals, it is not an easy task admitting to need help.

This is not the fault of SA, but of civil society’s, one that has existed since the Elizabethan Poor Laws in the 1600s.  If we, as a civil society can omit these stereotypes then maybe those individual’s in desperate situations will feel less epitomized and thus grab hold of the helping hand, shame-free.

To fall, one must have been pushed by a life’s occurrence that has ultimately turned into a force of inexplicable recovery.  The road to stability is one that involves the aid of an organization such as SA to offer immediate care.  Visiting with SA challenged my own understanding of homelessness to not be about the “lazy bum” but of struggle and difficulty of obtaining help.

While SA works on the front-line lifting those up off the ground, CWP strives to ensure they can be further lifted above the poverty line with government involvement.  The two organizations differ in their function (SA provides a service, CWP addresses the systemic causes of poverty) but both believe in the dignity of all human beings to and have a common goal of ending poverty.  With projects like CWP’s Engage Ottawa, and our other activities that work to raise awareness of the general public’s understanding of poverty and homelessness, we may in turn encourage those in need to receive assistance, and hopefully end the cycle of poverty that traps so many.  So let us end the recurring stereotypes.  It is time to look beneath the surface of poverty and see the person who is just like us.

Canada Without Poverty  (CWP) does important work to address the structural causes of poverty, by encouraging political conformity on the issue of poverty to provide alternative solutions to public policy that has disadvantaged and weighted down those with low-income.  CWP is one organization in the midst of dozens, possibly hundreds in the Ottawa area that work on the depths of poverty.  Whether an organization is confronted in the work with poverty directly or whether their purpose is to address poverty from the upstream, it is present in every corner of our country.  CWP collaborates with such organizations to address our current reality.

Isn’t this saying something, that there are a countless number of organizations in the very city of Ottawa?  Poverty is an important and seriously encompassing issue, contributing to other present day problems such as health, education, women’s and cultural issues.  Poverty:  an angry tornado covering every surface and weaving it into a fury of minimum wage, high rental costs and unaffordable child care creating a hopeless and helpless situation where people can’t escape the catastrophe.  Let us unwind the challenge.

Poverty is an issue that can so often be brushed under the rug, swept away.  However it lies right under our feet.  It can be invisible – the single-mother working night shifts to pay for groceries.  And it can be visible – the homeless on the street stating their case while asking for change.  That’s it.  Change.  We need change.  What we need is a change in how we understand our fellow Canadians.  We need to change our perception and understanding of poverty.  CWP has derived a project out of this need to broaden Canada’s understanding on the issue of poverty.  What is needed even more is a collective movement.

And so Engage Ottawa begins, a project that will tell the story of poverty in Canada, from the heart of Ottawa’s community.  I, Emily will be setting out to various community organizations, NGOs and social service agencies from January to April who are either confronted by the detriments of poverty or those who advocate for action and solutions on the wide-spread crisis that is so prevalent in Canada.

With this new knowledge I plan to blog with CWP, creating other action projects sprouting from Engage Ottawa that will draw-in the greater population.  These action events will engage the community in a creative manner with an effort to alter the perceptions of our society.

Boots laced, eyes open, map in hand I will be covering the corners of Ottawa, developing a wider understanding of CWP’s view and those who are also working on or around the issue of poverty.  Together, we intend to build a new perspective of poverty, one that is shaped by interviews that uncover reality.

I will be blogging about the perspective of an intern, with hopes that my own understanding of who is struggling will grow.  Join me on this journey; the journey of comprehension, inspiration and education.

Yesterday, we posted a blog on the Huffington Post titled, “Poverty: A Huge Cost to Our Health-care System” that looks at the cost of poverty on the healthcare system in general and the important relationship between poverty and health that is being overlooked.  Here is an excerpt:

“Poverty and health go hand-in-hand. People in poverty are more likely to use the health care system because of physical and mental health issues or illness, and be more likely to face an early death. Stress, poor nutrition, inadequate housing, and unstable social environments are a few reasons for this.

Known as the social determinants of health, these issues can lead to increased pressure on the health care system. Current healthcare spending that is associated with poverty is estimated at approximately 20 per cent. This fact demonstrates the weight that socio-economic disparities have on health systems and the importance of discussing both the future of the CST and CHT together.

While the debate on the future of the CHT has garnered media attention in the past few weeks, little commentary is surfacing on the funding of the CST, which directly impacts programs that benefit people with low-income.

The CST specifically supports provincial and territorial social assistance, post-secondary education, and reaches other social programs such as housing and childcare. Adequately funding these programs and reducing poverty saves money — the federal government could save $7.6 billion annually on health costs, and $2.9 billion in Ontario alone according to the Ontario Association of Food Banks (OAFB) Cost of Poverty report.”  (The full is on the Huffington Post Canada website.)

Research has shown that addressing poverty will save both the federal and provincial governments billions of dollars.  Aside from the fact that poverty is an injustice, eliminating it just makes economic sense.

A report released yesterday by the Canadian Medical Association Journal on prescription drugs reinforced the connection between poverty and health.  The report noted that people who are poor, sick or uninsured are less likely to be able to afford necessary prescription drugs. In total, 2/3 of Canadians pay for their medications themselves totalling $4.6 billion a year.  People who simply cannot afford to pay go without, which can increase the risk of repeated illness or hinder recovery.

As the premiers round up their 2-day meeting and the investment in the transfers appears to be shrinking, we hope that they turn to evidence illustrating the connection between poverty and health and consider the cost savings associated with addressing low-income head on.