Addressing Homelessness in Coquitlam Needs More than a Shelter
Today I walked into the Coquitlam Council Committee Room for a Tri-Cities Homelessness Task Group meeting. The group meets monthly and each January moves to a different city. In 2009 it met in Coquitlam, 2010 – Port Coquitlam and 2011 – Port Moody. So here we are back in Coquitlam and I was struck with how far this group had come in the three years.
Back in 2009 when I first walked into this same Council Committee Room we were pleased that we were making some head way on getting a small piece of property in Coquitlam zoned for housing a YWCA project single moms but frustrated and concerned about how challenging it was to make something happen for the homeless in our community.
Today, we are mostly the same faces that sat around the table three years ago – a group of about 15 regular attendees that include service providers (including libraries, social service agencies, police etc), community volunteers, city staff and politicians (myself along with Greg Moore from Port Coquitlam and Bob Elliot from Port Moody – both whom have been consistently supportive and hard-working to address the issue of homelessness).
So here we are, in a room that I first walked into three years ago and we have not only zoned and serviced the site at 3030 Gordon for a homeless shelter, but we added a new member to our table: Mark Smith from Raincity Housing - a service provider who will operate the shelter and transitional housing beds at 3030 Gordon and we look forward to the opening of Como Lake Gardens - a YWCA facility for single mothers – in a few months.
For me it was exciting to look around the table to see the progress we have made. Hope for Freedom Society with the collaboration of five church communities has successfully run a temporary mat program for the homeless for five years which helped to reduce the numbers of homeless in our community and highlighted the need for a permanent shelter. Hope for Freedom will continue to operate the mat program through to March 2012 and are currently seeking funding to provide interim shelter through the winter months until our stand alone shelter/transitional housing at 3030 Gordon is built (even though the Province announced the funding last month, it can take up to two years to get it built). And Homes for Good Society is up and running working hard on behalf of homeless individuals to find rental accommodation.
Looking around the table at all those who have stepped up, especially Sandy Burpee, Chair of the Tri-Cities Homelessness Task Group, I felt so proud to be part of this community and so honoured to have been part of group that has brought about so much for those in our community who are often most challenged to be heard.
I am looking forward to the next three years – to the opening of Como Lake Gardens, to seeing a permanent shelter/transitional housing resource being built and serving some of the most vulnerable in our community and to addressing the dearth of rental accommodation and affordable housing in our community. We must be prepared to look beyond homelessness and to address the range of housing needs in our community.
As I look around the room I know that these folks are up for the challenge. Are you?
[...] Coquitlam councillors were blogging this week, Selina Robinson is talking homelessness in the Tri-Cities, and Terry O’Neill is concerned about construction debris mucking up our [...]
Dennis Marsden Seeking Port Moody Nomination
January 12, 2012