Forum Is On Wednesday, January 10th at 8p.m. St. Catharines Centennial Library on 54 Church Street In the City’s Downtown
An Invite from the Niagara District Council of Women
Posted January 5th, 2018 on Niagara At Large
Niagara, Ontario – In light of the stark contradiction between the promises of the 1987 Federal Government during the International l Year of Housing for the Homeless and what some local Niagara agencies who serve those living in poverty are currently calling housing “crisis”, it is very good news that both Federal and Provincial governments are planning to invest extensively in affordable housing . But, is this enough given the severity of the problem?
As Diane Corkum, Executive Director of the Niagara Falls Project Share Food Bank says, “The scarcity of housing has built up over many years, but these days agencies are having a much more difficult, if not impossible, time to find affordable housing “.
And according to the Niagara ‘A Home for All’ Task Force, “in 2016 4,400+ households were on the wait list for affordable housing .”, while earlier media reports noted that Adrienne Jugley Niagara Regional Commissioner of Community Services, said ‘People can wait as long as 10 years on the list.”
For his part Bob Barkman of ‘RentSmart Ontario ‘ feels that in order to avoid the dismal failure of past promises, there is a need for a “new social contract” and broader thinking, with all levels of government and the social service sectors, among others, working on housing within the wider ‘poverty’ issue for solutions. These could well include dramatically different comprehensive programs, such as the Basic Annual Income .
Bob will be joined on NDCW Panel on Homelessness by Elisabeth Zimmermann, Executive Director, YCWA of Niagara; AJ Heafey , Niagara Falls Community Health Centre and Rob Cammaert, of Bethlehem Housing , all of whom work hard to provide much needed housing and other supportive services to residents of Niagara.
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