EXPLORING EFFECTIVE SYSTEMS RESPONSES TO HOMELESSNESS

SYSTEMS PLANNING FOR TARGETED GROUPS
home in Oakville] all the way to school in Burlington.”
Evan eventually returned to the group home after his
father: “called me and he told me that if I wanted to go
to my little brother’s confirmation – my little brother
is the most important person in the world to me – I
would have to go back to the group home.” Upon his
return to the group home, Evan quickly learned that
his parents and the group home staff would not be
upholding their end of this arrangement:
And so Friday night – [my brother’s]
confirmation was on Saturday – I’m
inside my room, I’m trying on my suit
and stuff like that, like getting ready for
tomorrow, and one of the workers comes
in and she goes, ‘I have bad news. You’re
grounded because you’ve been AWOL
[absent without leave] for three weeks,
so I’m going to have to take away your
iPod.’ So I gave her my iPod and she’s
like, ‘And also you’re not going to be able
to go to your little brother’s confirmation.’
And then I just stopped caring about
trying to make that program work.
At this point, Evan entered into a significant period
of housing instability that increased his involvement
in street life and undermined his ability to remain
connected to school:
Within two weeks of finding that out,
I got kicked out again [at the end
of February]. And so I started couch
surfing… I was sleeping on the street
and stuff like that… After a while couch
surfing, it just gets to point where like
you’re going to have to leave, right? So
from there I went and lived at the Dame
[youth shelter in Hamilton]… [I] kept
on getting renewals and stuff like that…
[Eventually] my ex-girlfriend’s stepmom…
took me to the Living Rock where I
filled out an application for Wesley at
the beginning – or mid-April. It took ‘til
August until there was a spot available.
Aspects of Evan’s story are worth highlighting. The
first is that the group home used the local sheltering
system as a consequence or punishment for youth
who fail to abide by the rules. The second is that the
shelter that Evan was ‘kicked out to’ was located in a
different municipality than his school, which meant
that he was unable to get to school using public transit.
By using a youth shelter as a punishment, the group
home increased Evan’s contact with street culture and
decreased his involvement with school.
The other part of this story that is worth noting is
that Evan’s first encounter with street-youth services
in Hamilton did not – at that time – lead to increased
housing stability for him. After accessing shelter
services on his own through the Notre Dame Youth
Shelter in Hamilton, Evan was unable to secure housing
within the period of eligibility (42 days) for emergency
shelter use that is funded by Ontario Works (OW)
social assistance. As such, he was required to apply for
numerous renewals. Other youth – for example those
who fail to abide by the rules of the shelter – will be
less likely to have their eligibility renewed.
It is important to note that Evan did not access the
Wesley Youth Housing Application process until a
friend’s mother intervened. In other words, the Notre
Dame shelter did not, in fact, serve as a point of access
for Evan to negotiate a transition to supportive housing.
From the time he submitted his application to Wesley
Youth Housing, Evan waited almost four months before
a spot there became available for him. Four months is
considerably longer than the standard length of time an
individual is permitted to use emergency shelter services
like those offered by the Notre Dame. As Evan’s story
makes clear, even with efforts to ensure that Hamilton
offers a continuum of housing services to streetinvolved
youth, there is insufficient capacity within the
system to effectively respond to the housing needs of all
youth. Significantly, from the perspectives of the service
users that I interviewed, youth with the most complex
needs have the greatest difficulty getting their needs met
through existing channels for service access and use.
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