October 19, 2006 - Kenora

Challenging the Contradictions

Thanks so much for inviting me to Kenora, via Winnipeg .  This is the furthest north I’ve ever been in Ontario . I’m very honoured to have been invited by a Health Unit, especially because I’ve been asked to talk about homelessness and advocacy – which I love to do!

I’ve been immersed in a few situations lately that have made me ask – is the lack of action on the part of politicians intentional neglect or intentional blindness?  There are so many catastrophes and so many contradictions – they are in our practice, they are described on the pages of the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star, they are everywhere I look. 

I’ve called my talk ‘Challenging the Contradictions’ and I’m going to tell you four stories and tell you the contradictions that are like red flags.

1.  Edward Aszbach died in Calgary last week. 

His body was found about 25 meters from a tent in a field. He was 43. His death was a homicide.

CBC called him a street person.  The Calgary SUN - a drifter.  When I called staff at a Calgary shelter they were upset. They had posted his picture on the walls hoping to learn more about him and what had happened.

Contradictions-

A few days before Thanksgiving weekend, the City of Calgary evicted at least a dozen squatters from a tent city.  Meanwhile, the Calgary Drop-In Centre, which has a capacity of 1,100, has turned away 125 people a night. That number is expected to more than double to 300 people per night now that cold has arrived.

Calgary agencies also report a frightening increase in homeless families.  There is no dedicated family shelter in Calgary .  Agencies have ‘glued’ together ‘emergency shelter beds’ through churches, synagogues, community halls and motels.

I have not visited one community in Canada that has enough emergency shelter space for families and children.

2.  Kevin Clarke is running for Mayor of Toronto .

Kevin claims to be the most wrongfully arrested man in Canada . He says he has been charged with 60 offences over the years. He is frequently picked up by police and is warned, charged or taken to hospital for confinement against his will.  On Tuesday October 10, an article appeared in the Toronto Star describing Kevin’s candidacy for Mayor, including a description of his unique style of campaigning which often draws the attention of the police or security guards.  But Kevin didn’t see the Star that day because he was being chemically restrained in the Clarke Institute, brought there again by the police.

Why is Kevin such a thorn in the side of authorities?

Well, he is vocal, passionate on certain issues and you could say - theatrical.

Here is a verse he chants:

“The only reason you don’t hear about Kevin Clarke

Is it because Kevin Clarke is not white?

Or is it because Clarke has nowhere to sleep at night?

Either one is not right.”

Disclosure of evidence on one of his recent charges says Kevin was “shouting out his candidacy for mayor of Toronto ”….and he was yelling “no more dead children” and “Go Leafs Go.”

Contradictions –

The real issues and solutions to homelessness are not on the municipal election agenda yet, with the exception of the fetish to focus on New York style solutions that involve counting, removing and evicting.  There are no proposals to look at anything innovative such as small harm-reduction shelters; or the phasing out of the volunteer Out of the Cold programme which provides mats or cots in church basements by replacing them with real city-funded shelter beds; or experimenting with pre-fabs or trailers for emergency housing, or better funding street outreach agencies.  

City Hall remains hard to navigate.  A positive decision in July by Council to fast-track homeless people with immuno-compromising conditions such as AIDS or cancer into housing with housing allowances has stalled somewhere. It’s now almost winter.

There remains persistent under funding of social agencies, yet yearly increases in the policing budget. 

3.  Paul Croutch was beaten to death last September.

Mr. Croutch was simply in his sleeping bag in Moss Park , next to the Moss Park Armoury when he was beaten to death. A woman who was a witness was reportedly beaten when she attempted to intervene. Three army reservists were charged with first degree murder, charges that have now been dropped to second degree. This week in Superior Court their trial date will be set.  The media called Mr. Croutch ‘transient’, although he had spent many years in Toronto . His work history included running a newspaper in Dawson Creek .  James Bartleman, Ontario ’s Lieutenant Governor, who knew Mr. Croutch, attended his memorial service at the Salvation Army.

Contradictions-

Since Mr. Croutch’s death, the armoury continues to be used as a training site for reservists and the Moss Park  public park outside has been used for military training operations in broad daylight. It is believed that the armoury is being used to recruit new reservists for Canada ’s mission in Afghanistan .

Armine Yalnizyan, an economist and the first Atkinson Economic Justice Award recipient has  reported on two major areas of federal spending besides health.  The first is new investments in research and development.  The second, spending on national defence and security which almost doubled between 1996 and 2006.   Defence spending grew from $8.4 billion in 1996-97 to $14 billion in 2004-5.  Last year’s federal budget gives Defence a $20 billion budget by 2010-11.  This year the Defence Minister announced a $16.3 billion additional spending for helicopters, aircraft, trucks and ships.

Meanwhile, the federal government recently tried to hold back millions of dollars for  SCPI (Supporting Community Partnerships – homeless funding) and there is no sign that Finance Minister Flaherty or the Minister Responsible for Housing, Diane Finlay plan to renew the program when it ‘sunsets’ in March 2007.

4.  Street Nurse Ad

In May, during Nurses Week, Street Nurses were ‘celebrated’ in print and television advertisements (and I’ll show you this image later today).  The ads were sponsored by several nursing organizations in Ontario but paid for by the Province of Ontario . 

I’d like to read you the letter I sent to the Ontario Premier after I saw the ad:

Premier McGuinty,

Thanks for highlighting the importance of the work of a Street Nurse in the Government of Ontario ad promoting nursing.

The ad says “today’s nurses are highly qualified, doing far more than you think.”  No kidding!  The ad depicts a nurse bandaging a man’s leg while he sits on the sidewalk.  Can you tell me why your recent provincial budget had no new dollars for housing?  Can you tell me why your government only announced a 2 per cent increase in social assistance rates which will only mean more economic evictions, more trouble finding housing and certainly a need for more Street Nurses? 

Most Street Nurses I know are proud of the work they do but find the necessity for it shameful, especially in a rich province like Ontario .

Cathy Crowe, Street Nurse

Toronto

The following are some comments from other nurses on what they are seeing – comments that were made in the movie Street Nurse:

“We’re sending 2-3 people a night for mantoux (tuberculosis) testing.  We had somebody the other night coughing up blood - like classic markers of TB and people are sleeping with no air on church basements and it’s nuts, and for the first time in almost 30 years of doing different kinds of street work I’m really scared now. It’s getting scary.”  Cathy Newman, St. Elizabeth ‘home’ visiting nurse

“I’m really, really angry and I’m really scared.  I just think, you know, someone said this is a micro epidemic - this is a friggin’ emergency.  We’re not talking about maybe there’s going to be a TB outbreak.  This is life and death.”  Barb Craig, Street Health

Today in 2006, the frustration of Street Nurse Kathy Hardill seems unbearable. Kathy sent me an email last month where she described herself as “drowning in the rolling sea of desperation which is east downtown Toronto .”

“I cannot keep up with the demand for food on a daily basis, from an unprecedented number of hungry people - food banks are empty or closed, soup kitchens are running out of food - I tell you, I have to steel myself in the mornings to go into the Friendship Centre because the desperation and volatility before they serve food is PALPABLE in there.

I am hearing about or assessing a flood of homeless people viciously assaulted by police on a weekly basis.

With the exception of my shelter-based clinic, I have virtually no clients who are "eligible" to stay in shelters, because they are so ill - frankly, if they live long enough to experience a pandemic flu, I will be ecstatic.   Where is the fight for emergency rent supplements for ill people, so they can get out of shelters before they get even sicker?

I have been pulling my hair out trying to find somewhere, ANYWHERE, for dying people to safely live out their days.”

Contradictions-

The void in Ontario policy on the issues of rent regulation, energy poverty, social assistance rates, the impact of pandemic or other catastrophes on vulnerable populations all relate to housing.

Nothing could be more disappointing than Ontario ’s track record on housing, especially given the 2001 federal-provincial agreement.  In Ontario , many promises of new units far outpace the actual number of units created. As Michael Shapcott reports, in the first three years of the federal-Ontario affordable housing programme, 46,332 units were promised and only 63 were actually delivered, according to Ontario ’s audited financial statements.

In closing, I provide these four ‘contradictions’ as examples of the issues that have been most on my mind in the last few weeks. They suggest a political landscape which includes political and bureaucratic indecision and bungling, the holding back of funds for social programs like housing or housing allowances, the reliance on charity for a band-aid, and the use of police and chemical restraint as a form of social control.  They describe the outcome of those actions – more families homeless, more violence, more disease and death.  Interspersed and ever present in these four examples is the influence of stigma, discrimination and prejudice to NOT create healthy public policy.

I look forward to hearing lots more about your situation, and I promise to plant some visual and hopefully inspiring ‘seeds’ for advocacy later in the morning.

Thank you

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