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The Liberal government has told us that we are nearing a $3 billion deficit. We are asked to expect less programs and services to pay more for those we are to receive. You intend to freeze medical and education budgets, to reduce welfare, handicap programs and to cut back on programs for those in need.

We are told that all this is necessary because of the mismanagement of the previous government. The leader of that government, Mr. Glen Clark, cost B.C. taxpayers hundreds of millions on fast ferries, bail-outs to failing paper plants, law suit settlements to lumber mill owners, ten of millions on the Vancouver convention center fiasco, millions in legal fees for his casino license trial. And now we find that Glen Clark has been found guilty in a civil slander suit dealing with the fast ferries. The cost of this one is $150,000 using taxpayers money.

If it is the policy of the Liberal government to ask us to suffer through these trying times, I would suggest to those in power to set an example of fiscal responsibility; so we know we are not in this alone.

Is the reason for this waste of $150,000 because government ministers, in the future will have set a precedent so that their court costs - if any - will be paid for by the B.C. taxpayers?

Jack has lived in Keremeos, British Columbia for the last 4 years and is very active in the village.

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Homeless Ideas Often Cosmetic
KERRY GILLESPIE
TORONTO CITY HALL BUREAU

In Milwaukee, a church has been declared a public nuisance for letting homeless people sleep there.

In Gainesville, Fla., police have threatened to arrest university students if they don't stop feeding homeless people in a park.

In Santa Barbara, it's illegal to lean against a building.

Key West has tried giving homeless people a one-way bus ticket out of town and Philadelphia has resorted to ads urging tourists not to give money to panhandlers.

Here in Toronto, mayoral candidate John Nunziata wants new laws passed so homeless people sleeping on streets can be scooped up and taken to hospitals and shelters.

"I don't believe that they're homeless," Nunziata, a former MP, has said. "I believe people that sleep in minus 25-degree temperatures are people that are sick, addicted to drugs or alcohol. They have mental incapacity, they're unable to make decisions on their own."

Nunziata is heading down a well-trodden path. Cities across North America are searching for new ways to deal with the old, and increasing, problem of people sleeping in parks and begging for change on sidewalks.

For many politicians and candidates trying to get a grip on rising homelessness, former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani is the man they emulate.

In the mid-1990s, under Giuliani's quality of life initiative, Manhattan was swept of panhandlers and squeegee people. The homeless were ticketed and arrested for sleeping in parks and obstructing sidewalks.

"There are fewer (homeless) people, certainly in the downtown area of New York," Nunziata said this week, crediting Giuliani's crackdown with a lasting effect.

Perhaps they are less visible, but they haven't gone away.

New York's current homeless population is the highest ever. Each night, 38,000 people, including 16,500 children, are housed in shelters and the city spends $880 million (Cdn) a year to do it.

In February, New York did a partial count of homeless people sleeping on Manhattan streets and found 1,800.

New York even recently tried using a vacant jail as a family shelter - until homeless advocates took the city to court over toxic lead paint in the cells.

"We are desperate to find places where we can put them while we search for permanent housing," Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Giuliani's successor, said on radio recently.

But it's unfair to claim that New York solved its homeless problem through legislation, says Dennis Culhane, a University of Pennsylvania professor and leading American researcher into homelessness. Giuliani's measures reduced the number of aggressive panhandlers, who weren't necessarily homeless, Culhane said.

"The biggest contribution in the declining visibility of homelessness in New York is that the city has built a significant amount of housing," he said. Since the early 1990s, New York has built 30,000 apartments or special housing units for people with mental illness and AIDS.

"That is a more realistic legacy.

"The other," Culhane said, referring to New York's reputation for cracking down on the homeless, "is something you hear from people who don't know what's going on." Homeless advocates across North America agree that affordable housing is the only thing that will reduce the number of poor people who live on streets and in shelters, and supportive housing is the only thing that will help those who are homeless because of addiction or mental health problems.

Still, laws that criminalize the activities of homeless people are flourishing. The National Coalition for the Homeless, an organization of advocates across the United States, last month reported details of anti-homeless laws recently passed by 147 cities in 42 states.

Such laws don't do any good, but frustrated politicians pass them anyway, executive director Donald Whitehead said.

Homeless people are picked up by the police for crimes such as sitting on sidewalks and sleeping on benches and taken to jail to wait until a judge sees them and gives them a ticket, he said. "Their homelessness hasn't changed at all and the cost incurred could have been better spent providing safe and decent homeless services," he said.

He understands the desire for those laws, however. "There's a growing number of people who are on the streets and there is this frustration that the numbers continue to grow. This issue has been in the public light for almost 20 years and people haven't seen a reduction, they've seen an increase."

Whitehead said the underlying causes of poverty and lack of affordable housing are ignored and people start blaming the homeless. "Compassion fatigue" sets in.

In Toronto, one homeless man on Queen St. W. knows where his problem lies. He stands, cap in hand, with a sign that reads: "residentially challenged."

So far, Toronto is a long way from mayoral hopeful Nunziata's "tough love" approach to getting homeless off the streets.

Here, security guards make sure the dozens of homeless who sleep outside city hall each night are okay and homeless people will be able to vote in November's municipal election.

At downtown's 51 police division, where officers in the community response unit would be responsible for carrying out Nunziata's ideas, Staff Sergeant Tom Kelly sees a few problems.

"Homelessness is not a crime. Being homeless, being poor, there is no criminal activity there," Kelly said, adding that his officers have few grounds to scoop homeless off the streets.

As it stands now, police can't pick them up, shelters can't keep them against their will and hospitals, mental health facilities and treatment programs don't have room for them.

To force them off the streets would require new city bylaws banning sleeping on sidewalks; provincial changes to the mental health act, deeming people who choose to sleep outside as mentally incapacitated so police could forcibly take them to shelters and hospitals; additional space in those facilities; and a way around the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which frowns upon laws that single out a group, whether it be religious, ethnic, or homeless, for different treatment.

John Jagt, who spent 22 years running Toronto's shelter system before retiring in May, says if those roadblocks were cleared he wouldn't have a problem in principle with Nunziata's plan.

"You get a guy who is so dirty, eating out of garbage cans, drinking himself to the point of blackout every day and living on the streets, I don't think freedom has much meaning to him any more. I don't think intervening and infringing on his ability to engage in those activities is a cruel thing at all, but we need to be mindful of why we're doing this," he said.

Is it because, like litter, people are tired of seeing homeless people on the streets and view it as evidence of the city's decline, or is it a sincere desire to help?

A coroner's study of the 46 deaths of homeless people in 2002 found that only one involved hypothermia and could be directly related to sleeping outside, said Jim Edwards, the Toronto East regional coroner.

Jagt also questions what will be achieved by laws that make the activities of a few hundred homeless people illegal.

The drunk, drug-addicted or severely mentally ill, and mostly male homeless who live out their days and nights in full view on the city's sidewalks are the visible face of homelessness.

But they may be as little as 1 per cent of the problem, Jagt said.

An official count of the homeless on Toronto's streets has never been done, but Jagt estimates there are about 200 to 300 on an average winter night, rising to 1,400 in the summer.

Last year, 32,000 people, including about 4,800 children, used the city's shelter system.

The largest growing group of shelter users are two-parent families with children. Each month, 2,000 new homeless people enter the system to replace those who have left.

While some of the homeless are chronic shelter users who have serious addictions or mental illnesses, many are people whose monthly incomes are simply too low to cover rent. Making street-sleeping illegal won't change that, Jagt said.

In 1994, the federal government lowered unemployment benefits and made it harder to qualify for them; in 1999 it tightened rules for disability pensions. In 1995, the province stopped building social housing, cut welfare benefits to the point that the monthly cheque is now lower than the average city rent, and froze minimum wage at $6.85 an hour. In 1998, it ended rent control; Toronto rents have jumped 30 per cent since then.

Those changes came on top of decisions made in the 1970s and 1980s, when the closing of psychiatric beds without ensuring adequate community support forced thousands of mentally ill into inadequate housing, shelters and onto the streets. Just as people use hospital emergency rooms when they can't find a family doctor, people turn to shelters for housing.

It's not an economical solution. A shelter costs $49 a night per person, equivalent to a $1,500-a-month apartment.

The city will spend $118 million this year - $77 million of it from the province - on shelters and related services. It also has a $1.2 million program for outreach workers to encourage the homeless to come to shelters where they can access services. Developing affordable housing for those who can't afford a home - and supportive housing for those who need a little more - is ultimately cheaper than providing shelters, Jagt said.

"The problem is, who is going to build it? Where are they going to build it? If you started now it would probably take three years and that's with everybody pulling in the same direction."

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It was a nice evening in downtown Calgary. There were four of us - Nick, Kaid, Matt and Kris - hungry for adventure. We expected to wait a few hours for our train to roll in. After a ten minute wait, this was it.

A line of sulphur cars pulled in with a slave engine in the middle. That was to be our home for the next 8 hours. We crawled inside the slave engine, nervous and not knowing if we would be rushed by workers or even worse, the CP Rail Police. We huddled on the floor for about an hour, hearing nothing but the gentle hum of the engine. The train started to move and some of our tension was relieved. We waited until the train left the city limits to explore our surroundings. In the engine, to our amazement, was a working stove, a fridge and a bathroom. As nervous as we were, we thought it would be best to sleep in shifts.

Morning brought a sense of relief. The sun was peeking over the mountains and we all felt an indescribable feeling. We were hobos and loving every minute of it.

Breakfast was beans cooked on the stove and the fridge was filled with fresh, cold water courtesy of Canadian Pacific Railway. The train came to a stop in Field, British Columbia for a train crew change. We peered out cautiously to see what was going on. The engine had detached to refuel. We unloaded our bags from the engine and set up near a creek to wait until the train was ready to leave. Four cans of tuna and six hours later, another steel chariot had arrived.

As soon as we grabbed our gear and stepped onto the engine, it was starting to pick up speed. From Field to Golden we followed the mighty Kicking Horse River with a view to be envied. We passed through numerous tunnels and occasionally ventured outside along the engine for a more intimate view. As we were reveling in our own utopia, the train came to an abrupt stop. We were in Golden. Kris noticed someone coming up to the front of the engine. He held the door shut while the rest of us dashed out the rear door only to be confronted by an irate CP policeman wielding a rock and a attitude. To our dismay the person entering the engine was only going to repair the phone and would have gladly let us remain in the engine. The officer with the rock told us to get off the property before he called the RCMP.

We headed to the highway to thumb a ride to Kamloops where we knew we could hop on another train. We got a ride in the back of a truck to the Shushwaps where we spent the evening. In the morning we split up into groups to hitchhike and meet in Kamloops under a bridge. Kriss and Matt were picked up first. Two hours later, some hippies in a RV picked us up. We met our fellow hobos under the bridge in Kamloops and they had met a new friend. Matt was sharing some refreshments with Jeffery Buffalo Bull, a self-professed professional buffalo rider, he reeked of booze and other things.

The most frustrating part of riding the rails is the uncertainty of when the next train will arrive. After a 12 hour wait and tempers mounting, a grain train pulled in. We split up into our groups again. Kris and Matt found some nice holes in the back of the grain car to sit in. We were not so lucky and had to wander down the line. The train started moving and we found a nice grain car just in time. A hopper hole is nowhere near as comfortable as an engine but it's twice the adventure. Cramming ourselves into the dirty hopper hole, we set up for the night ahead of us. With storm clouds chasing us, we dozed off for a few hours sleep.

We woke up in complete darkness, high up in the mountains. We did not go back to sleep. As morning approached, we watched lakes and wildlife pass by in the wink of an eye. With little sleep in the past two days, we found ourselves out of touch with the real world. We were consumed by our surroundings and felt at home on the rails. The adventure was coming to an end as the train approached the outer limits of Vancouver. The hardest part of getting off the train was leaving the adventure behind...and jumping off at an unreasonable speed. We hiked to the highway where we laid down for a snooze in the Denny's parking lot. The trip of a lifetime was over...until the next summer.

As a note, as easy as the lure of the railroad is, we at StreetViews do not endorse the art of train hopping as it is very easy to miss a step and be dragged under the train car where one could easily lose parts of their body or worse, be at the wrong end of a fatal accident.

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Adam Major-Hodges works directly with panhandlers in Calgary, Alberta and will quite often go to their turf if they don't feel comfortable in an office setting. Since he has dealt with panhandlers, Major Hodges has noticed three kinds of panhandlers in Calgary. One is the transients who are usually in Calgary for a short time only. They stay for a few weeks before heading to Vancouver in the winter or other waypoints during summer. The second group panhandle part time as a way to supplement whatever income they have whether it be AISH or casual work. Addictions and mental health issues are higher in this group. The third group is made up of chronic panhandlers. Many of the chronics are homeless and won't use any of the shelters in Calgary. They have the highest percentage of mental health and addictions issues of the three groups.

Major-Hodges encourages people not to give to panhandlers; in turn he assists panhandlers to find other ways of making money. Another way Major-Hodges encourages people to help is by donating to social agencies that help panhandlers.

One way Major-Hodges helps homeless panhandlers is helping them find suitable housing. He's found that it is easy for these people to get discouraged. Quite often they've left family and friends behind. Plus it is an adjustment to having walls around them instead of wide open spaces. Then there are living skills issues: how to pay rent on time and cleaning the apartment. Major-Hodges finds that most don't want to be homeless but some are because the work they have doesn't bring in enough cash to pay rent. A full time minimum wage job pays only $696.20 per month in Alberta and this is before deductions. With the price of housing the way it is in Calgary, it's hard to find a place to rent for a decent price.

Major-Hodges feels there is a need for more public awareness on issues regarding panhandling, as it's not just a personal problem but a societal one. He says the root causes of poverty need to be examined along with building low income housing, developing more job training and hiring more mental health workers.

Major-Hodges works to make sure that panhandlers and business owners are aware of current panhandling by-laws. In Calgary, by-law #3M99 essentially says no panhandling between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m., no standing in people's way, no vehicular panhandling, no aggressive panhandling and staying away from ATM's and bus shelters.

One thing that Major-Hodges finds that adds to the vitality of Calgary is the various buskers and vendors around the city. He finds buskers entertaining and vendors sell products that people can use. He hopes Calgary continues to try to create and attract more venues for people to enjoy.

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After selling street newspapers in 5 cities across 4 provinces, I have had a chance to see how street newspapers operate in different atmospheres and how the general public reacts to poverty issues and street vendors.

In Vancouver, each vendor was assigned a spot by the manager Mike McCarthy. We found out the hard way that his marketing skills were atrocious. What tipped us off were several people complaining about seeing a Spare Change vendor every half block along Robson Street. A few of us vendors got together and found this was the case. We brought this up at a meeting with McCarthy but our concerns fell upon deaf ears. Apparently in his mind there were so many people walking along Robson, every vendor should have done well. But flooding the market is a small area is a case of overkill. A vendor selling the same product every half block is like putting a Starbucks or McDonalds on every corner. Eventually the public will just tune it out. So we got together and made a list of where we would sell and not infringe on each others territory. But the power to be at Spare Change caught wind of this and proposed that vendors would have to sign a contract stating where and when a vendor could sell. I was one of several who got sick of the ego trip and headed to other pastures.

Edmonton and Calgary have a better system in place. Vendors work an area and no other vendor is allowed to work within a block and a half. This way an area doesn't get overcrowded and a vendor can build up a steady clientele of regular customers. Vendors in Edmonton have the advantage of selling in the underground LRT stations. A warm LRT station is a better alternative than selling in inclement weather. What Mother Nature comes up with from day to day is something a vendor has to deal with, whether it be wind chill factors or heavy rain or wet snow.

My shortest stint was two weeks in Winnipeg, not long enough to get a good feel of the streets there. My longest stay was at 11th and Broadway in Saskatoon. I actually was considered part of the business community and even had two TV stations, Global and CFQC, feature me on their newscasts. One of the free lance writers I knew did an interview with me which aired on CBC Radio. Talk about having my 15 minutes of fame! Though I haven't sold there in two years, I've stayed in contact with several people I met on the corner. I've been told that 11th and Broadway just hasn't been the same without me.

Another good spot I had was the University LRT in Edmonton. Due to a high volume of foot traffic, I sold 20 to 30 copies of Our Voice in 2 or 3 hours. Using a wrinkle dog hand puppet helped matters. "Princess earned her keep by creating many smiles from people passing by.

What is it like for the street vendors? Like anything else it has it ups and downs. One can pick up on the quirks of human nature and we can attract some unusual behaviour. A woman started telling me about a conspiracy theory involving the United Way. One guy asked me if I had a smoke on me. The alcohol on his breath just about knocked me over. Since I'm a non-smoker I told him no. I guess he didn't like my answer as he proceeded to tell me that street newspapers and vendors were a front for selling drugs and he, along with the cops, were watching me. Occasionally I've been mistaken for a particular religious group. Fortunately these incidents are few and far between.

Most people we deal with are pleasant and polite. Even if they just say hello as they walk by makes me feel noticed and human. When a customer buys a paper I like to ask how they are. It helps build up good customer relations.

Vendor sales seem to run in streaks. Some days I'll sell a paper every few minutes until I'm sold out. Other days I'll sell 3 papers in 35 minutes, do nothing for a hour then sell 6 papers in 15 minutes. The long stretches are hard on the mind and it's easy to get discouraged and give up. Or one can look at it as a chance to become a philosopher on what life is all about.

A vendor has the privilege of setting their own hours. I like working the City Hall LRT station across from the Calgary Public Library. It has a good mixture of people going by and I thank all those who've stopped to buy a copy of Calgary Street Talk.

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In Calgary approximately 15,000 lower income families are only one paycheque or family crisis away from homelessness. Homeless Awareness Week kicked off in Calgary on Monday, September 22 at Olympic Plaza.

In his opening remarks to the lunch time crowd, Darrel Janz, co-anchor and co-producer of CFCN Television's 6:00 p.m. News said, "This is a week I wish we didn't have to observe."

The Proclamation making September 22 to 28 Homeless Awareness Week in Calgary was read out by Deputy Mayor Dianne Danielson. She reported a 34% increase in the count of homeless persons in Calgary over the past two years.

The City of Calgary considers the homeless to be those who "do not have a permanent residence to which they can return whenever they so choose." The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation's definition of homelessness is "People who have problems with their housing adequacy, suitability and affordability and spend more than 30% of their household income on suitable housing (core household need.)

"Homelessness in this city is a growing epidemic," said formerly homeless, John Cromartie, "Finding and needing help is not easy to ask for and not easy to receive. Places like the Mustard Seed and the Calgary Drop In Center have been there for me."

Kathy Houston remembering her own experience of being homeless and helped by many agencies in Calgary, said, "I never wanted to live before. I just survived, but because of all the support I've received from so many people, now I want to live!"

"The lack of affordable housing is one of the greatest social issues we face today," reported former Calgary Alderman, John Lord, MLA. "N.I.M.B.Y. ( not in my backyard) is one of the primary causes of homelessness. It presents a huge barrier."

Several agencies working among the homeless set up booths to present their programs to the public. The Calgary Dream Centre (CDC) worked in tandem with ShineFM to raise money for the soon to be opened facility on MacLeod Trail South in Calgary.

The CDC, a ministry initiated by First Assembly Church of Calgary, is a faith based organization with a vision to re-integrate clients back into the community as productive members through the provision of education and residential care.

During the bitterly cold winter of 1996-97 people from a number of downtown churches met to plan a strategy that would address the growing problem of homelessness. Inn From The Cold Society was born and now works with 62 churches in Calgary to provide emergency shelter. Up to 4 churches per night make 15 beds available to homeless families and others in need. Last year Inn From The Cold filled 15,163 beds. Children occupied 2,689 of those beds.

"I've been off the street for two months now," Houston said, to the applause of the crowd. "Maybe you can't help in donating...but how much does it cost to give someone a smile?"

Six local organizations participated in Calgary's first Homeless Awareness Week in 1995. This year that number rose to 26. In Calgary the number of people needing a place to sleep will grow faster than the population this year.

This article originally appeared in City Light News in Calgary, Alberta.

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