Regina’s Housing First strategy sees success in early steps

REGINA – The Regina YMCA has had a busy first month of leading the Housing First initiative that’s aimed at ending homelessness.

The program was officially announced in January and began last month. The goal is to provide homes for the homeless and a support structure to guide them to successfully living independently.

READ MORE: Regina YMCA introduce homelessness reduction strategy, Housing First

So far, the YMCA is partnering with numerous non-profit organizations, like Carmichaekl Outreach and the North Central Family Centre, plus the city to make Housing First a reality.

The first year is focused on laying the groundwork for the ambitious goal. Along with the YMCA’s priciple partner, Phoenix Residential Group, one of these goals is locating “a couple dozen” pilot homes across Regina.

“Because in a true Housing First initiative, it’s not all located in one central area but spread to give individuals options on where they would like to live,” Pamela Reimer, YMCA Director of Homelessness Partnering & Housing First Initiatives, explained.

Phoenix has a history of facilitating arrangements with landlords to provide housing for people in need of assistance, and had their own program similar to what Housing First is aiming to achieve. Due to this, they are working on facilitating arrangements with landlords.

Kendra Jiles is the housing First Program Supervisor with Phoenix, and said landlords are receptive when they know Phoenix will back them up if tenant problems arise.

“If they have issues on their end, they contact us directly, and if the tenant has issues we help. We’re kind of that “go to” between the landlord and the tenant,” she explained.

Jiles said Avenue Living, Boardwalk, and Trademark Homes are just a few of the landlords on board. They just have to get all the paper work finalized to make it official.

At the end of May the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness will be coming to educate the public and stakeholders on Housing First. They will also help provide training on how to assess a potential client.

“The initial criteria is that someone is chronically or episodically homeless,” Jiles said.

Then the potential client will go through a series of extensive assessments going over what their needs are. If they are deemed eligible, they will be provided a home and a primary case worker.

The training will go over providing support services, which can include things like mental health and addictions services.

“They need to know that they’re supported and without these supports they’re not going to be able to succeed in maintaining their housing,” Reimer said.

In other cities with Housing First, like Medicine Hat, AB, it usually takes 12 to 18 months for a client to be able to independently maintain their housing.

Last year’s point-in-time homeless count found 232 people, but Reimer said this is likely lower than the actual amount. However, Mayor Micheal Fougere said this is important information for the program.

“We need to determine the number of people who are homeless before we design programs to help eradicate that,” he said.

“So these are all very good things to see happening. We have great partnerships, and we’ll do some good work.”

Regina receives one million dollars from the federal Homelessness Partnering Strategy annually, and $400,000 is now dedicated to helping fund Housing First.