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Homeless count numbers will be a political tool

March 24th, 2010 · 4 Comments

The city had its own homeless count, a first, yesterday, which everyone covered. Here’s my version. Interesting to note that the city’s numbers will be out in a couple of weeks — just before the five community emergency shelters are set to close April 30. I await developments on this front.

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  • Bill Lee

    Is Sally Ballem as much a nano-manager as Penny is reputed to be?

  • Lewis N. Villegas

    Another person on the count commented on your story thus, Frances:

    “Reducing street homelessness and keeping the HEAT shelters open is important, especially to provide some stability to the folks who are at risk of sleeping outside, so that they can start making good decisions.

    But if we are counting people in slumlord-run single-room occupancy hotels as “housed,” we are fooling ourselves. Not only do these places hurt people’s health (costing us all more in medical services), but they wear down a person’s dignity and are an extremely lonely way to live, and a person who is struggling with mental illness or addiction needs the support of a good community to help them make good decisions and work toward changing their lives.”

    There is a missing pillar. It is hard to imagine that we are going to make real progress on the “Olympic Promise” of eliminating homelessness until we look at livability in the historic neighbourhoods as a whole and put behind us approaches that have failed us.

  • michael geller

    Frances, seeing the juxtaposition of your two posts…homeless count and big fat casino…I wanted to relay a story my daughter told me Tuesday night…

    She was one of the 300 volunteers doing the count, and came across a lovely older man near 4th and Alma in Point Grey. He told her he had become addicted to gambling and had lost all is money and was therefore on the streets…

    And during the past week, he had also lost his false teeth.

  • Glissando Remmy

    The Thought of The Day

    ” Roballeermtson and company care about homeless people, as much as a dog licking his balls in public, cares about you looking at him.”

    Let’s be clear on this, in the past year and a half these City Hall people managed to destroy other people’s lives, by throwing them out as if they were bad apples… but now…they “serve hot soup and buns to the needy”!?

    I almost threw up in my mouth. What’s the next step? Are they going to open their walk-in closets to strangers? Will Mayor’s next month’s pay check, go as a contribution to the”Free Emery” campaign? Is Penny going to volunteer her time in the evenings from now on, you know, milking cows, tending gardens, making honey?

    Does anybody know how many bottles of sanitizer liquid they went through, by the time the Operation “Deflexion” was over?

    I know, some people will read this and say” See, how much they care?”
    There are plenty of people like this out there.
    P.T. Barnum allegedly described them perfectly when he said “There’s a sucker born every second!”

    It is also nice of you Frances, to inform us “a propos of all this” in your following post, that Ark got himself a job with Stantec. I see. I don’t know about you, but wasn’t he supposed to thank Penny for all this new found goodies? Hmmm, because it looks like he should have.

    This City Manger is no Homeless Counter (by the way, the “Take your sister to work” Day is sooo, last decade) I tell you that. To me, she most likely resembles the Medieval Sword Executioner, that kisses your forehead while your head is still in the air, just after beheading. Because… he cares.

    Got the picture?

    We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.