Health Providers Against Poverty

Toronto’s shelter system is in an undeclared state of emergency. As an annual response to cold winter temperatures coupled with an overcrowded shelter system, the City of Toronto (i.e. “the City “) opens temporary Winter Respite Centres, also known as warming centres. In order to better understand the state of these ad hoc responses to homelessness, Health Providers Against Poverty (HPAP) visited eight Winter Respite Centres, as well as the two 24-Hour Drop-ins for Women and Trans People. Our findings demonstrate that Winter Respite Centres and Drop-ins for Women and Trans People fail to meet the most basic standards as set out by the United Nations and the City itself.

We are calling on the city to immediately open 1,500 new and permanent shelter beds; the provincial government to immediately increase social assistance rates to match the basic income pilot study amounts; and on the federal government to spend the new $11.2 billion allocated to the national housing strategy within the next two years.

You can find the full report here:

HPAP – An Evaluation of Toronto’s Warming Centres and Winter Response to Homelessness

On January 10th, HPAP members Dr. Michaela Beder and Dr. Sarah Griffiths delivered deputations to the City of Toronto’s Budget Committee. Both are powerful calls for the city to take meaningful actions to improve living conditions for Toronto’s vulnerably-housed population in the context of the current shelter crisis and for more long term solutions.

We featured Dr. Beder’s manuscript in part 1 of our post (see below). For part 2 we have Dr. Griffths’ manuscript:

Read more →

HPAP members Dr. Michaela Beder and Dr. Sarah Griffiths delivered deputations to the City of Toronto’s Budget Committee on January 10th, 2018. Both are powerful calls for the city to take meaningful actions to improve living conditions for Toronto’s vulnerably-housed population.

They focus on 6 key recommendations:

1. Increase long term shelter space by 1500 beds to meet Toronto’s 90% shelter occupancy target.
2. All shelter staff should be trained in harm reduction techniques and philosophy (e.g. naloxone administration for people with an opiate overdose)
3. Keep at least 1000 interim shelter beds open throughout the summer until the new shelter beds are open.
4. Increase affordable housing opportunities by increasing rent-geared-to income housing, repairing old TCHC units, creating at least 1,000 new affordable rental housing units a year, and increasing supportive and mental health housing.
5. Increase tax revenue by raising the property tax, instituting a vacant property tax, reducing tax incentives for developers, and reinstituting the vehicle registration tax.
6. Change the definition of “affordable housing” from the average cost of market rent, to the amount someone on social assistance or Old Age Security can afford, ie “deeply affordable.”

In this 2 part blog post, we are posting the manuscripts for both deputations. Part 1 will be Dr. Beder’s deputation (see below) and part 2 will be Dr. Griffiths’.

Read more →

Check out this excellent Op Ed on the Toronto Shelter Crisis published earlier this week in the Toronto Sun. It’s written by Dr. Doris Grinspun and Dr. Lynn Anne Mulrooney of the Registered Nurses Association of Ontario (RNAO). Stay tuned for more updates on this issue soon!

http://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/opinion-time-for-mayor-john-tory-to-listen-to-activists

Check out our HPAP Op-Ed in the Toronto Star on the Oct 2017 Ontario Income Security Reform Working Group Report!

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2017/11/14/there-is-a-prescription-for-povertys-punishing-impact-on-health-in-ontario.html

You can find the full report, entitled Income Security: A Roadmap for Change, here.