By Kendall Worth!
A week ago, on September 23rd/24th, Nova Scotia experienced hurricane Fiona and people living in poverty made it through the best way they knew how, with their limited resources. For many of them, no friends and/or family members were checking in on them to see if they were OK. This article, written after Dorian, in 2019 talks about the difficulties, people living in poverty have, preparing for hurricanes. For people living in poverty, wild weather adds a lot of stress because of the limited resources they have at their disposal.
One major difference between Dorian and Fiona is that, following Fiona, Income Assistance recipients automatically got $150., within the week, with no bureaucratic nonsense or systemic problems. After Dorian you had to prove to a caseworker that your power was out for 48 hours or more. However, with the inflation happening these days, we have got to ask the question: Was this $150, one time payment enough, or should this $150 be ongoing every month beyond recovery from Fiona?
I have written a lot about social isolation, and FIONA added further to it, (following COVID isolation etc.) All of this increasing isolation strengthens the need for a “Social Prescription Program” to get started here in Nova Scotia. I remember when COVID restriction first came into effect I wrote this open letter https://nsadvocate.org/2020/03/17/kendall-worth-open-letter-to-premier-stephen-mcneil-offering-suggestions-for-the-many-problems-for-income-assistance-recipients-caused-by-covid-19/ to then Premier Steven MacNeil and then Community Services Minister Kelly Regan. In it, I suggest ways that the N.S. government can better serve the needs of those living in poverty and especially on Income Assistance. I am sure readers can understand why implementing these same suggestions, from the link above, would assist people in poverty during hurricanes as well as in pandemic times.
“We
need the immediate creation of a program like the social prescription
program I talked about in this story, Kendall
Worth on friendship, poverty, and feeling discourag. This way
income assistance recipients who also live the life of social
isolation can find a social program, a club, or even a volunteer friend who understands their situation
to keep in touch with during the time of self isolation. This would
also help the mental health of isolated people during this
time. Also, people I talk to suggested to me that creation of this
program will potentially eliminate going to the QE2 emerge just
because they need human contact”
I am also still advocating for this Social Prescription Program on my current BLOG. Social prescribing is usually referral to such things as education classes, food or medicine subsidies, housing navigation, arts and culture experiences and social groups around hobbies or interests, nature based activities etc. But a lot of folks are just looking for a friend and in some cases this is a program that could be offered.
In a conversation I had with one person back in June about Social Prescriptions, we discussed a “buddy system”. The way it could work is an income assistance recipient who is also socially isolated could get matched with a student who is studying Social Work at Dalhousie. As part of this system, maybe at times like Fiona, Dorian, and COVID restrictions as examples, the student can be the volunteer /friend who checks in on them, as well as in non-exceptional times, meet the IA recipient the student is matched with, to go for coffee, walks, etc.
Following Fiona, I was in touch with a few Income Assistance recipients who told me that Fiona, along with Hurricane Dorian in 2019, and then living with COVID restrictions, demonstrates the need for Social Prescriptions. They tell me that it is events like this, when they feel tired of being expected to live life Alone and Single. The vast majority of NS IA recipients are singles. 70%/80% ( a guess from personal experience -- exact statistics are unknown) of them lived through FIONA with no support, no-one to check in on them, etc. And of course, they have no one in their home to talk to because they are single and live alone.
If a Social Prescribing program had already existed before any of these events, then some of the possible connections and referrals or a volunteer (if that is the program) from that program could have acted as their friend who cares enough to check in on them.
During Fiona it was also important to think about those who are homeless and living in tents. It remains a mystery whether they had somewhere to sleep out of the weather or not. Nothing but warming centres for people who were evicted from homes, were advertised.
The main thing is we did the best we could to stay safe during Fiona!
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