By Kendall Worth*
In this post, I talk about when, in May of 2023, the lottery jackpot was $64 Million, and, that, if I ever won this amount, I would use at least half to do my part in helping the community of people living in poverty. Lately, I have been researching how to start my own foundation and the one thing I had learned from my research is that you need to have money in-order to start. The evidence from looking at those links, illustrates, that, in order to start your own private or public foundation, you have to have a large sum of money behind you, whether it comes from lottery winnings or elsewhere.
This dream is different from our current Mitigating Social isolation Project, also known as All Together Link. However, the foundation I am proposing, could, someday help fund All Together Link. These days when you calculate the expense required to solve all the problems we have in our society, it would take someone with a big enough heart and a lot of funds – probably $100-200 million - to make a change for many.
These days the question that comes to mind: Is $32 million or $64 million enough to help those who need it? When you put all the needs and crises happening in the community now; the answer is NO!
Why?
First I want to point out this post in which I talked about how persons with disabilities in Nova Scotia, who wanted to attend this protest in Ottawa, could not. What if money could come from somewhere for them to travel to Ottawa because Income Assistance policies would surely not pay for that! Then, this Video, about barriers faced by those with disabilities, which is from an event in St John's Newfoundland. A couple of Nova Scotians with Disabilities, wanted to attend, but could not afford to do so. Even though this video is from Newfoundland, much of what Anne Malone talks about, Nova Scotians can also relate to. If the dream Foundation I am proposing, already existed, then this foundation is where disability advocates could have applied for money to travel.
And for more on why this foundation is needed:
When you look around our city and throughout Nova Scotia, we see our homeless population continuing to increase.
Out of Control Inflation seems to just carry on and never goes away.
For years, dating back from when I was writing for the Nova Scotia Advacote, I was advocating to get a Social Prescription program up and running in Halifax, the current All Together Link is a project that a committee had to take into our own hands to set up, after years of our mental health system in Nova Scotia expressing no interest in addressing the need for such a project. My history of advocating for this includes this and this and this.
And to promote building community, a sense of belonging, getting rid of stigma, and reducing poverty are all important.
The Income Assistance rates are not enough to live on and Guaranteed Liveable Income is non existent.
And as pointed out in this post, rents these days are anywhere upwards from $1500 to $3000 or even from what some people tell me... $4000 a month.
All
of the above bullet points explain why we need a Foundation to help support people, when all levels of government fail those living in poverty and/or with disabilities.
In this recent BLOG post I give you a first hand look of what is happening today. Then, in this BLOG post I talk about the learning experience I had in 2023. Then, I came to think about the following factors:
Within the high number of Homeless population out there (Especially when, these days, unhoused are a mixed range of ages, with many working – usually minimum wage – jobs.) I ask myself the question, given the opportunity, how many of them could attend College or University and study to do something better in life?
Like, university student, Carrie Ann Bugden, how many other persons with disabilities are out there who cannot access programs and services, or would also be interested in post secondary education? In general, How many Income Assistance recipients who cannot qualify for Career Seek would be interested in still going to University, or other post secondary education?
Why is the Government going so slow in doing their part to make affordable housing available?
Let’s do some math here.
To rent an apt in HRM it costs between $1700 and $3200 a month depending on size and family size. So if we think about what it might take to get a wheelchair accessible apartment (of which there are few at the best of times) I estimate it at $2400 a month, at a minimum.
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| https://www.zumper.com/rent-research/halifax-ns updates housing stats and more monthly |
So, for safe, affordable and accessible (meaning accessible for persons in a wheelchair) accommodation, we are looking at an estimated average of $2400 a month. Except for the government, who should be doing more, who can afford to house the homeless?? They cannot afford these rents!
$2400×100 Homeless People = $240000...So where is that money supposed to come from?
That is what it would roughly cost per month to house 100 homeless people with disabilities, in Halifax. Not even talking into account other costs like heat and power, if not included. That $240000×12 = $2880000/year. This is simply pointing out the reality in Halifax and other parts of Nova Scotia these days. And wondering what institution can afford to pay this?? Individuals cannot. Why are we not forcefully demanding that the provincial government (hopefully with help from the feds) build non-market housing, which is the way out of this crisis?
Considering that the Income Assistance rates (for someone not considered to be full time employable, and who has housing) in Nova Scotia is $950.00 and although some people also get a rental subsidy, with inflation continuing to happen, people just cannot live day-to-day, anymore.
It very unlikely we will see landlords decrease rents in the new year. Therefore we have another winter ahead of us where many homeless people will be freezing outside. I have had some recent conversations where I was informed that, although a portion of the homeless population has been unhoused for a long time, more recently, there is another whole group of able bodied. single adults, that are also homeless. Persons with disabilities may have been homeless in the past; but more recently a source told me:
Persons with disabilities becoming homeless is more and more noticeable.
Also according to this same source, families including couples with children – are starting to live in the Homeless Encampments.
Now I want to take a moment here to reflect on this article from the NS Advocate, in January 2018,. In this article, I raise the question “Just imagine what a $2500 living allowance could do to improve the lives on income assistance?” From this same article, the following list:
“After rent, power, and phone bills are paid, it will give them better ability to afford to eat a healthy diet.
This amount would lift people, who have no choice in life but to depend on income assistance, out of social isolation.
It would allow income assistance clients to afford registration fees for places such as fitness centres, indoor swimming pools, etc. A lot of people on income assistance I personally talk to say affordability to these places is needed to help them stay sane in their day to day lives.
And we have to consider that since the above was written, January 23rd 2018, the cost of eating a healthy diet has doubled. When you go grocery shopping these day the evidence waits for you in the grocery store.
Even though Income Assistance rates have increased since that article was written, it is still not enough to live on. If there was a Foundation to help out with living expenses, that Community Services does not cover, people could get better access to what they need. Also they can have easier access to gaining something that can help them in life. For Example, maybe there are some homeless people who have the intellectual ability, desire and mentality to attend post secondary education. If these homeless do not qualify for Career Seek a foundation can help them with tuition. Some people may not be able to get a student loan due to them having bad credit. Another Example -- Maybe some homeless people have an idea for a business they want to get started. A foundation could help them with start up cost to get that that idea off the ground, to test out the idea. A third example if a student with disabilities who lives in another province and wants to come to Nova Scotia to study they could get some assistance. As we learned in Part#6 of the Carrie Ann Bugden Story such students do not qualify for NS Resources including Reachability, Easter Seals, Independent Living Nova Scotia, and Services for Persons with Disabilities through Community Services. Some services that Carrie Ann needed were also not covered through her University Medical Plan. Money is going to have to come from somewhere to cover the cost of Home-Care, Mental Health treatment, to replace wheelchair batteries if they run out while living on campus here. In addition, student loans do not cover the cost for off-campus housing, For example, any student arriving from say New Brunswick, PEI, Ontario, or Alberta, just like Carrie-Ann, will not qualify for those services either. This is also true of any Nova Scotia student travelling to another province and residing there only as a student.
I will conclude this article by saying that the idea for this Foundation, is coming from a place of all around frustration. Many in poverty weather on Income Assistance, and/or especially the working poor these days, live in fear that their time of being homeless may be coming. The idea for a Foundation, is to move toward the overall goal of reducing anxiety and depression. Also, we have to consider that the longer it takes for Government to act with real solutions to the real problems at hand, more pressure is put on places like Food-Banks and not for profit organizations. However, these days, even general concerned citizens are feeling the pressure to help out, more then ever.
What is the solution?
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*Kendall Worth is an award-winning anti-poverty activist who lives with
disabilities and tries to make ends meet on income assistance.
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