Looking back, and how we can learn from other demographics

By Kendall Worth!

This BLOG post comes from years of experience advocating for Halifax’s growing population of people living in poverty. I have learned that many people facing poverty are also suffering from social isolation and social anxiety. I am advocating for a social prescription program in Halifax, which you can read about here.

We have tried to start a social prescription program in 2023 and 2024. It seems that more research is needed to learn how something like this can actually work in Halifax. 

I want to start off by taking a moment here to look back at previous BLOG posts. This one here is where I advertised a survey that myself and a small committee formed through All Together Link. We had asked a wide range of questions of people living in poverty in Halifax. 

The survey asked people to identify zero-cost social activities they enjoyed. It was surprising that nobody selected hiking, walking, or team sports. This was sad because outdoor activities are so good for mental health. As one service provider pointed, many people who rely on social services and programs, or who are experiencing homelessness, “walk an estimated 20km or more per day.” This doesn’t just include walking between food banks and soup kitchens, but because many don’t have anywhere to go. They are left just walking around, which makes walking less enjoyable. Walking has benefits but it would be nice if people were walking recreationally in nature and not because they are left to wander.

For a short time, this project was called Mitigating Social Isolation before it was changed to All Together Link.

Because of my idea to form All Together Link and the Mitigating Social Isolation project, I was invited to attend an upcoming conference in Toronto.  I want to attend this conference so that I can learn what social prescribing organizations in other jurisdictions do and how they work. 

I will be writing a BLOG soon to let readers know if I will be able to attend this conference, and work is being done within my community of supporters to help me attend. If you want to support me in attending this conference, please reach out via my contact form on the right-hand side of this BLOG post.

Since All Together Link has ended, I have been having conversations with people living in poverty who said they have never been able to attend this kind of event even though they wanted to. Both poverty and social anxiety have prevented them from experiencing this kind of opportunity. 

Many people in Halifax do not have enough money to live on. Low income assistance rates cause and contribute to high anxiety. Also, the bureaucratic nonsense and systematic problems in our system do not make things easier. To top that off, Nova Scotia has a poor mental health system and limited resources. It is issues like these that have kept people living in poverty from attending events like the ones we had with All Together Link, and in other areas too.

To learn what Halifax needs, we need to ask more questions of people living in poverty than the survey I did in May 2023. This will help us better understand how to solve these problems.

Those who read my BLOG will know about my Sober Bar idea, which promotes safe socializing.  Here is something currently happening in Dartmouth that relates to Social Prescribing.

Remember, different people living in poverty have different interests. One organization or project is not fit for 100% of the community living in poverty in Halifax.