By Kendall Worth
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| People on the Halifax Waterfront |
This blog post is information from an interview with Mike (not his real name, as is my habit for reasons I have explained many times) along with input from other first voice folks.
As I have explained over and over, living your life on Social Assistance in N.S., encourages you to live in social isolation. Mike, who I interviewed for this post, made strong points about how people cannot expect us to be sitting at home and socially isolating ourselves. Also during this interview Mike suggested I should link this post because he says it backs up the point he is trying to make.
Mike told me that, these days, society seems to be doing more and more to promote Social Isolation and treat it as “OK”… when it is not OK. During my interview with Mike he told me that he has had many conversations, with folks living in poverty, about his experiences of attending events on the waterfront, through the summer, on his own. Mike has actually talked to me about how he found that at times, safety was a concern, going to things alone , especially walking alone at night.
Of course many in my community have no choice. If they want to go to events, for example, like Busker Fest or to see a band play as this post illustrates, they have to respect boundaries of their friends. The boundaries of Mike’s case is backed up by this blog post.
Before getting into Mike’s nitty gritty, here are a couple of links to posts that also deal with this issue, and who had similar issues to Mike. See here and here.
The “nitty gritty”…
During my interview with Mike he stated an opinion that people with mental health issues and invisible disabilities should not always be labelled as welfare recipients, and CF and Bob, who I was in touch with about this current blog post were both in 100% agreement. Mike, CF and Bob all have 2 things in common.
#1 – They are recipients of income assistance and both work part-time being allowed to keep the first $450.00 of their earnings before the system starts Clawing back.
#2 – They all had experiences where they did not attend Summer events, among other things, due to Safety Concerns.
Of course they went alone because they respected their friend’s boundaries and the fact that they were not interested in going with them. As a result of going by-themselves, they ended up getting approached by some young trouble makers, in 2024. Mike said someone who he did not know from Adam, who looked like he was in his early 30s came right into his personal space and started asking him personal questions that were none of his business. When Mike tried to walk away, the young man followed him, so he had to start running. Eventually he made his way inside a business and they called security.
CF had a similar issue, when attending by himself. Just like Mike, an issue made him feel unsafe. He got approached by a group of people who looked young enough to be teenagers – early 20’s. 20’s. He did not know them,. He was cornered by one, while another said Do you remember me? When CF replied, telling him, no, I do not know you, leave me alone CF was accused owing them money, and two of the teenage-looking guys punched him in the face. CF ended up screaming for help, and two people passing by went and got waterfront security, while a third passer-by stepped in and broke up the altercation.
In the meantime Bob, who has been on the system for many years, finds that the Halifax waterfront is a spot where, he knows from experience, is a targeted location (outlined in the link re: “Bob” above) Anyway Bob and many other welfare recipients finds that Bob and others run into people who know them from other parts of their lives, who may force them out of their comfort zone. Bob tells me that when he goes down to the Waterfront, he is very careful to watch his surroundings. Bob has had different times in his life when at times he has gone onto the waterfront and run into people who know him from other parts of his life(Not from food banks or soup kitchens) meaning they may treat him with stigma and disrespect.
Mike and CF have experienced this as a result of going to Things on the waterfront by-themselves as well. As for Bob, during Summer of 2024 he
#1 – Had an issue where a young man looking to be in his 20’s approached him and asked Bob if he remembered him. When Bob said to him, no I do not know you from Adam, 2 of the gentleman's friends showed up on the scene. When Bob walked away, the gentleman and his two friends followed Bob, and Bob had to go inside a store for his protection.
#2 – During 2024, Bob had another incident on the waterfront -- 3 teenagers got after him accusing him of owing their homeboy money. Bob started running for his life and make his inside a business for his protection. The Business called security, and eventually they did back off.
So a solution is:
If welfare recipients are going to find that going to certain places alone by-themselves is a safety concern, then maybe moving forward they should keep to attending events limited to Day-Light hours.
Mike, CF, and Bob while chatting about this, came up with another idea. A solution I support and often write about is the creation of a Social Prescription Program or a Social Precribing Organization . Mike, CF, and Bob, however ,talked in recent conversations that part of what could be offered through this program or organization is some sort of community safety plan for those do not have friends to attend with. However for something like this to be achieved we would need to need to build a community of support for the Social Prescription and Social Prescribing idea.
In this BLOG post I introduced one idea as to how we could start the work on building this community of support. Here is another post where I touched on the benefits of building community. Anyway as part of this Conversation Mike, CF, and Bob also talked about how is it is also only during daylight hours when welfare recipients have access to the places where they go get their meals. If they miss going to Souls Harbour or Hope Cottage then they are going to miss out on one or two of their meals for that day. So Mike, Bob and CF all suggest talking about Creating a Safety plan for those who have no choice but to have to go these free Summer Events alone, because they have no friends or are respecting the boundaries their friends have set.
I will conclude this article by saying, lets talk about what a solution looks like, but the answer is a mystery.
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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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