Homelessness in Vancouver: A very complex issue

Last week, I had a conversation with Nancy Zimmerman on her post regarding the ticketing of homeless people who were sleeping in Oppenheimer Park (at 4:30am on Thursday I think), in the Downtown East Side. As I have mentioned before, the realities of the Downtown East Side (DTES) are very complex, and homelessness is not an easy issue to tackle. If it were, Vancouver wouldn’t have any problems of homelessness.

One of the most debilitating and dis-empowering feelings I have ever had in my life is the feeling of not having where to sleep. The most recent time I moved to Canada, I simply didn’t have a place to stay nor had I secured housing at the university. Therefore, for like three weeks, I *had* to stay at a friends’ place. While her apartment was very nice, living out of a set of luggage bags is NOT really nice.

Now, I have adapted to Canada and to Vancouver, but those feelings of disempowerment are not easy to let go. I hope I never get to experience them, ever again.

I am also keenly aware of how much Nancy loves her neighbourhood and how committed she is to social change. I think that we ought to take a holistic view to the homelessness issue and more than anything, be compassionate. We never know when we can end up there. Fate has a way of turning out in unexpected ways.

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Related posts:

  1. Homelessness Action Week 2009 (Oct 11th to 17th)
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  3. Public policy lessons on homelessness for Vancouver’s next mayor
  4. Homelessness Action Week 2008 – October 12th to 19th, 2008
  5. Homelessness in Vancouver and sustainability: Researching the issue

July 19th, 2008 in Downtown, Vancouver, homelessness, public policy issues, social change | tags: ,

Comments (2)

nancy (aka money coach)July 19th, 2008 at 8:59 pm

Thanks for this, Raul. It’s pretty deep into our dna, the need for a place – even a little space – to call our own; a place to belong. Clearly you are able to empathize with those who don’t have it. I think you are *exactly* right: compassion is called for. If every last one of us in Vancouver were to evaluate and problem-solve through the eyes of compassion, I am absolutely certain we could, indeed put an end to homelessness. Thanks again for your thoughtful post.

mike howardMarch 15th, 2009 at 9:00 pm

hi my name is mike howard 2 years ago i was on the dtes streets on and off for 15 years. until recently i have been trying to find a way i can help with the homelesness . today i run a recovery society called
Gabriella’s recovery homes based out of surrey bc . I provide a safe
enviroment woman and men with addiction issues. All my clients were all homeless before they came to me so please let me try and make more of a difference with the homelesness epidemic

thank you for listening

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