Stories

Home for good

Program helps urban Indigenous tenants maintain their housing for the long term

It’s one thing to have housing. It’s another thing to keep it.

For those who have been couch surfing, living in a shelter or who are re-integrating after spending time in a facility, the list of needs once they have housing can be long. Budgeting, credit recovery, job search help, food, financial aid, addiction supports, tenant rights, medical care — Hamilton Regional Indian Centre (HRIC) helps with all of these and more.

“I want to thank you all for giving my life back.”

“Anyone can give you money to get your foot in the door,” says Sarah Cameron, housing and homelessness supports and services manager for HRIC. “To maintain housing requires in-depth, intense support. Everyone’s needs and timelines are different.”

Demand for HRIC’s housing programs is high, with waiting lists of between 100 and 300 people at any time. Thanks to a grant from Hamilton Community Foundation, a new housing stability worker will provide ongoing, culturally appropriate services and eviction prevention support to existing clients so staff can continue to support other community members who are still working through their housing journeys.

Eviction-prevention grants are one way HCF’s SCAFFOLD initiative addresses the housing crisis. By supporting direct service delivery to vulnerable tenants with diverse needs, these grants enable early intervention to prevent homelessness.

HRIC’s clients can access all the centre’s resources and receive referrals to other supports. One senior suffering from advanced COPD received a rental supplement and weekly food delivery; another successfully applied for priority non-profit housing and received tax help, a housing supplement, furniture and funding for his electric scooter.

The thank you cards and emails are proof of the impact. “Everybody is only two paycheques away from losing everything,” wrote one woman. “I want to thank you all for giving my life back to me,” wrote another.

“A lot of the people we see aren’t connected to their culture,” says HRIC’s Chantel Johnson, who has been doing double duty as a housing intake and stability worker for the past two years. “Our cultural programming, teachings and traditional medicines help them figure out who they are and get in touch with what they lost. The message is they matter.”

This bridge to culture is critical to staying housed, Sarah says. “Once people have new meaning in their lives it creates change in their homes, their behaviour and their decisions. That’s when people start to really do better.”

Excerpt from 2023-24 annual report