Sounds Good To Me

It's hard to fathom how a decently civilized fair-minded society can accept the presence of homeless people in their midst. The very fact that in a land of plenty, where generally the population shares a healthy appreciation of social responsibility and fairness, we can now take for granted something that once seemed intolerably brutal: that there are among us people who live their fractured lives on the streets of our cities.

As though it's one of life's many inevitabilities. There's universal agreement on the humanitarian requirement to give assistance to people in need, and that's one of the reasons why Canadians believe that government-sponsored, tax-paid welfare is available to a wide range of people and families whose fortune has soured, or has never been promising for one reason or another.

Mental illness comes to mind, physical ill-health or/and incapacity. The bad luck that comes with losing long-time employment as a result of market factors out of one's control and with advancing age further employment appearing dim. The socially-stigmatized but very real calamity that befalls people who for one reason or another become drug-addicted and irresponsible.

In their great wisdom, social service agencies and provincial governments saw fit to close down group institutions which at one time looked after the needs of those in this society whose mental and physical incapacities left them incapable of forging their own futures. These unfortunates were gradually released to the public venue to fend for themselves, now representing a sizeable portion of the homeless.

There are those whose limited incapacities have resulted in poor social skills, including the acquisition of skills required to take one's place among the working population, and these people too fall by the wayside. Gambling addiction, along with that of illegal drugs has left people adrift, jobless, unable to care for themselves, on the streets.

There are young people, those still in adolescence, who have chosen to escape an abusive family background and find themselves homeless, helpless, hopeless, resigned to living on the street, exposed to conditions inimical to their health, their independence and physical well being, but determined to make their way in these socially primitive conditions.

There are the families living a pay cheque away from being thrown out of their living arrangements and to whom the final blow does arrive, where the current assisted living agencies seem unable to cope with the crush of familial disasters with an inadequate supply of municipally-designated housing in support of the working poor.

Along comes statistics and arguments gleaned from experimental outreaches here and there indicating that for an outlay of a sum of $25,000 per year each of these homeless souls could be accommodated with decent living arrangements, enabling many of them to have their dignity restored along with a determination to make an effort to become independent through education or job searches.

Sounds like a lot of money, $25,000 a crack to restore life and promise to a forgotten segment of society. On the other hand, it's estimated that costs associated with an informal upkeep of these lost people which includes medical, hospital, policing and incidentals related to temporary shelters and food provision the cost can range as high as $130,000 per individual.

Sounds like the way to go is to empower social service agencies, provincially and municipally to work hand in glove to solve this dreadful dilemma. Life on the streets anywhere in Canada during our hard winter months takes its inevitable toll on too many. As a country of great wealth and opportunity we can do much, much better.

Time to care enough to give it a try.