Dealing with challenges and recognizing opportunities
At the same time that the staff at Eva’s was grappling with the inadequacy of existing housing and employment supports for homeless youth, a key staff person working in housing at the City of Toronto identified a centrally located abandoned fire truck garage as having great potential for a housing facility. The city issued a request for an expression of interest to shelter and housing providers asking agencies what they would do with this property. The responses yielded a good cross section of ideas. The proposal from Eva’s Initiatives was chosen, partly because of the organization’s solid reputation, despite the fact that it was not an agency that delivered services in the downtown core.
The political environment at the time presented both challenges and opportunities for Eva’s Phoenix. The City of Toronto was amalgamating, resulting in changes affecting all levels of the bureaucracy. City bureaucracy was somewhat in chaos trying to sort out the new system, and staff and politicians were busy dealing with bigger issues. But this situation allowed the project to move ahead with little resistance. As well, because there was no policy in place to govern how the city dealt with vacant buildings, securing the building was not difficult.
The city played several crucial roles in getting the project off the ground. The city lobbied for longer-term funding for Eva’s Phoenix, helped bring some financial partners to the table (including the federal government ), lent credibility with the business community, and had established links with media.
Bob Yamashita was with the City of Toronto at the time, as the Manager of Homelessness and Housing Initiatives. Along with another staff member, Sheryl Pollock, he was instrumental in making the Eva’s Phoenix concept a reality. Part of their role was to facilitate partnerships at various levels within the city, and with other agencies, the province and the federal government. They were able to bring all of these partners to the table. At the implementation level, Sheryl was able to troubleshoot issues between the city and the agency. This included working through the Facilities Management and Real Estate Departments for building permits, and ensuring that proper procedures were being followed, funds were flowing, and approvals were in place.
Political interest in homelessness was building at the same time. Then Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman had established a Task Force on Homelessness and an influential report on the issue (led by Anne Golden) was garnering much media attention. Some key City Councillors lent their support to the issue of housing and homelessness, particularly Jack Layton. Layton used his union networks to bring in Buzz Hargrove from the Canadian Auto Workers Union who supported the project financially through the CAW’s Millennium Fund. This in turn helped leverage support and involvement from other trade unions, including those involved in the first construction-training program to build the facility. Even the Conservative provincial government felt sufficient pressure to start funds flowing to the project, largely because of the focus on youth training. Funding at the federal level was received through the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program, administered by the City of Toronto.
Eva’s leveraged the non-traditional support they had received during the development phase, and the success of first construction training program, to garner additional community recognition by being awarded the Peter Marshall Award for Innovation from the Association of Municipalities of Ontario, and the Leonard Frost Award from the Ontario Association of Hostels. These early awards in turn gave the project more credibility and further enhanced Eva’s partnership building efforts.
 Lessons Learned
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Develop a model that focuses on long-term results (i.e. helping the youth to become self-sufficient and re-integrated into the community) rather than concentrating on short-term success (e.g. program “graduation” numbers), which might skew the mission of the program.
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Build a multi-faceted argument to justify the project, including both an economic and a social case.
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Identify key, influential champions at all levels of government who are committed and willing to work across departments, across governments and across sectors. Make the best use of all networks, including personal networks.
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Stay true to an open-ended community approach that allows people (especially youth) to get involved, make mistakes and claim ownership. Develop projects that are inclusive, have user involvement, participation and control.
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Accept diversity within homeless youth. They are a complex group with many individual strengths as well as challenges Build leadership and a level of tolerance among everyone involved.
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Choose an appropriate location. Youth generally do not want to live on the fringes, away from the centre of the city and the action. Unfortunately this is often where rent is the highest. Underutilized city-owned buildings might provide a possibility.
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Safety is a two-way street. While communities may have safety concerns about a shelter moving into their neighbourhood, the location of the shelter must also be safe for the youth themselves. Consider the area surrounding a proposed location in terms of traffic, access to public transportation, isolation etc.
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Be prepared for challenges at every level and be ready to respond. Try to anticipate what will stand in the way, and how to deal with the roadblocks. These can include many bylaw issues such as land-use regulations, outcome-based funding from social service agencies, attitudes on the part of politicians, law enforcement, and community members (NIMBY).
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Identify opportunities and move quickly. Take advantage of any opportunities within the environment, including those that do not seem like likely opportunities (such as a government undergoing great change).
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Build on the learnings of others. Get people on board who are like-minded and have worked on similar projects. They can candidly outline the pitfalls, but also the benefits of such a project.
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Connect with people who are willing to throw out the rulebook. There are always a million reasons why something cannot be done. Don’t waste time with the naysayers. Find the people who believe in the vision and are willing to do whatever it takes to make it a reality.
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