KEY POINTS:
Over recent weeks there has been a sustained, and possibly unprecedented, level of media interest in Auckland's homeless community.
Firstly there was coverage following the release of the latest findings of an annual count of people sleeping on the streets of central Auckland. After this came the very tragic death of a homeless man and the considerable media interest that ensued.
Then public comments by Councillor Paul Goldsmith once again sparked media interest in the issue. Complaints from the public about mattresses littering Queen St and anti-social behaviour led him to call for greater police power to move homeless people on from key city locations.
The response from the public to this suggestion was, from our perspective, encouraging, as it indicated a level of understanding of the issue that has not been seen previously.
Simply moving people on, without assistance, was judged to be barbaric and pointless. The reality is that it is a very small minority of homeless people who act in an anti-social manner. Most tend to keep a low profile and avoid confrontation.
People do not choose to live on the streets. Nor is there a stereotypical homeless person. Rather than being the perpetrators of violent crime, homeless people are far more likely to be the victims of violence on the street.
Those who come each day to LIFEWISE's centre on Airedale St, and to other inner city services, are individuals with unique stories. What is common to all is that for one reason or another they have slipped through the net of our society's support services.
Simply re-housing people and expecting them to survive on their own without ongoing support is unrealistic. Such an approach just perpetuates the vicious cycle of homelessness and repeats previous failed community integration from the mental health and criminal justice systems.
The irony is that there is spare accommodation available in inner-city emergency accommodation and boarding houses. For some homeless people this will be appropriate. For others, particularly those with long-term complex needs, additional specialist accommodation is needed. But we are not going to fix homelessness by simply dumping people into homes.
What's missing from the "put them somewhere else" approach is the support from multiple organisations that is required to address the diverse needs of these people. We also need to ensure that they can remain in this accommodation.
The homeless often pass through a revolving door of addresses because of a lack of basic support. Moving from life on the streets to unsupported accommodation leaves homeless people lonely, isolated, poor, and lacking the life skills to sustain a healthy existence, driving them back to the streets.
What if we could create support structures to address the wide range of personal issues that are preventing homeless people from successfully integrating back into society and maintaining successful tenancies?
And if so, when and where do we start? Well we can start with where we are now.
This year LIFEWISE moved beyond providing just core emergency support to homeless people in the form of meals, clothing etc and brought mental health and addiction treatment services on site in our centre.
The aim was to better prepare people for sustaining accommodation. We are now talking to boarding houses, emergency housing providers and Government about providing multi-agency wrap-around support services to newly housed individuals - things like meaningful daily activities, training, jobs and opportunities for social interaction.
However, LIFEWISE doesn't currently have the resources to achieve the level of support that's required to solve the problem alone. We've got the experience, the commitment and the relationships both with homeless people and the wider sector but we don't have the resources required.
As the burden is falling unfairly on unfunded community organisations such as ours, we hope the Government, both local and central, joins us and other community agencies nationwide in this effort.
A good start would be to have a government strategy on homelessness as happens in other countries.
At present we don't even know accurately how many people are homeless or vulnerably housed in our country.
People sleeping rough on our streets is a social issue - not a police issue.
While important, this is a relatively small problem as social problems go, and with a co-ordinated effort it is possible to find a long-term solution.
Solving homelessness involves a change of attitude in all of us - from those who victimise homeless people by abusing them on the street through to those who ignore them in our social policy. The question isn't can we fix it, but do we want to?
* John McCarthy is general manager, community services of LIFEWISE, which is the new name for the former Methodist Mission Northern.
www.lifewise.org.nz
