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What is Homelessness?

Homelessness is the lack of a safe place where individuals and families can grow and contribute to the ‘quality of life’ in their community. Homelessness may be absolute or reflected through core-need.  The Community Action Plan on Homelessness addresses issues surrounding both absolute and ‘at risk’ homelessness.  A learning tool has been developed by CAH staff to answer questions on homelessness.  Please feel free to print and share this information. 

How many are homeless in Halifax?

It is the experience of communities across Canada that it is next to impossible to determine how many people are homeless in any community.  In Halifax there are approximately 161 emergency shelter beds in the HRM, so on any night the number of beds occupied could be counted.  This 'point in time' census would not include people living in door-ways, or any number of make-shift sleeping arrangements that people have to make just to survive.  Not everyone who is homeless is comfortable accessing shelter through the current shelter system. Shelters are not an option for everyone.

There is also no way to determine how many individuals or families are living in sub-standard or over-crowded conditions or couch-surfing - sleeping wherever friends or families can offer a couch for a night or two. Community Action on Homelessness considers families and individuals who live at-risk as essentially homeless.

Over the past year the HRM has been involved in research related to housing and homelessness.  Visit their website to view their research, including the Portrait of Streets and Shelters.

Who is homeless in Halifax?

Homelessness has many faces. Single men are identified as a large group but there are increasing numbers of youth, women with children, and entire families facing homelessness. The Community Action Plan on Homelessness also recognizes that First Nations or Aboriginal and African Nova Scotians are also represented among the homeless in Halifax.

Homelessness knows no gender, race, sexuality or ethnicity. However, there are certain groups of people who experience homelessness more than others due to years and years of systemic oppression. The 2004 report, Homelessness in HRM, A Portrait of Streets and Shelters, revealed who is absolutely homeless or living ‘at risk’ in Halifax and why. The report included a one-night count of people who were living in the rough, using shelters or otherwise without shelter. This survey was accompanied by interviews with community agencies and many homeless persons. Of the 269 individuals, including 35 children found to be homeless on the night of the survey:

• 41% were under the age of 25
• 5% were over the age of 65
• 67% were male and 33% were female

For more information on who is homeless in Halifax download our learning tool.

“All I Want is a Place to Live and They Won't Even Give Me That

The following is adapted from the CAH National Housing Day Zine. Thank-you to the individuals who volunteered their stories.

"I have lived in rundown buildings. The landlord never fixed anything. My apartment was covered in mice and it was cold. There was no heat. I don’t think they put the heat on. We should have more housing. More affordable housing. It would help the problem of homelessness. If there were more apartments there would be less people who are homeless. More shelters for the homeless. My life was completely different before living in Metro Non-Profit Housing Association. I was freezing over there in Dartmouth, but here you can turn on the heat. The apartments over there weren’t well kept. But here they are. My living conditions are better, I’m happier over here than I was in Dartmouth."  ~ Anonymous

"Being homeless means being out on the street for 24 hours a day. It means sleeping in the back of the church in all kinds of weather. It means eating at Hope Cottage. Not being able to take a bath or shower. On the rainy nights your bedding gets wet and you can’t sleep because you’ve got no cover, no roof over your head. You end up sitting up, huddling under wet blankets, never knowing who’s going to be around at night because there are always other people there. You don’t know if they’ll be crackheads or alcoholics or what. Some of the housing I’ve been in has been shared accommodation and you don’t know if they’re gonna be crackheads and alcoholics – and most of them are crackheads and dope-takers – and the landlord expects you to live with them. I’m in a good place right now since I moved into Non-Profit Housing – I’m on my own. I don’t have to worry about drug dealers. I’ve got a nice little apartment. I’m on my own.  I can take care of it." ~ Patricia Rayner

“The biggest challenge was trying to find a place where there was no one else because usually if there was someone else around and if there was drugs or alcohol involved, then the chances then the chances of a fight were greatly increased… I slept on the Commons, under bushes, I slept in Victoria Park on the benches, Point Pleasant Park…The few times that I realized what I was doing, it was kind of scary.

But most times, I was either high or drunk and I just didn’t think…about not having a place to live or meals or anything… [Regarding Accessing shelters] you were looked down upon. You were judged from the time you got in there until you left… And there’s still a lot of people that feel the same way. they won’t go because they feel that they’re being judged and they’re made to feel that they’re not as good as everyone else.”  ~ Bob MacAulay (from The Chronicle Herald, Nov.8, 2003 by Lois Legge)

When I was living in my apartment on North St., it was infested with three different types of mice. I hated to see it rain because my apartment would flood up to more than 2 inches. The owner refused to do anything about it and made excuses. The closets were always full of mildew and dirt from flooding and the leaking roof. Mice were jumping out of cabinets and there was a hole the size of an orange in the ceiling.

The pipes would constantly freeze up in the winter a lot. The landlord would use my electricity to unfreeze the pipes in the whole building. In my apartment I had almost no heat and a lot of dampness. The outside door was left open in winter and more cold came in, besides people trying to break in. Today my asthma is a lot worse, arthritis and allergies as well. The toilet backed up a lot. In my apartment there was old carpet and it was very dirty. Drug people came looking to buy drugs there, because the man who lived there before sold some. In the evening ladies of the evening were standing outside the building with pimps fighting. I wish someday the man who was my landlord would go through what I did.   ~ Anonymous

The Lonely Streets
- Hank Brewer -

The Lonely Streets
You may think that I’m an old man
As I walk with shoulders bent
But once I had a young man’s dreams
Now I wonder where they went

I once had a home and family
But my choices forced them away
Now lonely days and tear filled nights
Is the way I have to pay

The city it is crowded
But we walk the streets alone
It seems that you’re invisible
If you don’t have a home

Now thanks to people out there
Who have shared my despair
I have a beautiful place to live
And friends who really care

I’ve been down and out
Despair staked its claim
But like the phoenix from the ashes
I shall rise again