Members of Local 1866 Volunteering Community Services

There are many reasons people become homeless, and the combination of factors that lead to homelessness are different for every individual, and offering our help while allowing the people to maintain their dignity created an overwhelming sense of goodness . Outflow Saint John is a drop-in centre that provides food and necessities, someone to talk with as well as providing a safe relaxing environment for anyone that comes in. All types of donations welcome as well as volunteers. Their goal is to be in operation 7 days a week.
Our goal will be to help them achieve this goal. Thank you to all that donated and volunteered your time to make that special difference in someone`s life. cg

Volunteers (members of Cupe Local 1866)
Amanda
Suzanne & Dave
Patricia
Crystal
Carol
Charlene
John & Sandra

Putting a name to poverty

Published Thursday November 19th, 2009

SAINT JOHN - Lydia Blois said she met a lot of homeless guys Wednesday as she and a group of high school students roamed through the uptown and handed out doughnuts, subs and chocolate bars. For some reason, many of them were named Steve.

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Kâté Braydon/Telegraph-Journal

Colby Armstrong, left, and Laurie Kindred listen to John Williams' story out in front of the Salvation Army on St. James Street, where Williams has lived for the past four years.

When you learn a street person's name, she said, everything changes.

"It's more immediate," Blois said, holding a box of doughnuts as she stood in the middle of King's Square. "It's more real. It's more scary. This could be a Steve I know at school. The gap is extremely small."

Fifty students from four high schools - Saint John, St. Malachy's, Harbour View, Simonds - and the Woodlawn Learning Centre, walked through the city centre in four groups handing out the food. Each wore a shirt or toque with HELP emblazoned on it - Homelessness Housing Learning Policy.

Steve Davis was one of the Steves who Blois and the others met Wednesday. His fingers were stained by tobacco and his wire-like brown beard streaked with grey. The 52-year-old carries most of his possessions in a white plastic bag.

Since mid-October, he's lived on the street and in the evenings taken refuge behind a dumpster.

"It gives them a step into life," Davis said of the students hearing his story and that of others like him. "What life is all about," he said.

When Davis takes off his ball cap, a card falls out. The hat, he said, is his file cabinet. Jammed inside are dozens of cards, the notes scribbled on each blurred by sweat.

Within weeks, government will increase social assistance payments to the poorest recipients by 80 per cent and health cards will be extended for up to three years, until a prescription drug plan is introduced for all uninsured citizens by 2012.

Soo Min Park, a Saint John High School student, was at the Salvation Army shelter speaking with residents. Up until Wednesday, she thought the homeless were more part of TV than reality.

"The least you can do is smile," Park said. "Let them know you know they exist."

On Saturday, another group of young people will open their hearts as they perform on the 73rd annual broadcast of the Empty Stocking Fund. It will be carried live from the Saint John High School auditorium by Rogers TV, Rogers 88.9 and CTV.

The HELP event is only in its second year and was organized by the Greater Saint John Steering Committee on Homelessness that is made up of a number area groups.

Colin McDonald of The Resource Centre, one of the organizers of HELP, said that homelessness is now on the provincial government's agenda.

"It's a step in the right direction, but only a step," McDonald said.

He worries the system still isn't adequately prepared to fight the problem. He said it still isn't addressing the invisible homeless, many of whom are teens that surf from couch to couch of friends until they overstay their welcome and are left with nowhere to go.

"It's a big battle," McDonald said.

Jayme Hall, president of Outflow, a drop-in centre on Waterloo Street for the homeless, said money can't solve all of society's ills. The chequebook syndrome, he called it.

"I honestly think it could have a positive and negative impact," Hall said.

For those with addictions, more money could mean more grief, he said. Hall believes government could take a lesson from the students he worked with Wednesday. The high school students asked those they met if they wanted a coffee or a sandwich. The students then went and purchased the sandwich, doughnut or coffee, and returned a few moments later.

"If the government could see the faces, put names to those faces, as hard as that is, we would see things start to go away," Hall said.

With the sun behind him on an unusually warm November day, Steve Davis gathers up his cards and stuffs them back into the brim of his hat.

He'll spend another night behind the dumpster and out of the wind.

"It ain't nice," he said. "It ain't glamorous, but it's a place to stay."

Steve, said McDonald, is the lesson everyone needs to learn.

"Once you meet Steve, it's real." McDonald said.