This month, Operation Come Home is pleased to welcome our newest staff member, John Heckbert. John is joining OCH as the new Associate Executive Director. He has longstanding experience in the charitable sector, having worked in non-profits for more than twenty years.
A Message from John
I am thrilled to have joined Operation Come Home, and to have an opportunity to work with such a dedicated and expert team of people.
The current reality for organizations like Operation Come Home is very challenging, and the outlook can at times appear grim. But there are great reasons for optimism.
To explain this, I want to share a few facts that may surprise you:
Homelessness is on the rise in Ottawa [1]. According to research and point-in-time counts, homelessness continues to rise in Ottawa[2] each year. And it has accelerated during the pandemic. Last October, City Councillor Catherine McKenney noted that there are now 1900 people (including children) sleeping in shelters. And the number of people sleeping outdoors doubled between March and October 2020, relative to a year ago. And as homelessness grows each year, the average age of people experiencing homelessness is decreasing.
The rise is partially due to COVID-19. Part of the rise in homelessness is surely due to the economic fallout brought on by the pandemic. But it is also due to longstanding trends, reported both locally and nationally by Statistics Canada, since 2010[3]. Declines in housing affordability, changes in mental health care, and increases in economic insecurity are factors driving this long-term rise.
We know who is likely to experience homelessness. We know of many characteristics that make a person more likely to experience homelessness, including factors like: whether they have experienced discrimination as a racialized or Indigenous person, have been involved in the child welfare system, identify as LGBTQ+, or have experienced addictions or mental health challenges. Many people who experience homelessness are new to our city – around 40% of people experiencing homelessness have been here less than a year. 20% have lived here their whole lives[4].
So, we know that homelessness in Ottawa is growing, in part due to changes in our society, and due to the pandemic. Those experiencing homelessness for the first time are likely to come from marginalized or at-risk populations.
We can make a difference to help these people.
Homelessness is not an inevitable by-product of city life. It rises or falls as the interplay of systems and support mechanisms in a community chang. And crucially, it can be addressed at the individual level like any other social problem.
To help, Operation Come Home has adopted a few key strategies:
Focus on youth: One key factor in solving homelessness is addressing it early. About half of all homeless adults report that their first experience occurred when they were under the age of 25[5]. Once trapped in a cycle of poverty, it can be difficult to escape. Focus must be directed to youth, diverting them from chronic adult homelessness. Many can be successfully reunited with their families. Those that cannot, or those from the foster system, can be given help to get on their feet.
Offer holistic, supportive programming: Many homeless youth experience mental health challenges , either as the cause of their homelessness or from experiences they had after they became street-involved. Others require timely crisis supports or help managing addictions. Success in this area requires effective evidence-based programs, designed by social service experts and people with lived experience.
Provide youth opportunities to succeed: Motivation plays a large part in helping a young person leave homelessness behind. They need to be respected, and given opportunities to succeed, either in academic settings or in an employment context. In some cases, they can receive support to find their own job. In others, they may choose to gain work experience in an innovative social enterprise.
I joined Operation Come Home because they focus on these outcomes, but more importantly, they have enshrined a few key attributes that guide how they work.
Operation Come Home is nimble. Rare among non-profits, the organization has an entrepreneurial culture that is instilled at the board level and is manifested throughout the entire team. Staff are quick to learn and quicker to adapt, pragmatically using new strategies to help youth where it’s best to do so. Most notably, this is evident in their successful social enterprises. These businesses generate funds, while providing youth with employment and real-world experience.
The organization is also relentlessly focused on the needs of their clients. This is the norm for social service organizations in Ottawa, but at Operation Come Home, the distance between strategy and client is uncharacteristically short. I saw first-hand how, during the worst of the pandemic, the team quickly adapted their programs to continue offering services for youth.
Perhaps most importantly, Operation Come Home is rigorous. Those of you who know Elspeth McKay, our Executive Director, will find this unsurprising. Elspeth has created a culture at Operation Come Home that shrewdly and systematically makes careful decisions for the benefit of its youth. Her team carries this approach across the breadth of their work – from how they collect data and use it in decision-making, to which partners to engage, and where to deploy efforts.
I hope you can support Operation Come Home in advancing this important work. Please consider becoming a volunteer, or making a gift today.
Thank you,
John Heckbert, he/him
Associate Executive Director
Operation Come Home
[1] https://ottawa.citynews.ca/local-news/ottawa-homeless-crisis-worsening-as-winter-approaches-nanos-poll-shows-pandemic-effect-2826580
[2] https://www.homelesshub.ca/community-profile/ottawa
[3] https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/82-003-x/2021001/article/00002-eng.htm
[4] https://www.homelesshub.ca/sites/default/files/attachments/PiT_Infogr_EN.pdf
[5] https://www.canada.ca/en/employment-social-development/programs/homelessness/reports/highlights-2018-point-in-time-count.html