Almost 200 people gathered for the Plan to End Homelessness Summit, hosted by the YMCA of Regina on Wednesday.
The meeting aimed to gain community input into the development of a plan for Regina. Presenters explained a goal of defining and reaching functional zero in Regina.
"Ideally it's a shortened time period where someone enters a shelter and then there’s a set time period from the time that they exit the shelter into housing,” chair of the Regina Homelessness Community Advisory Board Susannah Walker said.
Regina is still defining its version of functional zero. Walker says they're looking to Medicine Hat’s recent improvements around homelessness as a guide.
"They’ve reached functional zero in Medicine Hat, so it's really encouraging for us. We know it can be done, it's a solvable problem,” Walker said.
In February, the city announced that a committee of 20 community leaders has been formed to draft a plan to end homelessness in Regina.
The YMCA invited consultant Alina Turner to Wednesday’s event to discuss what Regina can do.
"Today is about sharing what we are seeing from a trend analysis and data analysis perspective and national best practices and it's about hearing from the community,” Turner said,
Roundtables at the event discussed 14 different topics, including reconciliation and housing.
Rent subsidies, new affordable housing and sustainability are all key ideas in the plan, but Turner points out that Regina is unique, and can't just follow the same path s medicine hat.
"The trends here are very different. The indigenous population here and the overrepresentation of Indigenous people in the homeless count are staggering in fact,” Turner said.
Turner added Regina is an urban centre that attracts migration and the pressure that puts on the housing system and the service sector is something that’s not the same as Medicine Hat.
Indigenizing homelessness is also one of the goals of the plan. Instead of administering policies to indigenous people, organizers want policies developed with Indigenous people.
Organizers will take information from Wednesday’s event to form a draft plan scheduled to be ready for June. Following that, the official plan is set to be rolled out in September.
