Homelessness cannot be solved overnight. But in its first year of operations, Living Space in Timmins has racked up some pretty impressive figures towards that end.
Executive director Jason Sereda summarizes his centre’s performance over that first year.
“We’ve had close to 20,000 contacts with people,” he reports. “So that’s 20,000 opportunities to intervene with people, hear their story and find out what kind of supports they could utilize.”
A lot of those contacts are with the same core of people using the services, or having lived on the street for a long time.
Sereda says Living Space concentrates on them first, because to have the most impact, you have to help those most in need.
“We’ve moved over 20 people from chronic homelessness into housing in just one year,” he notes, “but we know that we’ve had over 75 distinct individuals that we’re supported in some way in our first year of operation.
As it looks to expand its services, Sereda says Living Space needs more community partnerships and volunteers.
If you want to become involved, contact him at [email protected] .