Not many charity fundraising walks are held in the evening hours. But the upcoming Coldest Night of the Year event, organized by Richmond’s Chimo Community Services, will be doing just that on Feb. 25 to emphasize a point.
At around 5:15 p.m., when the 5 km walk to and from Thompson Community Centre is scheduled to start, the temperature is expected to be relatively low to give walkers a first-hand feel for conditions the city’s homeless population have to contend with on a regular basis and why funds from the event will help the 160 who call the streets home.
“It’s not meant to be super-comfortable event,” said Clay Tang, Chimo’s manager, resource development. “It’s meant to give folks a hint of what it might feel like to have no place to go in the evening.”
Tang added the walk, one of many that take place in communities across the country under the Coldest Night of the Year banner, is foremost a fundraiser and secondly a way of drawing attention to the fact Richmond has a sizable number of people in need of shelter.
“That 160 without homes doesn’t account for the folks who are on the brink of homelessness, the youth who are sleeping at the community centres, the couch surfers, the people who are staying with different faith groups and family members,” Tang said.
One of the most recent trends in the local homeless population is a rising number of seniors, Tang said.
Chimo’s Homeless Prevention Program is helping to address that situation, said Jean Fisher, Chimo’s volunteer resources program coordinator.
“The program targets groups of people and one of them includes those who have been released from hospital where they have been temporarily housed. And more and more of those individuals are seniors,” she said. “We’ve had clients who are in their 80s with nowhere to go.
“We typically don’t think of homeless people being elderly, but in one month we had about four or five of them as clients.”
“The greater challenge, though, here in Richmond, which is characterized as a rich community, is that the homeless simply don’t exist,” Tang added.
So, where do the homeless stay?
Tang said the Salvation Army’s shelter has room to accommodate about 10 men. And Nova House provides shelter for women suffering domestic abuse. Both are often at capacity.
Others seek temporary shelter in places such as fast food restaurants, libraries, community centres, under bridges, in parkades and in the forested areas at Richmond Nature Park.
Many local homeless people will also gravitate to where more services exist, such as the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver.
“With that, we are not being a good neighbour. We’re saying, ‘You take these people,’” Tang said. “Richmond is a wealthy community and we can supply the services, if the will is there to adequately support people in need.
“The money is there. It’s just a matter of prioritizing.”
It’s also a way of saving precious social care funds.
“It costs a lot less to put a roof over someone’s head than it is to deal with them being homeless,” Fisher said, alluding to the involvement of other social service agencies, medical care, policing and legal systems costs that can spring from living on the streets.
“Plus, once they get settled with their own place, maybe they find work and contribute back to society,” Tang said. “A lot of people are probably tired of hearing it, but we need to keep playing that same tune about upstream thinking and providing preventative services and making a community that keeps people connected.”
Money raised at the event will be, in part, used for some additional expenses at Richmond’s extreme weather shelter at St. Alban Anglican Church that are not covered by government funding.
“I think the shelter gets around $9 a person, which doesn’t really provide much room for anything else, such as professional cleaning services,” Tang said.
Fisher added that some homeless people are dealing with health issues and may require the temporary means to fill a drug prescription.
“If someone is diabetic and ends up at Nova House with just clothes on their back, it would be beneficial to have a small fund to be able to provide them with what drugs they need,” she said. “The fund could also cover the cost of a transit pass.”
“Or even an umbrella,” Tang added.
The public can support the Coldest Night of the Year walk in a number of ways. They can register for the walk, which costs $25. Or they can register and conduct some fundraising through pledges to complete the walk.
Plus, teams that have been formed to do the walk can be sponsored.
All of that, plus a route map for the event, can be accessed online on at Canada.Cnoy.org.
