The number of youth who are experiencing homelessness in Regina has increased over the last few years, according to Namerind Housing Co. point-in-time (PIT) count.
In their count, they found 824 people are currently experiencing homelessness, with 25 per cent of those first living unhoused between the ages of 0-17.
“I feel that, at a minimum, those numbers are accurate,” said Jeff Dudar, CEO of the Street Culture Project.
He noted their Tuhk Sih Nowin Youth Shelter, located at 1314 11th Ave, has been virtually at capacity since 2022.
Because of that, “[There] is a need for probably three-quarters to 100 per cent more shelter spaces for youth at any given time in the city.”
Before COVID, Dudar said the shelter would average eight to 12 people at any given time.
Namerind’s survey also found 54 per cent of those homeless faced mental health challenges.
Dudar noted, “[since the] post COVID era, there [is a] general sense of like loneliness that youth are experiencing and that loneliness [is impacting] their mental health.”
Mental health challenges for youth are a contributing factor to drug addictions, which are often driven by fentanyl and synthetic opioids.
Dudar also mentioned depending on the youth’s current living situation, they could choose to stay and deal with the challenges or leave and find shelter, which he referred to as “fight or flight.”
Youth ages 16-18 who stay at Tuhk Sih Nowin Youth Shelter can reside there for a maximum of 30 days.
The 30 days are “intended to address like the short term acute needs of safety and well-being and then working with the Ministry [of Social Services] to find longer-term housing for that youth should there be [a] continued need.”
The Street Culture Project works with the ministry for their Youth Transitions Unit (YTU),”[which] provides youth [ages 15-21] with a safe and supportive environment where they can gain valuable life skills to make a smooth transition into independent living,” according to their website.
Additionally, their Youth Supported Housing Operations Resource Education (Y-SHORE) program helps individuals 16-24 transition from homelessness to independence.
Dudar mentioned, “the [Y-SHORE] program [is] funded through Reaching Home, which is connected to Namerind, and we have a partnership with Regina Housing Authority, and we have access to seven units in one of their complexes in the city.”
The waitlist for youth to get into these programs has increased, with Dudar noting, “I think we could safely say that we could increase our opportunity to provide those services by 100 per cent [and] I would [still] be skeptical to say that we would meet the need in the community.”
Another challenge their transition programs face is finding suitable places for the rest of the youth in the programs.
A landlord “could be hesitant [about potential] property damage for reasons related to, you know, past negative experiences with renting to that demographic.”
“In a perfect world, we would be the landlord to the participants, but we don’t have the internal capacity or the resources to purchase apartment complexes or houses to that extent in the city,” he added.
In the short-term, part of the Street Culture Project’s vision is acquiring additional resources, whether that be ones they own or partnering with other organizations to make them accessible for youth.
From there, “we want to try to provide services and move our services upstream and [be] more preventative so that we can chip away at and eventually overcome the youth homelessness situation crisis in Regina,” he said.
Dudar was asked what he believes is the biggest thing that is lacking in terms of addressing homelessness.
He mentioned there are lots of things, but mainly pointed towards “getting lost in our day-to-day work and we are often ourselves as organizations in survival mode trying to find funding to support underfunded programs and services and then we end up competing with one another as organizations for pockets of money.”
Dudar feels this can often lead to further barriers being put up regarding working with other organizations.
So, he would like “to see there be a more coordinated effort to maximize those investments in the community.”
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