Shortage of shelter beds for women

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There’s a sad reality in the city of Hamilton on this night. It surrounds the growing problem of the number of homeless women being turned away from shelters. Officials say the rate is alarming, and they’re working around the clock to try to find a solution.

51-year Roxanne Wilson is a McMaster University graduate with two degrees. She had a good job and owned her own home. When she moved back to Hamilton about a year ago she was unable to get a job. But she never thought in a million years she’s find herself living in her car: “You see the life you had and now you’re looking at ‘I don’t know where I’m sleeping tonight’. I’ve never known that. This is all foreign to me.”

So Wilson turned to the shelters in Hamilton: “You call day after day after day to many different shelters, we’re full, we’re full, so there’s nothing you can do.”

She’s not alone, officials say approximately 1,200 women a month are turned away from shelters in Hamilton. There are only 196 shelter beds available. At Mary’s Place they’ve started double bunking and still turn women away.

Yolisa De Jager, Good Shepherd Women’s Services: “Right now it is very pressing. We have very limited space and high demand. In terms of our turn away numbers, we’ve been, between Martha’s House and Mary’s Place, we’ve been having to turn away combined about 300 people a month.”

And some of them are women with children trying to leave abusive relationships.

Wilson is one of the lucky ones. She eventually got a room at Martha’s house: “It’s heaven, I hate to use that term, but compared to what I’ve experienced.”

And while officials say it is a big challenge getting women in here, they says it’s an even bigger challenge finding a way to get them out. They say there is a shortage of affordable housing in Hamilton”

De Jager: “The incomes they receive don’t always match the reality of what the market rent is, subsidized housing is limited in terms of its availability, it’s not always immediately available.”

In some cases it’s a seven-year wait.

While women are being turned away in droves there are empty beds in the men’s shelters.

We have learned The Good Shepherd and other community stakeholders are planning to meet in January to really put this issue on the fast track and see if they can come up with a solution quickly.