Housing First in Williams Lake has successfully housed 20 people since having launched their initial pilot last year.
Project Manager Anne Burrill says that’s been rewarding to see that transition, and that having secure housing and a safe place to live is a fundamental piece of living a healthy life.
“We’ve housed 15 people since June, but we’ve actually housed 20 people in the program so far. So in the past year we started our initial pilot last November; just about a year ago since then we’ve housed 20 people,” she says.
Moving forward, Burrill says they are hoping for additional new landlord partners.
“One of the challenges in the program is always to find affordable housing for the folks that we’re working with. They are generally on quite low income and we are generally looking for a bachelor or one bedroom units and those are to find particularly at an affordable rent.”
Housing first in Williams Lake currently has three landlord partners and Burrill says they provide many supports for landlords as they are directly working the tenants.
“We’re providing support and we’re addressing any challenges that come up so landlords have the opportunity for us to really problem solve and deal with any issues that come up with those tenants up front. I think landlords, the feedback we’ve gotten is that the landlords are very happy with that. We also arrange direct pay of rent so that also is helpful for landlords.”
There has been very good community support for Housing First from a variety of folks according to Burrill adding that they have even received donations of furniture and household items as well as the time to move them.
Burrill says they will continue the intake for another month or two depending on their numbers and that they are waiting to hear on their funding for their fiscal year at which point they can make some decisions about the longer-term intakes.