The Sunshine Coast Community Foundation’s new Vital Signs update reads like a portrait of a community that is becoming stressed to the max. When it’s a major struggle to simply have a roof over one’s head, collateral damage in the form of broken lives can be expected.
The report’s indicators show that single people and lone-parent families are being hit especially hard, with median incomes well below the levels needed to cover the cost for rental housing. Assuming a unit is even available, the average rent is estimated at $1,085 a month for a one bedroom, $1,625 for a two bedroom, $1,885 for a three bedroom and $2,667 for a four bedroom. The Coast is ranked as “severe” in the Canadian Rental Housing Index, so it should be no surprise that the homeless shelter clientele has doubled over the past 12 months or that the Sunshine Coast Community Services program director speaks of “deepening poverty and isolation” in the community.
Statistically, couples with children appear to be in better shape in terms of median income, but with the lack of affordable childcare deemed “critical,” many families are also finding themselves in dire straits.
Against this backdrop, the Sunshine Coast has seen a surge in people accessing psychiatric care and community counselling, and a marked increase in domestic violence cases.
Social service providers are naturally calling for more funding to meet these growing needs, and we expect the new government in Victoria will try to be more receptive than the B.C. Liberals were. However, the NDP is bound by the same fiscal realities as the last government, and the problems identified in the Vital Signs report are not unique to the Sunshine Coast, or even to B.C.
Ottawa, meanwhile, is set to announce its 2018 immigration target by Nov. 1. Despite the housing affordability and availability issues across the country, the federal government’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth has recommended jacking up the number of immigrants to 450,000 a year. Canada brought in more than 320,000 immigrants in the past year to July – a 33 per cent increase over the previous year’s 241,000 and the highest number since 1971 – and now another quantum jump in numbers is being considered.
This is the kind of public policy madness that got us into the current crisis.
We don’t realistically expect government to do much to fix the problems facing Canadians, but is it too much to ask that they don’t keep making things worse?
For more on Vital Signs, click here to see Sean Eckford’s article.
