United Way Ottawa has teamed up with artist Michael Simon to create three bright red benches that resemble houses to spread awareness about youth homelessness. The message? A bench is not a home.
“We wanted people to walk down the street in Ottawa and to see the benches and to think about the struggles of homeless youth and what they go through every day,” says Carol Gagnon, vice-president of community services at United Way/Centraide Ottawa. “What a better way than to model a house, because that’s what’s needed when you’re homeless.”
The benches are located where Sparks Street intersects with Elgin, Metcalfe and O’Connor streets. They will remain there until late November.
The benches display plaques that feature messages about homelessness. One bench says, “More than 1,400 young people in Ottawa have no place to call home.” Another states: “In Ottawa, only 43% of people with disabilities participate in the labour market compared to 70% of the general population.”
“The top reasons youth would face homelessness is because (of) mental health issues, drug addiction, and conflict in a home,” says Gagnon.
According to the Alliance to End Homelessness Ottawa’s latest Progress Report, there were 6,695 different individuals who used emergency shelter in 2014. Of those, 923 were youth between the ages of 16 and 25.
“The whole project has been one of the best experiences I’ve had making something to put out to the public,” says Simon, the installation artist behind the project. “The response from people has been really nice too. I like to think that it got the idea across.”
The benches look like the skeleton of a house. There’s a doorframe, a doorstep, and the beginnings of a roof, but they are left incomplete on one side to allow for sitting.
“The form of the house came from an idea that these benches are hopefully just a transition back to something that’s home,” says Simon. “It’s not a complete home. There are no actual walls, there’s no actual door. It’s not finished, it’s not perfect, but hopefully it’s something that can still be finished.”
It was the first time the Sparks Street BIA has worked with the United Way, according to the association’s events and programming coordinator Kevin McHale.
“They pitched the idea to us and we said absolutely, not a problem,” says McHale. “I look forward to continuing that relationship.”
At a city hall event on Sept. 23, United Way Ottawa announced its goal to change 57,200 lives during the 2015/2016 campaign year.
United Way Ottawa invests in four partners who deal with youth homelessness: the YMCA/YWCA National Capital Region, Youth Services Bureau of Ottawa, John Howard Society of Ottawa, and Operation Come Home.
Housing was also a hot topic during this month’s federal election. The Liberals announced plans to adopt a National Housing Strategy, including an investment of $20 billion over 10 years towards affordable housing.
The Conservatives promised more affordable home ownership, with various promised measures to add more than 700,000 new homeowners.
The NDP plan included renewing operating agreements on social housing and an investment designed to reach more than $2 billion by 2020.