“It’s great news to see a decrease in the number of homeless people in Vancouver and it validates the City’s focus on our most challenging problem,” said Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson of the 2011 Homeless Count report.
“Hopefully that’s the trend that continues, we want people accessing shelters and getting off the street. That’s the first step,” said Robertson. But [the province] has a lot of buildings coming on stream with the city, so we will see people moving from shelters into housing in the next few years. Hopefully we will see the overall numbers coming down.”
Results show the City of Vancouver experienced an 82 per cent reduction in street homeless since the last count in 2008 and a further six per cent reduction - 110 people - in overall homelessness since 2010.
The Metro Vancouver Homeless Count, conducted over a 24 hour period on March 16, 2011 across Metro Vancouver, shows:
- since 2010, the total number of street homeless in the City of Vancouver has decreased by 276 people to 145, or 65 per cent;
- sheltered homeless, which increased by 69 percent between 2008 and 2010, increased by a further 13 per cent between 2010 and 2011 as more people moved inside; and,
- Vancouver had the largest decrease of homelessness of any city in Metro Vancouver.
Up to 1,400 new supportive housing units will open in the next two years through a partnership between the City of Vancouver and the Province, through BC Housing. City Council has also approved several innovative new housing projects, including the renovation of the former remand centre to provide 90 new units of housing, and a partnership with the YWCA to build housing for women and children above a new library in Strathcona.
Read more about Vancouver's Housing and Homelessness Strategy.
