New city homelessness data from the last three months show less than 40 per cent of people living in Sudbury’s encampments are on the city’s list of people looking for housing.
There are currently 277 names on the By-Name list and 77 are in encampments. The new data overview in August said that encampment number reflects just 34 per cent of those actually in encampments.
In July, it was 37 per cent; in June, 36 per cent.
Sue Ritchie Raymond, the city’s new manager of homelessness and housing stability, told Sudbury.com the newly available data overview is part of the city’s strategy to “ensure that we're getting a little bit more information about who we're working with in the community.”
She said it was important to show that the By-Name List doesn’t “capture everyone” and that part of the city’s work is to “engage with the individuals in encampments to encourage them to be part of this co-ordinated access so that we can get them services and support.”
It’s with the ultimate goal of supporting the path to permanent housing, said Ritchie Raymond, who also helps the city with programming, tracking outcomes and helping guide “investments that come from the federal and provincial government, as well as part of the tax levy.”
The By-Name List, formally known as the co-ordinated access list, is a provincially mandated real-time list of people experiencing homelessness in Greater Sudbury.
But it’s only those who have consented to add their name to the list, to be used as a tool of the Coordinated Access System (CAS), a group of Sudbury social services agencies, like the Homelessness Network.
Raymond Landry is co-ordinator of housing services for Centre de santé communautaire du Grand Sudbury, one of the partner agencies under the network umbrella. He is also the co-ordinator of the Network itself.
Hearing from front-line housing and outreach workers, Landry told Sudbury.com in an email that it’s a combination of things, such as the difficulty in locating people who can’t be found because there aren’t enough staff or resources or the encampments are in too remote an area.
Even if they are sleeping in an encampment, that doesn’t mean they will be the next day. “People are mobile and transient even within city limits,” Landry wrote.
Some are living in the encampment, but only for the summer and not interested in registering, said Landry.
It’s an annual seasonal cycle that often sees people who are precariously housed, or in unsafe or remote places come to the city during the warm weather.
But also, “some do not want to register, and do not want to be found or identified,” he said.
The lack of uptake could, at least in part, also explain the discrepancy between the By-Name List numbers and the numbers from the provincially mandated Point In Time count on October 8, 2024, an estimate of the number of people experiencing homelessness in Sudbury on a single night. The count found 505 people experiencing homelessness in Greater Sudbury.
The city’s homelessness data the night of the Point in Time count shows 310 names on the By-Name List.
Getting that intake percentage higher is about building trust, said Ritchie Raymond.
“A number of the individuals that we work with in the encampments are reluctant to share personal information: they may have had bad experiences in the past, they may choose to remain anonymous, and there may be some mistrust with organizations,” she said. “Many of them have some health conditions and they're not interested at that time in engaging in the services.”
“It's a matter of relationship building over time,” she said.
When asked if there could be an aspect of hopelessness, a frustration with the hope for a home that never comes or can’t be managed, Ritchie Raymond said that’s the case.
“In my experience, there's always an element of hopelessness, both with organizations trying to engage and support individuals experiencing homelessness, and those individuals as well who are unsheltered,” she said.
She said there is “certainly frustration,” but it’s also what “drives our efforts in providing the services every day and working with our community partners to find innovative solutions.”
You can find the city’s homelessness data on their website here.
Jenny Lamothe covers vulnerable and marginalized populations, as well as housing issues and the justice system for Sudbury.com.