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Place to call his own key to staying sober

By: Larry Kusch

24/11/2009 1:00 AM | Comments: 22

Ronald Courchene, 34, says it’s tough to stay away from booze when he’s living on the street.

BORIS.MINKEVICH@FREEPRESS.MB.CA Enlarge Image

Ronald Courchene, 34, says it’s tough to stay away from booze when he’s living on the street.

Ronald Courchene has been down and out as he's battled alcohol and substance abuse.

But now he's hoping that a new national program for the homeless -- unveiled in five cities, including Winnipeg, on Monday -- will provide him with a place of his own, instead of the shelter he winds up in every night.

"I'd like to get a place where I can be my own boss, you know, instead of looking at authority and (them) telling me what to do and when to go to sleep and when to eat or when to smoke..." Courchene said Monday outside Thunderbird House on Main Street.

Inside, aboriginal leaders, academics, social agency staff and community activists attended the launch of a $110-million federal initiative aimed at studying the best ways to helping homeless people, such as Courchene, while providing a roof over the heads of some 1,300 people, including up to 300 in Winnipeg.

"They said they were going to get me a place but nothing has happened yet," said Courchene, a 34-year-old aboriginal man, who got wind of the new At Home/Chez Soi program and wanted to know if he could take advantage of it. The project is being co-ordinated by the Mental Health Commission of Canada.

Instead of the system providing homeless people with their own place after they've completed counselling or addiction programs, as is the case with Courchene, officials are testing the idea of providing the home first and then the programming.

"I'm really trying hard to stay straight and what not, but it's a difficult task... Sometimes I slip and I fall into that pothole, and I get high and, you know, get drunk." Courchene said. "People are under the influence because they got nowhere to go."

Despite wanting in on the new program, Courchene won't necessarily get one of the 300 housing spots available. Because the project is part of a scientific study, participants will be chosen at random from a set group. There will also be an equal number of people in a control group, who will receive treatment and support in the normal way.

The Winnipeg segment of the project is unique because it will deal exclusively with homeless aboriginals. And the services and treatment programs they receive will reflect First Nations culture.

Marcia Thomson, a career provincial civil servant, will be the Winnipeg co-ordinator for the national project, which is also being carried out in Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto and Moncton, N.B.

"We already have 30 units of housing available, so we think we're well on our way to housing over 300 people by (in 2013)," she said.

While public and not-for-profit housing will be used, the bulk of the living spaces will come from private landlords, who will receive a cash subsidy of up to $200 per unit per month, plus staff supports, for renting to street people, Thomson said.

Participants will get a furnished unit and help adjusting to tenant life. At the same time, they will receive treatment for substance abuse or mental illness. A worker will visit at least once a week.

larry.kusch@freepress.mb.ca

300

Number of homeless aboriginal people who will receive a home in Winnipeg under a new federal initiative.

 

35

Estimated number of people living on the streets in Winnipeg, with another 1,900 using short-term or crisis shelters.

70

Percentage of homeless people who are aboriginal.

 

 

110 million

Amount of money Ottawa committed to fund the Mental Health Commission of Canada's research project on homeless people.

85

Percentage of funds that will go into direct services and supports to homeless people participating in the study.

 

30

Number of new housing units lined up so far in Winnipeg for homeless people to move into.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition November 24, 2009 A4

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22 Commentscomment icon

second class citizens? really? Curious to know what classifies one as a 1st class citizen. Clearly one could have no bad habits whatsoever, to fit into such an elite group.

This says it all:

"I'm really trying hard to stay straight and what not, but it's a difficult task... Sometimes I slip and I fall into that pothole, and I get high and, you know, get drunk." Courchene said. "People are under the influence because they got nowhere to go."

Now that this person has somewhere to go, it doesn't mean that he has something to do. If there is no programming for the first bit, do you not think that these people will slip back into the drugs and alcohol out of pure boredom?

I am very skeptical that this program will work. These people need a lot of counseling and rehab prior to being given the keys to their own place. If not, I can guarantee that this program is going to be disastrous by a long shot.

The people who are homeless that truly want to get off the streets will do it regardless of this program, they'll pound on the doors of agencies until they get themselves off the street. The people who delve into the drugs and alcohol will not - they've made their choice, and until they choose to sober up, giving them a house is only going to give a roof over their heads while they blast their minds with intoxicants, and when the program is done, they'll be back on the streets.

alrak

Very few people are capable of being original thinkers. There is nothing wrong with reading books and learning from them, university kids do it every day.

There must be 30 million people who quit smoking in the last 20 years, most of them without any help at all.

Can't quit or won't quit? How can you tell the difference?

Was it just a coincidence that you did not hang out with drug users or was it your personal choice?

Bad habits are never easy to break, but who said life was easy? It's not easy to raise a family or educate yourself. So why should it be easy to quit smoking?

Obviously you find pleasure in your vices.

So who do you suppose is going to quit your smoking for you?

You are the only one who can channel your energies so you are the only one who can stop your own smoking. There is nothing in tobacco that compels people to light up a smoke every 15 minutes. I bet you control your smoking indoors where it is forbidden today....so the secret is don't ever lift another cigarette to your lips and that will be that. And I won't lie to you, it won't be easy.... breaking bad habits never is.

The only reason to call a bad habit an addiction is to persecute someone as a lesser human being.

We can all look out the window to see that smokers are all second class citizens today.

Luke, you don't agree with Chris Buors, you agree with something he's read and pasted onto this forum.

Seriously...how many of you know a smoker that has tried to quit unsuccessfully more than once. Or an overeater with health issues related to obesity. I was young and uneducated when I started smoking, I heard quite a few of the negatives to why I shouldn't start, but didn't pay much attention. I never realized that I would have such a horrible time trying to quit my addiction all these years later. I'm now older, wiser, and waaaaaay more educated about smoking and my will isn't working. Darn happy that I wasn't someone who was surrounded by people who did hard drugs or alcohol all the time. Think about that.... I'll bet you have at least one bad habit that you can't kick.

ponikwe

Saying I'm wrong does not make it so. Calling me ignorant and uneducated is also a mistake. It was not so long ago that people believed what Sigmund Freud wrote. Freud had a critic in his time named Karl Kraus. We now know that just about everything Freud wrote was wrong, what is never mentioned is that what his critic Kraus said was right.

The one man's opinion I quote the most on mental health issues is Dr. Thomas Szasz. Szasz is psychiatry's harshest critic and is himself a psychiatrist. Szasz has written some 26 books and hundreds of papers on the issue.

You ought to have a look at some of the titles of Dr. Szasz' books. He only writes when he believes the people in possession of the field are wrong. I read everything the man wrote and will best any argument you care to forward.

Szasz books.

The Myth of Mental Illness, Psychiatry: The Science of Lies, The Manufacture of Madness, Cruel Compassion: Psychiatric Control of Society's Unwanted, The Meaning of Mind: Language, Morality, and Neuroscience, Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences, The Theology of Medicine: The Political-Philosophical Foundations of Medical Ethics, Our Right to Drugs: The Case for a Free Market, The medicalization of everyday life, Coercion as Cure: A Critical History of Psychiatry, The Meaning of Mind: Language, Morality, and Neuroscience..

Szasz is right, the rest of the world is wrong. People who have "problems in living" ought not be stigmatized with psychiatric label

@Chris Buors you are entitled to your opinion, even though it is wrong. And by wrong, I mean WRONG. Spouting unproven rhetoric based on a one man's opinion is foolhardy at best, completely ignorant at worst. But have at it! Keep showing the limited depths of your compassion, education and understanding!


This program actually has merit and worth. It has worked in slightly different forms in other cities. I just LOVE that Winnipeggers are so quick to judge through racist and ignorant tirades like some of the crap I see posted in these sections.


Heaven forbid that something good might happen to an Aboriginal person living within Winnipeg's municipal boundaries.

I'm shocked! I actually agree with Chris Buors for a change.

A person can modify their own behavior if they really want to. It takes will but can be done. Sanctioning it by calling it an addiction & blaming the problem on the substance takes the onus off the individual. That's why we see crimes committed to pay for these supposed addictions. It's a cop-out perpetuated by those that can use studies & treatment of said dependencies to justify their employment.

We all have the will, we just have to take responsibility for our actions.

Dr Jeffery Schaler is a true existentialist ie believes in freedom of choice and taking reponsibilities for these choices. I think Ronald Courchene is also a true existentialist, he has lived through the consequences for his choices. This experiment to is making a choice, let these men meander around the street high, harming themselves and maybe others,using resources, police, ambulances etc or lessen this by sticking them in their own place, where it'll take at bit more inertia to get into trouble. In the end, if the cost of housing is less than the cost of not, the project will be a success. I believe this experiment has worked in Portland, Oregon. A win for society and for the homeless.

to b_dog
"And why the focus on aborignal people. Firstly, they have homes supplied to them, on the reserves"
If by homes you mean mould-ridden shacks with 15 or more people living in them.
"Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, feed him for life". Are you gonna be the one to teach them? You seem more willing to condemn then help.
And everyone else stop being so self rightous, these people are giving the homeless a second chance of becoming productive members of society

I agree everyone chooses their own path, however I seriously doubt anyone chooses to be homeless. Once you have hit the bottom and have no where to turn, your options dwindle and its such a daunting task to pull yourself back up again.

I think this program will encourage the substances abusing homeless population to work towards sobriety and hopefully become productive members of society. After all isnt that what we all aspire to be in the beginning?

The individual with the addiction is the one who has to do the actual work. And its a life long program, not a 30 day program.

This is simply letting them know that 'hey, someone is paying attention and you are worth something and you can get better.'

Unless you actually have experience with addiction, you shouldnt really comment on it.

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