By: Joan Turbitt

Joan Turbitt — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 02:47:00 +0000

There is a lot more than 1 homeless person in Burlington,let alone all of Halton. I started Burlington’s first food banks in the early 80′s and ran it for 21 years. People living in poverty come in all sizes and shapes ages and gender religions and countries of origin and socio and educational status.
I have seen people with Masters degrees and persons just out of prison. Single parents the working poor
most of whom are severely under employed. People with disabilities who must try and supplement their incomes as well as seniors on the lowest fixed income who lose their disability status as soon as they become seniors. Ridiculous? You bet.
IN the 90′s the Conservative govt. took it upon themselves along with many other traavesties to reduce the govt. incomes of these persons by 22.6% I believe it was. Today each time the childrens income cheque is raised it is clawed back. I no longer do this work so I am not completely up to date. But it would not be difficult to do.
Given that single persons even seniors have to wait up to 12 years for an apartment. There are too many stupid solution preventing rules in place to proceed fast enough to reduce this humongous group of people.
I am solutions oriented and I believe a fast and cost effective measure for some on this list or who should be in rent geared to income could benefit immediately if rent supplement is given now. I am considering those single persons living in a small apt. already who can’t move one way or another and certainly not to a new place no money. Some live in very low rent 2 bedrooms which cost less than 1 bedrooms so no need to turn them down as there are precious few places at these rates. One of the reasons so cheap is no elevator. So for a few hundred a month quite a number of persons are taken care of. Experience tells me that hydro is low in these situations and the allowance of outside lines (clothes) which snap back against the wall when not in use would cut hydro even further. How does $30.00 mo sound?

By: Carolyn Swan

Carolyn Swan — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:31:56 +0000

1 is too many… Now lets talk about the real poverty.
The people who struggle from month to month. Can’t pay their bills.
Don’t have cable tv or a phone. Don’t have enough money to buy the healthier foods to feed their kids.
Haven’t had their eyes checked in years cause they can’t afford $75.00
Go without medical drugs cause they have No bennifits.
If you make 10,000 or 100,000/yr we are expected to pay for eye tests, other medical things too. Its time that we start thinking of the lower income in this town. Base things on peoples wages.
It’s time we had MORE AFFORDABLE homes be it a small townhouse or 1 2 and 3 bedroom apartments. The waiting list for lower income apartments for a single person is 12 years. If you have kids its 7-10
they need help more. This is where we need to be thinking.

Comments on: Living in poverty among our most wealthy

By: Joan Turbitt

By: Carolyn Swan