‘What we need is housing’: Tri-Cities event to discuss affordable housing solutions

Vanessa Wideski wants to create a conversation about affordable housing solutions in the Tri-Cities, especially for Indigenous people.

This is why The Low Entropy Foundation, the nonprofit she founded, is hosting an event Friday morning where panelists and audience members alike will have the opportunity to speak on both service gaps and solutions to homelessness in the Tri-Cities. 

As the executive director of The Low Entropy Foundation, she’ll use this information to inform a strategic plan on becoming an affordable housing provider.

“We just see more and more people being displaced. And if we don’t take action now, it’ll just continue to get worse,” she said.

In 2023, the Greater Vancouver Point-in-Time count counted 160 homeless people in the Tri-Cities — an 86 per cent increase from 2020. 

Wideski said once they complete the strategic plan, they’ll see if it’s a good fit for their organization. If it isn’t, they intend to share it with other groups who might want to provide affordable housing. 

The event is scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. and finish at noon at the City Centre Branch of the Coquitlam Public Library.

Lack of affordable housing

Last year, Low Entropy conducted a feasibility research study in the Tri-Cities, to find out where there are service gaps for unhoused people.

“It was shocking to see the absence of support, and again, especially with the lack of Indigenous support,” Wideski said.

Other than Spirit of the Children, an Indigenous non-profit, she said there’s not much in the outreach or housing space that supports Indigenous people.

Seeing this, Wideski said they started an outreach team last year, and managed to house eight people before their funding ran out.

But what they heard from other community organizations is that the core issue is lack of affordable housing.

“A lot of them were saying, ‘We don’t need more outreach. We don’t need more sandwiches and people out here. What we need is housing,’” Wideski said.

This is why Wideski found funding to create this strategic plan and is currently holding events to discuss solutions.

The event is moderated by Janice Abbott, with three panelists: Marcel Swain, the CEO of Lu’ma Native Housing Society, Chantelle Burga, the Executive Director of New View Society, and Perry Staniscia, a former BC Housing Commissioner. 

Abbott, the former CEO of Atira Women’s Resource Society (who stepped down after an audit found conflict of interest violations) said that subsidies of some sort are needed to create affordable housing.

“In an expensive market where the cost to build housing is expensive, where land is expensive, where development processes are expensive, in order to build affordable housing, you need support from the government — or somewhere — you need a subsidy.”

Abbott said she hopes this event builds support for the idea for culturally safe housing for Indigenous people in the Tri-Cities.

Community

Wideski stressed the importance of community coming together to make a change.

Twenty years ago, she said she was homeless and addicted to crystal meth, and it was support from community members — whether it was giving her food, or offering a job landscaping — that helped her.

“I was able to make some money and earn an income and start supporting myself, and get myself off the streets. But that was because people cared and people wanted to give back and help.”

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