Episode 7: Katherine Bitzer

Adam 0:22   Hello, everyone. Welcome back to Winter is Coming. My name is Adam Cresswell and you are listening to a podcast all about housing justice. And we have been talking through the last few weeks. We've had our first batch of episodes, or volume one of season one is out and you can listen to all of those episodes now. And we are into volume two here, the second half of the season, our second batch of episodes, and we're continuing to look at this topic of housing justice, which is a term that we use to say that we don't just want to live in the reality of a housing crisis. We don't just want to simply respond to a housing crisis, but we actually want to move towards housing justice, which means not just roofs over people's heads. Not just lower prices in the market, but actually a society where we really live into what we believe to be a truth, which is that housing is a human right and that everyone should have access  to housing and all that comes with it, the supports, the community. And so we are talking about this in this context specifically, as many of our guests, not all, but many, and me, myself as a host, we're coming to you from the traditional territories of the Haudenosaunee, Anishinaabe and Neutral Peoples. You might know it on your map now as Kitchener Waterloo. And so, we're looking through that particular context because it's important to understand that housing justice, and how we respond, looks different depending on where we are, depending on the lands that we're on and our location and our context. But also, we're really pleased to hear so much feedback from people in the first batch of episodes that folks all over the country, as far as British Columbia and the Maritimes and Saskatchewan are listening and able to really get something out of this podcast as well. And so today we are pleased to have another rep from the really incredible organization, which, if you don't know it now already, you should. Katherine. Bitzer is part of the affordable housing project team at the Working Centre. We've had Gemma Ricker on from the Working Centre. We hope to have more folks who can chat about the work because the Working Centre has for decades been doing so much to combat poverty and to create a more just city in Kitchener and in Kitchener Waterloo as a region. And so I'm delighted that Katherine is here today to chat about some of the many different projects that the Working Centre is on. And Katherine, you've told me as you came on, you've been working there for like 20 years now.

Katherine That is correct, yeah.

Adam, So you worked in a number of different roles and on probably so many different projects over the years, because the Working Centre is just incredible at responding to needs as they arise. And Katherine is also a longtime member of Trinity United Church who is part of how this podcast is being brought to you. Trinity is doing really incredible work as they've lived into. What does it look like to not just go to church, but to be the church? And to say, how can a community focus not just on getting people together on a Sunday morning for a service, but actually creating the kind of world that we all want to see, a world of justice and liberation and inclusion and that Trinity has made it their primary mission to support housing justice and affordable housing in Kitchener Waterloo. So it's awesome when we can get this kind of cross-section of folks from Trinity and folks who are in the world like you, Katherine, doing incredible work. So, thanks so much for being here today.

4:25 Katherine Thank you. It's a pleasure.

Adam 4:28 Maybe just a way to start. Just tell us maybe just a little bit about yourself and your role at the Working Centre.

Katherine 4:39   Sure. So I am, as you mentioned, a lifelong member of Trinity United church and very proud of that. I have grown up and I live and I work and I play in downtown Kitchener. My home is never too many steps from where I spend most of my time, whether that be the Working Centre or places I go with my kids. And then the Sunday morning trip to Trinity has always been a part of my immediate sphere.  As I mentioned, I grew up here. I went through Teacher's College to explore a career in education, and I have worked with kids and have really enjoyed that. About 20 years ago, not quite, but nearly 20 years ago, I was asked to come in for a six-month contract at the Working Centre, just supporting a placement as someone was away overseas, and I said yes. And that has, like literally turned into a 20 year career.

(Six months going on 20 years).

Katherine 5:44   That's right. I'm still waiting for that contract end date to come up.  So, yes, I have been with the Working Centre for a very long time. It's a very special place to me and has really informed well, I would have to say my faith certainly informs what I do, (what) the choices I've made in life. And the Working Centre is very much a part of that decision making. So I started off in employment counseling, doing the frontline employment counseling work, and then I backed up into a role of supporting the employment counselors, where I was what we call the buffer role between what the government requirements were for our various employment contracts and supporting the employment counselors. And then I was asked, actually in January of this year, I had taken a little bit of a break. We were planning a big family road trip. and so I’d taken a bit of a step back from the Working Centre, only going in to support the person who succeeded me in that role. And they said, would you be interested in helping out with the affordable housing stuff that we're doing right now? Because we just need someone in there to help hold some pieces to help move them forward. So that was my foray into the affordable housing piece at the Working Centre.  But I want to just backtrack a little bit to talk more about Trinity's role because I think it's important that you mentioned that. And I'm so proud that Trinity has really taken on supporting housing justice, supporting affordable housing. It's been near and dear to my heart for many, many years.  For about 15 years, Trinity was part of the Out of the Cold program and we were a very big part of it, actually. We had we had huge numbers of people who would come for an overnight bed for supper and then breakfast the next morning.  And so I was part of that team that helped to support that program for quite a number of years. And that came to a close in 2014 with the region's promise that there were enough beds in emergency shelters. And also they were saying we want you, we want the churches to support our homelessness to housing strategy. So that was 2014. And so I just wanted to highlight the fact that Trinity had a very big role. This was certainly a band aid solution, but it was something that we are doing in response to seeing people outside, seeing people cold, seeing people hungry, seeing people with no place to rest for the night. And so Trinity stepped into that in a very large way and many, many volunteers were involved, many hours, so much food acquisition, other supply acquisition, and it was something that the whole congregation really got behind and supported in a very tangible way. And that was a big part of my initial connection with folks who were either homeless or living rough or couch surfing, that sort of thing. So that was my first real strong connection with folks in that precarious situation.

Adam 9:02   Yeah, I think it’s great to point that out too, because we talked a little bit about it in a few of our episodes, about the critical role of emergency shelters, but also recognizing they’re an emergency response. And so I think it is important to highlight that. The Out of the Cold program, I remember it as a kid at a few United Churches and I actually remember like maybe a junior youth, like maybe grade six or seven and someone coming to chat with us, he was a representative, a leader Out of the Cold. And I remember that was also one of my first kind of forays into seeing the church response in Kitchener Waterloo through programs like Out of the Cold and a few United Churches were involved. And so I can tangibly remember that connection between United Churches and Kitchener and Out Of the Cold and to know that Trinity was a big part of that was something that even I was aware of going to a different church as a kid.

Katherine 10:02   Yes,  I did a bunch of different shifts. I was on the set up shift at one point and then I moved to the overnight shift. And I tell you that two or three in the morning, that's a tough shift to cover.  But that was what worked for me at that time in my life. And so I was very happy and proud to be a part of that effort of the churches and then just carry on with what happened with those Out of the Cold places closing down and it was covered seven nights a week. But then the region, you know, was  saying, you know, we feel we can house everybody. We feel we have enough spaces, enough beds in the emergency shelters to house everybody and we want to focus on moving into more permanent housing, which is great. However, eight years later they did a point in time count in September 2021. I don't know if I'm assuming this may have been talked about already, but it documented that over 1000 people in our community, community were experiencing homelessness. 1000 people. And that number is really shocking. And I think you just need to let it sink in for a minute to think about how many people that entails, that are living rough, that are in precarious situations.  It's so much more than a number. And what was once hidden, I think, has become so visible in Kitchener and I think in other places, well, actually, I'm sure in other places across Canada, as we see the tent encampments grow, (and) it's almost like there's this loud voice to the community saying, ‘don't leave us behind. We're Here.’ Right? This is (not this is) what we're being forced to do right now. And living in tent encampments, I know some people might struggle to look at them and to see them take over parks or take over corners of land, but it's actually a place of safety for people. Because when you're out there living rough, you are constantly at risk of theft or assault or and even just the toxic drug supply overdosing.  It's so difficult out there. And so these tent encampments actually are, and that to me, they're a natural response. It's what any human would do. You want to congregate, you want to gather so you can feel safe. And that's what these intent encampments are. And they're glaringly visible and they're glaringly telling us that we need to do better as a community. That this is, this is intolerable, that people are having to make this choice because there's nothing left for them.

Adam 12:56   When you talk about that, it's more than a number. I think that is really important. It's easy in conversations like this or if you're reading articles, we see numbers all the time and we even see numbers in the context of struggle and need. How many people are experiencing housing insecurity or experiencing  living on or close to the streets. And it is really easy to just go, especially around a number like 1000, as a way of sort of becoming (we become) desensitized to it. And I think it is really important, like you said, to sit with that and to recognize for those of us, if you don't know, if you happen to believe, and you probably do, and maybe you just don't know it. But if you think you don't know one person who is experiencing this, just imagine if it was one person that you knew, that you loved, a friend, a family member who is experiencing this, and you would recognize that just that one person, it would turn your world upside down. It would mean everything to you to want to work, to find a pathway to healing and wholeness and then you extrapolate it into there's a thousand. So, one is too many. And we have now 1000 people in and by some accounts it's tripled in the last couple of years from where it was even in 2018, 2019. And I think that you're right, there is I think it is really important. We haven't had a super deep dive into this yet, but it is really important. We talked about it on every episode in some way, shape or form, but to recognize that the encampments that we're seeing, and it's not just in Kitchener Waterloo, of course, but the encampments Victoria Park or Willow River Park and at Victoria and Weber, that it is really important to understand that,   like you said, if I'm struggling, whether it's with housing or a break up or something, I go to the people in my community, whether that's friends or family or the people that I can rely on. So, to understand that not only is it a challenge to be living in these precarious situations, but to also feel like you're on your own, I think it is really important for people to understand what you said, which this is a natural response to what's going on. And it is incredibly important for anyone to have community. Everyone deserves that, whether they're able to be housed or not. Everyone deserves to have people around them, to have neighbors, and to recognize that we don't do a great job of seeing those and recognizing those who are struggling with housing as our neighbors. We attach labels to them. We attach perceptions to them. They're that person who I see on the exit on highway seven, or they're that person whose kind of always hanging around the corner by the gas station. These are our neighbors. And so, as Gemma said in our Safe Supply and Housing episode, just because someone is experiencing housing doesn't mean they don't deserve health and life. And I think that applies to community, too. And I think that's really important. And as you said, I think it's a very important thing. I recognize that it can be a struggle for folks who are in constant proximity to think themselves, what are the implications of this? And do I feel safe being near this? And those are very understandable and valid feelings. But to recognize that these encampments coming together, it's very important that it has made it impossible for us as neighbors, as citizens, and for the region, as regional and municipal government, to ignore and to just kind of continue band aid solutions, or no solutions, or even worse, the criminalization of those who are struggling with housing. And so I think it is really important for us to recognize that these are our neighbors who are naturally responding to the situation that they found themselves in, and that hopefully now we understand, like, this is something that the housing crisis is affecting everyone at every level. And so to understand that, we need to be thinking, how can we support, not how can we shudder or bulldoze or erase or ignore, particularly with the encampments, how can we support our neighbors who are living there?

Katherine   17:42 Absolutely. And so one of the responses of the Working Centre, we actually have what we call St. John's kitchen, which, if you want to give it a sort of a colloquial term, is a soup kitchen right across the street from the encampment at Victoria and Weber streets. And so throughout the course of the pandemic, we worked hard to keep access to washrooms, to showers, to laundry, to food, to a warm space, to a space of inclusion. And often the sort of comments that come from people experiencing life in this way is, you saw me as a person. You didn't see me as a drug addict. You didn't see me as someone struggling with mental health issues. Like, the fact that someone feels so labeled all the time is really sad. And they don't even feel human anymore because of the constant judging.  I understand too, it can be difficult. And particularly the toxic supply of drugs on the street are mind bending.  They alter the brain in such ways that people do act in pretty horrific ways at times, but that's the drugs and the drug dependency is a whole other huge [thing]. And I think you probably touched on this around the safe supply, but that's a whole other conversation around, like, just the type of drugs on the street and how destructive they are to people's lives and people's minds. And so (but) that's the reality. And so how can we work with that and continue to invite people in, continue to offer love to people who need it the most?   At this time of year, when the snow starts to fall.  And I know that in the Middle East there might not be snow at this time of year, but it really makes me think of the story of Mary and Joseph as they travel. And they're a young, poor couple, dislocated, forced to travel long distance to a place where there are strangers in a strange land. No community connections there, no access to shelter. And despite their need, Mary being with child, they're turned away by most, and given hope by one person who did what he could. That is not just a story to me that we talk about at this time of year or reflect on at this time of year. But to me, that's an integral part of our Christian faith and how to me, it's a statement, it's a calling to how we should be reaching out to those in our midst today. Because if we don't that I don't think we're really understanding or we're not really living out our Christian faith and I'll just put it back on myself. This is how I feel, right? That it is important to take these stories from the Bible and to think about, reflect on, well, what are they telling me? How are they being a roadmap to guide me in my choices and decisions in this day and age? And to me, you can't get much more of a parallel than when you see all those tents covered in snow, people dislocated, disconnected from their community, just struggling, just looking for someone to give them some hope, looking for someone to give them just something that a bit of love that so often is denied to them.    

So I could talk a little bit about the Working Centre (of that) for those who maybe not so familiar with it.

Adam 21:43 Yeah, for sure. I just wanted just to see because I think that was really important. A lot of the folks who are listening are either perhaps from United Church, or from the Hub, which has a lot of folks from the United Church in it as well. I think it is. We talked about this at our Christmas service last year, one of the core of that Nativity Advent story. And for those who come from different perspectives, different traditions and different backgrounds, too, just understanding this as one piece of how we understand one of the cores of that story, there's no room at the inn. And understanding that there are so many of our neighbors who are experiencing that exactly right now, and particularly in winter in Canada and all the threat and danger and insecurity that comes with that. I think that's a beautiful thing to be highlighting as we're just around at Christmas time, just coming out of it, and to be able to stop and recognize that it's good to come together. And particularly in 2022, probably a lot of people have been able to get together in ways that they have been in the last couple of years. But yeah, to go deeper than just to do the traditions or sing the songs or the carols, but actually think about how this story has just so many deep reverberations when we look around at our neighborhoods and our neighbors is, I think, a really critical thing. And it really can't be overstated that this is something that we are able to respond to. We're able to be in some way, shape or form. And we all have different … roles to play and gifts to offer, but in some way, shape or form. I think you said it beautifully. We can give love to our neighbor in some way. We can offer something, whether it's showing up to advocate at a city council or regional meeting or offering food or shelter or blankets or space on a property. And that's how a better tent city started. Or even for those of us who are still in a very early learning stage to offer a lack of judgment and just to offer to drop a label or drop a caricature, drop a perception and to see someone as a neighbor and a person who deserves dignity and respect and love. It’s a really important thing. And so I think it's really important that we just kind of have sit with that and understand that that's the role, no matter if we're connected to the Working Centre or church or not, that's the role that we can play to each other in our neighborhoods.

Katherine 24:44  Absolutely. And I think that's well said. And when we talk about housing justice and talking about housing as a human right, I mean, whatever, whether you're from a faith tradition or not, we're talking about basic needs here. We're talking about human rights. And to have shelter over your head, can you imagine going night after night trying to figure it out, trying to carry everything on your back, trying to figure out where you're going to sleep, if you're going to be safe?   It's exhausting. And so how do people cope? And most of us do have some mental health challenges, right? But then how that gets triggered when you're under so much stress all the time and then you throw in the crossroads of how mental health and addiction get played out. It's not surprising that we've ended up where we are when housing as a right has been pushed aside. I think we have people,  I think even people who, as we talked about, who are early on in their learning can appreciate the fact that the housing market for those who have means is really difficult. Right, there's people who are struggling, wanting homeowners, who can't be right.  Who wants to find somewhere to rent and can't.

Adam 26:20 Exactly. Purchasing certainly we know is out of reach for so many people who would have considered themselves even five years ago within reach of that. And that's to say as well with the rental market. And that's why I think it's important to understand this. And I hope it offers that window into understanding and empathy and a desire to respond to those who are living close or living on the streets, to understand that. It's been a crisis. It's been a challenge for everyone when we see just these insane, these incredible, I should say, like rental prices, to understand that if it's that difficult for those of us who maybe,  are maybe there's multiple people working full time jobs. And it's still difficult to be able to do that, to understand whenever physical or mental health or addictions come into play too. That how that snowball effect makes it, just turns  into a situation where  it becomes that much more difficult, is really important for us to see that windowing too.

Katherine 27:40 Absolutely. And we can talk about the spectrum there's, folks... The Working Centre  really is focusing its work on responding to chronically ill, street-involved people who face deep addictions and mental health issues. And that is not easy work, but that is important work. And that is the work, that is where we find ourselves and the firm ethic to say ‘it is not okay for people to sleep outside in the winter, right?’ No matter what the challenges are, coming from folks who have experienced so much trauma in their lives for so many different reasons. It is not okay that people have to end up in a tent or not even in a tent outside in the wintertime here in Canada. And so that is the end at which the Working Centre works. But there's an absolute spectrum, as we just mentioned, where people are barely making it, either they're living at home or with friends, or couch surfing, because they can't get enough money to pay rent. Maybe they're having a place where they're renting, but it's really tight month by month. There's people who once maybe dreamed of owning a home and now just feeling, well, that will never happen for me because I can never save up enough for down payment. I just wanted to know that there's an absolute huge spectrum, and I think we need to understand that it's a continuum, right? They're not separate silos. And so if we can help folks earlier on in their learning journey to sort of jump in at one of those points and see how that can slide one way or the other, I think that's very helpful because it's very easy to see how if you're living paycheck to paycheck, and then all of a sudden, that paycheck stops. What do you do now? You're on a couch or you're asking, begging friends and family to help you, right? And people don't always have those webs of support.

Adam 29:42 Yeah. And it's not just as we know we talked with a couple episodes, it's not just, not only when a paycheck stops, but people get rent-evicted all the time. They're renting somewhere in a house or an apartment and it's going to be sold. And the only, very paper thin protection is that there is legislation that's supposed still be in place all the time. It does not always work, which is if you're renting, you're supposed to be able to be offered that. But we know that I have so many stories of friends who have been taken advantage of and even the legislation doesn't protect them. And now they're going out into a market that is just criminally overpriced or as we talked about another episode, or you have to move because your situation changes. Maybe you need an accessible entryway where you didn't or bathroom where you didn't before or maybe your family has grown. And so there's just so many ways that the situations are precarious even for those who have housing. So again, to understand and when you talked about… when we think about the encampments as well, and think about, instead of seeing it as a problem  or a danger or something unsavory, to just start understanding through the lens of I think to myself, ‘how much do I hate moving?’ Like every time I've done it, it's stressful, it's wrought with problems and challenges and roadblocks and cost. And I'm someone who has not had to live, has not been targeted in a way where I've had to live close to the streets or live rough. I already hate it. And then so imagine if that's your daily life, constantly on the move, constantly having to wonder if you've got a space or if you and your possessions are safe. It's so again, seeing it through this lens and understanding and that was a big learning curve for me too. But understanding that, like you said, the encampments are a natural response, that if I was in that situation, I would want those things too, is I think, something that as neighbors of folks who are living in camps, we need to be able to put ourselves into that lane.

Katherine 32:05Absolutely. And I just wanted to go back to the fact that the Working Centre has been working with the reality, or walking… I should say, with the reality of homelessness for a long time.  And as we know, as we talk about the encampments, you know, that has been hidden for many years from many people's understanding in their eyes. But now it can no longer be ignored. And I think that’s unfortunately a good thing because hopefully it will take us to a different place of more housing justice, and as much as it saddens me so much every time I go by and I see, as I've mentioned, tents covered in snow and I've done camping at the end of the season, early on this season, and I know how cold it is. Even if you have good gear in a tent when it's cold outside, it is unpleasant. It is mind numbing. And so how you can get up and then just go and say, well, I'm going to go find a job today.  Right?

Adam 33:12  Exactly.  To try and extricate yourself from that situation the way that when you're in that part of the continuum, it just pulls you into a cycle, is something that is just a reality for so many people.   

Katherine 33:28   That's right! And so the main focus or the philosophy of the Working Centre is to form a web of support around people. Because we talked about people coming together in encampments to find that security, to find that safety.  But there's also a lot of, not a lot of folks helping one another to find health care because no one has had much luck with healthcare, right? You imagine someone walks into a healthcare clinic, a walk-in clinic and they're probably not going to get the services they need if they look or smell in a certain way, right? That's just the reality. And when you've been turned away enough times, you're not going to bother anymore, right? And also folks don't have the means to say, okay, I'll go buy us all dinner tonight, right, so that we can eat. What the Working Centre does is we try and form webs of support or through our project, work around people. So, whether it be providing. Food, providing health care, mental health care, for sure, and stability in terms of a safer spot to live, whether it be in the shelter or we work towards having more interim, more affordable housing. So it's that if you sort of picture we all have our webs of support around us, whether we know it or not, right? It might be a relative, it might be a friend, it might be a colleague at work, right? It might be our doctor, right? We have these webs of support.

Adam 34:58  Yeah,  if  you go to university or college, there's Residence Life Systems, and there's Faculty, and there's Office of Advisory and there's Sexual Education Health Centers. I think that's a really important thing to point out. We all who are able to live with some housing and security, typically those of us who are middle class, and particularly white middle class,  we aren't doing things on our own. We have so many webs of support that are around us that we take for granted or that we don't even realize.

Katherine 35:25   And so if you sort of think about what your webs of support are, and then imagine if someone starts snipping at those strings and see what that might feel like or where you think you might end up, I think that's a really powerful exercise to play out.  Because if I lost the support of my family, if I lost the support of my friends, if I lost my support of health care, right, where do I find myself? What is my mental state? Where am I going to turn to, to find comfort?  And so these webs that the Working Centre very much approaches it on a person by person basis. We have projects, right, that, like our St. John's kitchen I mentioned, sort of like the soup kitchen. We have a medical clinic. But within those, we focus on the person saying, okay, how can we help to build that web of support around the individual? And I'll say right now, because of the crisis, and starting in 2019, the Working Centre saw there was a need for emergency shelter that wasn't being met and people were sleeping outside. And so that began our really strong leaning into providing shelter and housing options for people. And currently we support over 300 people within our various housing and shelter projects. And as I mentioned, these are folks who  have been living rough for a long time. And so it's deep work with people,  but there's a lot of hope for it. And I can just share a story about one of these that came up during COVID, during the Pandemic, as we call it, University Avenue or UA, and did a previous guest work.

Adam  37:20  Yeah,  we've had Gemma Ricker on and she spoke about UA in her episode. She spent quite a few months working on the University Avenue housing project that the Working Centre has.

Katherine 37:37   And so what I just wanted to note that is it opened up in response to crisis in the midst of the Pandemic, opening up in October 2020, and 80 dorm style bedrooms and some congregate spaces. And it was to support those who were living rough outside in a car, on a bench, right? Maybe couch surfing. And (it takes) just by having shelter, that's sort of step one. And I'll talk about the housing first model in a minute, but shelter is sort of just providing some with shelter and some stability around shelter is step one.  And it's been about, so that's, now we're coming up on two years. And it's incredible, the change with a lot of intense and intentional work, that a quarter of these original folks have since stabilized enough to move out into different supportive housing.

Yeah.

So to me, that offers so much hope because the amount of trauma that people carry with them is so real and so layered and so complex. But with this sort of thing, we're offering shelter and we're offering love. Right? It's kind of as simple as that. And to say, like, okay, yesterday wasn't a great day, but today is a new day. We're going to start again. It's just what everyone wants. Who doesn't want that in life? Like, you mess up, you did things you shouldn't have done, and then to be forgiven and to be given the grace to say, okay, let's start again, not, okay, well, you're out. Right? Yeah. Which can be a response. So I just wanted to note that about UA, which was very much as I mentioned, no one saw this coming, but it was so necessary. We just made it happen. The Working Centre made it happen. And we're coming on the two year anniversary, and it's a much different place than it was two years ago, as we learned together with the folks,  understanding how to best meet people's needs, even from simple things, how to best serve food, how to make different things accessible or available at different times, all of those little things. But they make a big difference because, again, when you look at someone as a person, as a human being, and not as a, you're not sort of just labeling them in a stereotypical way, it just shifts the entire relationship. And it shifts how you can walk with somebody.

Adam 40:14 Yeah. When you talk about how in the two years since University Avenue has been operating and that one quarter of folks have been able to move to move ahead on the housing continuum and find more stability in terms of housing or employment,  I know this from Jem's episode as well. Well, like that community finding again, and this is what is so important about the encampments in our community, in our city is the stability of having a community, of having people around you who know your story, who will walk with you, who on the worst days are there and will celebrate you on the good days. Having that kind of stability is so important. And like you said, is something we all want. And to think that even in this case we've seen 25% of the folks move that way is really important. Because I think people get locked into the idea since probably all of us growing up, particularly here in  the north of Turtle Island in the 20th century, to be able to just say, well, we've always had folks who struggled with houselessness or who experienced homelessness. It makes us think that this is just a problem, that is just the reality of the way things are and that it can't change and that there's little things we can do. But really, the sun's going to rise every day and there will always be people, like living on the street. Streets? And only one of those statements is true. And so, to recognize that University Avenue is an example of finding solutions. And again, understanding it depends on the, it's all about the community and the context and the individual. But we can actually solve this problem of housing and security. We can actually move towards housing justice for people. It's not just a reality that we just have to accept or live with or at the best, just put band aid solutions on. To see that 25% of the folks who have been involved have been able to find stability proves for us that it doesn't have to be this way. And I think that's just really important because our imaginations get so locked into just accepting the way things are and not believing that things can change, particularly on a topic like housing justice and where we see injustice with housing. And so I just really value the work of the Working Centre and for people to really just hear that there are solutions to these things. We can actually tackle these problems if we're willing to invest in  the people who are our neighbors and in supporting them.

Katherine 43:20   Absolutely. And I love how you use the word “invest” because that's the next stage. We need to invest in more housing stock that is affordable, that is supported. I'll go out, not a very far limb to say high end condos. We don't need too many more of them in Kitchener. No, because  they're not serving the needs of, and not just those who mentioned, who are at the sort of the far end of the spectrum that work with the Working Centre, but even the families who are looking for a family home or for folks who can't afford that sort of level of financial commitment. But I'll go off on that tangent because I could talk all day on that.

Adam  44:06   We can do a whole episode where you have that tangent, because I couldn't agree more.

Katherine 44:09   We absolutely could. So, we want to talk about investing in affordable and supportive housing, which is the housing first model. So if we look at congregate shelters, like the emergency shelters that the Working Centre is offering now, down on King Street at the former Schwaben Club, you get 70 people a night. It's sort of similar to Out of the Cold and that people come and have supper and spend the night and get breakfast and then have to move on for the day. Although I do want to note that there is good news about a 24/7 model that probably will be up and operating by the time this podcast is broadcast. So that is good news, particularly as the winter weather will continue to deepen over the next few months. So life in that sort of congregate shelter or congregate drop in spaces like St John's kitchen, it serves basic needs right in the short term, but it becomes unbearable over time. You lack privacy, you lack a place to feel necessarily 100% secure because your stuff is always out in the open and you lack possibly there's some restfulness, for sure. But you're also sleeping in a room with 60 other people. And if any one of us can imagine that, it's not the kind of sleep you're going to get when you go into your own bedroom. You can close the door and have that, just that mental space for yourself. Adam 45:49: And how often do all of us need that? Oh, my goodness, I just need to be alone for a bit. The ability to have that is something that we take for granted. Yeah.

 Katherine 46:00 Absolutely. Absolutely. And so Housing First is a recovery oriented approach that supports community members who are dealing with the reality of homelessness by providing independent and permanent housing along with additional supports and services. So this Housing First concept is really important to us. And the projects that I'm working on are affordable housing business builds and I'm so excited to be a part of this. The one I'm working on is going to transform the existing building, which currently houses St. John's kitchen, our medical clinic, our second hand furniture store, is going to transform that space into 44 units of affordable and supportive housing. Then what we're going to do is take the first floor and renovate it. And we're going to put in a redesigned medical clinic, one that's actually  [designed] where we're not sort of fitting people into random sort of funny little rooms because that's the way the building looked. This is going to be purpose built for a medical clinic. And then the back half of the first floor will be purpose built…public showers, public washrooms, public laundry. And then next door to that will be our brand new St. John's kitchen, which will be a real space of community gathering, offering the same sort of services of hot meal and welcome and inclusion, and encouraging folks to access the supports that come through the medical clinic, whether it be primary health care or addiction services and supports or any of the other services that are offered at the medical health clinic. And so that is what's happening right now, (is that) it's all on paper. No one can see anything that's happening when you walk by. But I know that in the background, we have engineers, we have the architects, we have all sorts of people busy doing their thing that they need to do to bring this building to life, to bring this vision to life. And it's such an exciting project that we're hoping to get shovels in the ground by March 2023 and then completion and occupancy by March 2024.

 Yeah. So that is truly where we need to move to, is how can we come together as a community? And there are other builds absolutely going on in the community. I can just talk about the one that I know best, but there's lots of other builds. And so if we can see the challenge of maintaining a home, the challenges of maintaining good mental health, the challenge of maintaining good physical health,  if that's something that is a community concern, it's a community issue. And so when there are folks who are not able to meet those,  (somewhat) those benchmarks, then it is a community issue that we need to come together on. It's not somebody else's problem. It's not something that you can ignore and feel that it doesn't affect your life because it does affect your life.  If you can imagine, like if all of the shelter systems let me go back there, if all of your support networks were not in place as they are now, how would your life be different and what would you be asking of your community to help you through that rough time?

Adam 49:31 Yeah. When we had Kristen Wright, who's a systems engineer working on housing systems, she talked specifically about this idea of community wealth and then that is what we want to move towards is where  we have, like you said, webs of support that we are able to benefit from and that we're able to offer to others. And that mindset shift to go from it's someone else's problem to how can we as a community respond. I think is really critical and I think is something that many people struggle with. But again, it's all about putting ourselves in the shoes of someone when we are at our lowest points, when we're struggling, we want and need our communities around us. If I've lost my job or I've lost a loved one or gone through a horrible breakup or had to move out of my house for whatever reason or whatever it is, even if it's separate from housing, I want and need my community around me. And I don't know how I would react if I just heard well, it's not my problem. From everyone around me. So these are things again, these are things that as our neighbors, as humans, depending where your faith (petition) is, as children of creator, that we would want for ourselves and that we should all want for each other. And that mindset shifts from ‘that's their problem’ or ‘they probably deserved how they got there’, to how can we as a community respond, this is my neighbor, am I my siblings keeper? The ability to shift that mindset is, I think, really key for us at individual local levels and  at municipal levels, at social levels, at government levels, at organizational levels, at church levels.

Katherine 51:41  That's right. And I mentioned my work. Is very much in my choices in life have been very much driven by my faith over the years. And that's something that is very central to me and even folks from different faith traditions. There's so much commonality between the basic following of the golden rule, right? Love thy neighbor as yourself, right? Those are not just messages from any one faith tradition. And for me, another passage ‘I was hungry and you fed me, I was thirsty and you gave me a drink, I was homeless and you gave me a room, I was shivering and you gave me clothes, I was sick and you stopped to visit, I was in prison and you came to me’. And if you've done any of these to the least of them, then you've done it for God. And so I think that is another really important driver of my own work. There are similar concepts in other faith traditions that say ‘really, can you help someone with their most basic needs?’ And if you are helping another person here on Earth, then you are also living out in the way that the Creator is asking us to live out.

Adam 53:20  The ability for us as community members. And again, from whatever tradition, whether we come from a faith tradition or not, to be able to live into that reality, of seeing ourselves in the eyes of another person, of being able to dream that it doesn't have to simply be the way it is, but that there are better ways that we can treat each other, that we can live. And that all the way up to the details of that. We don't have to do housing in the way that we've always done it. And clearly something needs to change because, again, whether we've been living close to the streets or not, everyone now for the last year and a half we have the headlines that we know we're in a housing crisis at every level, should prove to us that this can't continue in the way that it is (and that's). Work happening at places like the Working Centre are showing us that alternative vision for what it means to be a neighbor, to love someone, to offer what we can to someone who is in need, and to learn ourselves how we are in need. And I think that's part of what is so difficult for people is because it's the water that we swim in. We're just so used to the way things are. And like I said, whether it's, yeah, there's typically someone at that street corner or for the last year oh, yeah, that encampment has been there for a while. And so because we just get so used to it, it's hard for us to imagine, okay, well, maybe I know that it doesn't have to be this way, or I don't want it to be this way, but what does the other way look like? And I think that's why getting the work and the stories from places like the Working Centre and the stories that you shared about the work here today is so critical, because we have to be able to see what that alternative vision is, what that alternative reality is. Where University Avenue was formerly a… was it a residence or was it a hotel originally? Yes.

Katherine No, I believe it was a residence.

Adam 55:19   … It was a residence. So to look at a place and say instead of just a building that was not being used by the University of Waterloo anymore or instead of seeing how that could become another McDonald's or subway or office space or condo or high end condos. The Working Centre saw this space and said, “We have the ability to house x number of people here and not just give a roof over their head and get them out of the cold.” But to give them permanence and stability and support and community and a pathway to moving forward into a more secure space on the housing continuum. The Working Centre that you and the folks who are there saw that vision and saw that potential and then guess what? Realized it and it's happening. It wasn't just in theory and it wasn't just this pie in the sky. We'd all love for things to be better. They saw and they put in the work and they've proven to us, as members of folks who live in what we now call Kitchener Waterloo, that it is possible to do things in a different way and that these things can be successful. I think a lot of people get into the mindset of these dreams of how society could look just aren't realistic. But we have the actual, real stories of people, the real accounts of how this work is happening. And so, it's time that we just move aside from that perception that there's nothing we can do about this or that the best we can do is emergency shelters or that the best we can do is put up big houses and condos on the green belt. And somehow that's what's going to solve the crisis that we're in. We have so many people like you and like the Mancini's and all the people that are at the Working Centre that are doing this work. And we need to invest in how we can show up and support this work, whether financially or by a volunteer or by a staff or by advocating for the work happening in city council meetings, in school board trustee meetings and at our churches. You've mentioned today particularly just how your faith has been so central to this work. And that's inspiring for me and for those of us who are from the Hub who is the other half of how this podcast comes. Jesus justice and inclusion is what we strive to live out. And so for those who are coming from churches or any community organization, if you're listening, and you're not as part of a church, but particularly for those who are listening from any community organization or church to say, how can we respond as a community to our neighbors in need? And we've had a couple of churches already reach out that have heard the story of what Trinity has been doing and saying, how can we get involved in that? That same way. And to recognize that where you have community wealth, whether in a family or friend or network or a work situation or a church or you're a volunteer at a school or at a restaurant or anything, how can we leverage that community wealth? To respond to this is an important question that we need to ask ourselves. We don't just have to be employees of the Working Centre to be doing this. And we heard that from Gemma. Gemma Ricker had just finished school and saw the posting on Indeed and got involved in University Avenue for a year. And we all have the ability to respond to this situation, and we all have the ability to move housing justice forward. And the first step is getting that perception that there's nothing we can do about this and just trashing that, because it's just not true. And the work of University Avenue and the Working Centre, not just UA, but the Working Centre over decades, is proof that better ways are possible.

Katherine 59:35 Absolutely. And I'm glad you mentioned that, that you don't have to be an employee at the Working Centre. Right. If you can change how you see someone, change how you talk to your kids or to your friends or to your neighbors about the tent encampment, the folks who might be living there, you can advocate for more affordable, supportive housing stock in this community. And then you can even go as far as at the time of year where we're opening our hearts and our wallets, there's lots you can donate to at this time of year to help keep people warm. And so, all of that is so important. And we can all do it, it's all possible. And yes, there is a way forward, but we have to commit to it as a community. And community contributions are a huge part of it. And I would argue that it would be very difficult without. But the reason that things are able to move so quickly these days, Adam, is that there's been a shift ever since I think it's become so visible. There's been a shift in understanding of the severity of the situation. And so therefore there's been a shift at a political will level, there's been a shift at a funding level, and there's been a shift at folks who are stepping up and saying, I want to help financially. And that is what is allowing this. Positive pathway for it to happen.

Adam 60:54 Yeah. And like I said, we don't want to see anyone having to live outside or have any living Encampments. But recognizing that our neighbors who have had the courage and the endurance and the resilience to form these Encampments have been the biggest reason why steps have been taken forward. And so also to recognize that for those of us who aren't experiencing this housing and security in the same way, our role to be able to come and advocate and support is essential. As the folks who are experiencing this lead us in saying these are what the solutions look like for my community or for me or for my family or for my friend who is living next to me here. The encampments have provided that beacon is one way to say it and highlighter that inability to ignore this. And so it is really important for us to laud the work and the efforts of those who are living in Encampments at creating their own path to no longer being side swept  or ignored or made invisible so that change can really happen as we kind of steer here towards kind of a landing pad. What's one thing that you want people to walk away from this conversation? Understanding or knowing about? Housing? Justice.

Katherine 62:26 I think housing justice is something that we need to be aware of, is that it affects well, the injustice of housing, if I can go to the opposite, affects all of us. So where there is injustice in one part of our community, there is injustice in all of our community. And the strings between the various pieces, between the various people, as invisible as they might be, at times, they are real and they are there. And so when there's justice at one end of it, then it affects everyone and all of us. And so if we can see that in a more holistic way that housing justice is something that we all must be a part of and that it is a universal, basic human right and if we can shift our thinking and our lens to that, as opposed to ‘so and so’, there must be a reason why they're on the street. Or maybe they want to live that way, or it's nothing to do with me. Those are all false narratives. Because housing injustice, when it's experienced by any one person, ripples through and is experienced by everyone. And so if we can change our mindset towards it and we can offer love instead of judgment, then we'll be in a much better place.  

Adam 63:50 That's a beautiful place for us to land. I'm so grateful for the work, Katherine, that you are doing for six months, going on 20 years at the Working Centre and the work in your own life. Like, as you're saying, you're talking about shifting that mindset, and it's clear that that's been work, that you've been engaged in yourself. And so again, again, it's just you're helping us see through your story and your life and your work at the Working Center, the art of the possible and that we can shift our mindsets. We can see things in different ways. We can imagine that something is possible, and we can actually achieve that different reality, that different possibility. It doesn't just have to stay a dream, but it can actually be realized. So thank you so much for taking time and chatting with us today. I would love to have you come back and chat with us again in a future episode, because I just know, having worked at the work center for 20 years, I would just love to hear more stories. And I'm sure there's so much more you could tell us about how we move towards justice and housing justice. And at that core, as you talked about, at its most core, loving our neighbor. And I'm particularly grateful as someone who comes from a Jesus tradition too, for just the way you've been inspiring and expressing how integral your faith is connected to your work. And for those of us at the Hub, that's something we always want to be able to move towards. And I'm sure those who are listening from Jesus traditions appreciate it too. And so no matter where you're listening from, we're really glad that you have joined us as well for this conversation and we're excited to continue this next week and to talk more about how we go from housing crisis to housing justice. Katherine, thanks so much for being with you, with us this week and for Winter Is Coming. I'm Adam Creswell, and we will see you next time. Thanks, everybody. (65:53)