The city has launched a five-year plan to end homelessness, involving community consultations and partnerships. The plan, titled 'Homes for All,' includes strategies like increasing affordable housing, hosting events, and annual counts of homeless individuals. Community support and awareness are crucial for the plan's success by 2019.

1. Ending city homelessness
The city unveiled its five-year plan to end homelessness, Thursday morning.
It might seem ambitious, but community homelessness initiative supervisor Katherine Sheppard said
the goal can be met with the support of the community.
The plan was assembled after a series of community consultations involving more than 55
organizations, a survey of 44 people without homes, and a Community Advisory Board on
Homelessness (CABH) review committee worked with a hired consultant to put it together.
"Homes for all"
The vision statement of the plan, "community with homes for all," encapsulates the idea Sheppard
shared with stakeholders gathered at Teresa Sargent Hall for the launch event.
She and the CABH are counting on increased infrastructure, community partnerships, strengthened
resources, education and awareness to eradicate homelessness in Grande Prairie by 2019.
"What we are going to do is take all of those goals and the focus is going to be on those (strategies)
and who's going to be involved to get us to that end goal," Sheppard said.
The tangibles outlined in the plan include strategies like working with property managers to
increase affordable housing options, hosting an annual homeless initiative showcase event and
continuing to take point-in-time homeless individual counts annually.
Sheppard said the plan requires collaboration between the city, CABH, government funding
partners, service providers and citizens to make sure the outcome is achieved. For the average
citizen, she said taking few minutes to research resources available goes a long way.
"Become educated on what a person might be experiencing when you walk down to the bank and see
them outside asking for money... Become aware that there are resources in our community that you
can speak to them (about)," she said.
For Sheppard, getting the plan rolling will mean liaising with the separate parties that need to be
involved to meet the goals in the plan.

2. Advocating with city council for a policy to ensure a percentage of new rental developments are
designated as affordable housing, supporting aboriginal organizations to increase supported housing
options with a cultural focus, and 25 other other strategies are all outlined in the plan.
By 2019, Sheppard hopes the CABH will be able to shift its advocacy focus to proactive rather than
reactive programming.
Her first step to that end is awareness of the plan.
"We have a community out there that needs to be aware of it," Sheppard said, noting that it will be
available around town in businesses and at all of the municipal buildings.
Braeden.jones@sunmedia.ca
@DHTBraeden
http://www.dailyheraldtribune.com/2015/04/16/ending-city-homlelessness