Title: From streets to homes: mapping the rise of housing first policies and programs in Canada.

Funder: SSHRC ($36,097)

Grant Period: March 15, 2011-March 14, 2013

Principal Investigator: Dr. Joshua Evans

Co-Investigators and Collaborators: Dr. Jeffrey Masuda and Dr. James R. Dunn

Description: Over the past three decades Canada has experienced a growing problem with homelessness. In recent years, major changes have occurred with respect to how governments are responding to this issue.  Many of these changes reflect how Canadian policymakers have looked outside Canada’s borders for new policy approaches. The introduction of the ‘Housing First’ (HF) models is one example. HF is a relatively new model for alleviating street homelessness. It has rapidly spread from the United States to parts of Western Europe and Canada. HF models ambitiously seek to ‘end’ street homelessness by directly providing the ‘chronically homeless’ with immediate access to independent and subsidized housing accompanied by professional supports. Through HF programs ‘hard-to-house’ individuals by-pass housing hurdles that exist within traditional shelter orientated systems. In Canada, HF models have featured prominently in recent federal and provincial strategies and have spread swiftly among cities.

With this research project our aim is to examine the learning practices and policy pathways that have contributed to the rapid rise of HF policies and programs in Canada. In doing so, we aim to answer five questions: Where and when have HF policies and programs found implementation in Canada? How has the HF model been discursively constructed abroad and within Canada? What pathways have permitted the flow of HF policies and programs to Canada and aided in their circulation among Canadian cities?  How has the HF model been adapted to particular places? How do these local examples compare on a national and international level?

By answering these questions, we hope to better understand how Canadian policymakers are learning from abroad and experimenting at home with regard to housing policy. More broadly, these insights will enrich our understanding of the urban policy landscape in Canada.

Title: Creating alternative spaces of employment for people with mental health problems

Funder: SSHRC ($99,000)

Grant Period: March 2010-March 2013

Principal Investigator: Dr. Robert Wilton

Co-Investigator: Dr. Joshua Evans

Description: In recent years government policies in countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States have emphasized moving disabled persons into ‘mainstream’ paid employment. Access to mainstream employment is viewed as a route to social inclusion for disabled people; however, existing research suggests that moving disabled persons into ‘mainstream’ work environments is problematic. A key problem facing disabled people is that the social and spatial organization of contemporary work remains, for the most part, based on non-disabled norms. In this context, understanding how to create accommodating work environments for disabled people is a key challenge.

The purpose of this research project is to examine how social enterprises attempt to create accommodating work environments for people with mental health problems. Social enterprises are entrepreneurial organizations with a social mission that lie between the private and public sector. Social enterprises have received little attention from geographers working on disability who have tended to focus on mainstream workplaces, training programs and other social spaces unrelated to employment. In Canada, there is currently little understanding of the range of social enterprises that exist for people with mental health problems or the lived experiences people involved. This project aims to fill this gap.