Summertime surge of family homelessness

Each summer, there’s a surge of families who find themselves in a housing crisis and needing emergency shelter.

There are a variety of reasons for this including:

• Landlords can be more inclined to evict families in the summer when it’s not life threatening to stay outside.
• Relatives may find it harder to accommodate children when school is out and kids are around through the summer.
• Cost of living goes up for parents who have the additional cost of summer childcare leading to their potential loss of housing.

_{Beach and Spadoni; Family Homelessness: Summertime Struggles}

Right now there are 13 families experiencing homelessness in Peterborough, and currently we can only accommodate 5 of them in shelter. This means that most of the families in a housing crisis in Peterborough, are having to find their own solution.

In our Emergency Shelter at 196 Brock St. there are several kids in and around the shelter each day. Youth and families are meant leave the shelter throughout the day, but in extreme heat we encourage families to stay in our air conditioned space, offer quiet activities and cool treats, and sometimes start up the sprinkler outside for kids to run through.

While we try our best to provide safety at the YES Emergency Shelter, the research shows that homelessness can have long-lasting negative effects on kids. These include developmental delays and an increased chance of experiencing homelessness as adults. For this reason, it’s a priority for us to help families find housing quickly once they arrive at Emergency Shelter.

However, this has been increasingly difficult because of the severe lack of affordable housing in Peterborough. This shortage has led to families experiencing homelessness and having to stay in shelter for several months on average.

At YES, we want to provide better solutions for families in a housing crisis. These could include:

• Increased family support staff to help families find and keep safe housing
• Children’s programs in shelter to enable parents to keep employment, look for housing
• Affordable and supported family housing

Help us maintain family supports and work towards better options for parents with children by donating to YES today.