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PAXnorth church has nine steps leading up to its front doors, and no ramp.
That’s why some community members were upset when the venue, at 5568 Cunard Street, was chosen for the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia’s annual memorial.
“It came as a total surprise,” says Claudia Jahn, program facilitator at AHANS. She didn’t realize the church wasn’t easily accessible until people began complaining and she visited the venue.
The AHANS holds an annual memorial to honour Haligonians who have passed away while living in poverty or homelessness. It’s held at a different host church each year, and it’s meant to welcome everybody. Many adults who are homeless or experiencing poverty have limited mobility and require canes, walkers, wheelchairs or motorized scooters to move around.
“When it became apparent that this would exclude community members from attending it was decided to seek an alternative location,” Jahn says.
The issue was resolved quickly—the memorial will take place at St. George’s Round Church—but it is indicative of the greater structural problems facing those experiencing poverty and limited mobility in the city.
Bonnie Barrett, who uses a walker, waited for three years to get into affordable housing on Gottingen Street. “I can’t walk very far, so it’s easier for me to live here because it’s closer to everything I need…like the food banks,” she says.
But even buildings equipped with elevators or ramps can pose problems.
“I’m up on the fifth floor, and if anything happens, if there’s a fire or whatever in the building, I have to wait for somebody to come get me because I can’t do the stairs,” Barrett says.
There are other problems outside the home: “It’s really hard to get around,” says Barrett. “Some bus drivers won’t lower their bus so that disabled people can get on.”
Murdena MacDonald, another tenant of Metro Non-Profit, stopped using her walker because people would yell at her on the bus. “They’d say, ‘You’re in the way,’” she says. “So I use a cane now.”
“Any struggle that a housed person would face, that has a physical disability, would be amplified by homelessness or poverty,” says Adam Craft, coordinator of the Metro Non-Profit Housing Support Centre. Structural discrimination issues may be little individually, but they add up.
“It’s death by 1,000 cuts,” says Craft. “People with physical disabilities can sometimes be an afterthought.”
The struggles are many and varied. Money is one obvious problem. Kathleen Decker relies on Income Assistance and disability benefits. But, she says, it’s never enough.
“They don’t give you enough money to live on—to pay rent and your bills, and buy groceries for a special diet.”
A single renting adult on Income Assistance in Nova Scotia gets less than $800 a month, and $535 of that has to go towards rent. That leaves less than $300 for things like groceries and bills.
“There’s a lot of economic disparity there,” says Craft. “People who have physical disabilities have a hard time participating in the economy in a financially viable way.”
Housing is also an issue. Nova Scotia is an old province, and Halifax’s buildings reflect that. Most weren’t built with accessibility in mind.
“From a private landlord perspective, there isn’t much incentive to house folks with physical disabilities,” Craft says. “Ramps aren’t sexy.”
The annual Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia memorial will take place December 22, at St. George’s Round Church on Brunswick Street.
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This article appears in Dec 18-24, 2014.
Although this article is about a church, it’s our partner church, that rents our facility. It’s a rented space, and it belongs to us. To clarify, Souls Harbour’s main space is not accessible, although the basement, where we have our meal program each day, has a ramp. The cost to make the main floor space accessible is exorbitant for a small organization like ours. But with word of mouth, perhaps someone here knows someone out there, who can assist us with a major gift for the equipment and installation to build a new set of outdoor stairs, and a sturdy lift for the inside stairs. If so, please email Melanie at mhack.rescue@gmail.com. Let’s start talking about accessibility!
Michelle Porter
Executive Director
Souls Harbour RESCUE Mission
5568 Cunard Street
Good point by Michelle. Before you jump all over a private landlord, or a church, you might wish to consider that wheelchair (unpowered or powered) ramp construction is not cheap. You want to have the lowest angle possible, so that a person in an unpowered wheelchair (or someone pushing an unpowered wheelchair) can actually make it up the ramp. You need landings, edge protection, handrails, weatherproofing and grip strips if you’re using wood, possibly a fair bit of concrete for foundation supports for a long wooden ramp, and you may need to install extra outside lighting to illuminate the ramp. Nobody wishes to discriminate – well, almost nobody – but a fair few churches, for example, aren’t exactly wealthy. And in the case of some, they may actually not even have the convenient physical space to install a practical ramp.
The $800 income support, $535 rent + $255 expenses, is essentially correct. In addition, recipients get Pharmacare benefits and some other sources of income are not counted (mostly child-related). You can keep up to $150 of earned income before a dollar-for-dollar reduction in benefits.
It would be disingenuous to think the Department of Community Services does not consider the possibility that those receiving assistance will supplement their personal allowance with food from food banks and soup kitchens. Right or wrong, Souls Harbour is subsidizing the Department of Community Services.
The inaccessible church upstairs, as Michelle Porter observes, does not affect the meal programs. The need for a ramp is something faced by hundreds of Nova Scotia churches with aging and declining membership.
Thank you Souls Harbour for generous work with the poor among us.