Recent NewsSHIMI: Supportive Housing for Individuals with Mental Illness
SHIMI is an innovative solution to a pressing community need for individuals who are living with mental illness and in need of supportive housing options. The project provides high quality, secure and independent housing together with a range of responsive supports to adults living, and recovering from, a mental illness.
SHIMI is a partnership of:
- New Dawn Enterprises
- Mental Health Services (Cape Breton District Health Authority)
- Cape Breton Mental Health Services Charitable Foundation
- Crossroads Clubhouse
- Canadian Mental Health Association
- First Voice
- and community members in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality.
Martin’s Story
Martin is an elderly man living with a diagnosis of Paranoid Schizophrenia who was on the verge of eviction once again. He was facing homelessness due, in part, to symptoms of his mental illness. In the past these symptoms have triggered incidences that were not understood by his landlord. Martin’s living environment contributed to increased feelings of depression resulting in decreased mental health wellness. Martin’s one-room apartment was unfit for living: leaks, rodents, a lack of heat supplied by the landlord. Most of our visits to Martin’s apartment found him wearing his winter jacket with scarf and hat, as he slept this way each night. Read the rest of the Martin’s Story»
Identifying Existing Barriers
Persons living with mental illness are frequently marginalized and vulnerable, continuously challenged to find decent housing at an affordable cost. Many live in substandard apartments, partly because of the dynamic of private sector market rent levels and partly because of the shelter allowances provided by the Provincial Income Assistance Program. In addition, persons with mental illness continue to experience discrimination in their community. They are often shunned because of the visible signs of poverty, the presentation of symptoms, and the general misconceptions that many have about mental illness (propensity to violence, irrational actions and or beliefs, criminal intent associated with drug use, etc).
Suitable apartments and the associated utilities which can be fully paid from the shelter allowance portion of income assistance are very rare. Average market rents for 1-bedroom apartments can run in the $575-per-month range or more and utilities may be an additional cost. Apartments that rent for appreciably less than this generally have some compelling reason that they cannot command average market rent. Principally this will be because of their physical condition or because of their location.
These individuals frequently experience housing insecurity (couch surfing), living in substandard accommodation, low income and social exclusion.
While successfully confronting any one of these issues would be a challenge, combined they can lead to a poor quality of life. The risk of homelessness is high.
It Starts At Home
There is now a considerable body of evidential research to support the advantages of, and the need for, community-based support for individuals living with mental illness to change these outcomes. The level of need and extent of support are determined by the individual. Full partnership, respectful communication, autonomy, choice and stable, decent and flexible housing are the cornerstones of this project.
The voices and experiences of people who live with mental illness have been and will continue to be the driving force of this project.
Supports within the local community are far more effective and efficient than institutionalization or a congregate style housing option for the great majority of this population. Community support options provide persons living with mental illness the possibility of choices. The ability to exercise these choices — thereby creating as independent a lifestyle as practical, building self-confidence, empowerment and ontological security — in turn reduces negative impacts of mental illness on the individual, family, friends and the community as a whole. The first building block for community based support is secure housing.
The SHIMI model follows the practice of integrating small numbers of apartments seamlessly and unobtrusively into the community. The housing is secure both in the physical sense and in the financial sense:
- Physical Security: the apartments and buildings are finished to a mid-market standard and professional property management ensures that the rent is collected, the bills paid and quality standards are maintained.
- Financial Security: all shelter costs (rent, heat, power, water) are included for a rent of $535 per month. This is the maximum shelter allowance available to single individuals through the Province of Nova Scotia’s Income Assistance Program. Fixing the rent at the maximum shelter component ensures that the balance of an individual’s income can be used for food, clothing, transportation, etc.
- Furnishings: through the generosity of the Mental Health Foundation of Nova Scotia and the Cape Breton Mental Health Foundation, each new apartment is furnished with a full suite of furniture and appliances, including a washer and dryer.
MHS’s first experience with community based housing was through a partnership with the Cape Breton Island Housing Authority, which designated 10 units for individuals living with mental illness. This partnership broke new ground as the mandate of the Housing Authority is to provide housing for families and for seniors, not single adults. These apartment units are in buildings which normally house seniors, and there are sometimes issues with younger individuals fitting in with the other residents. The Housing Authority’s ongoing relationship with MHS staff has been extremely supportive. There have been situations where Housing Authority staff have gone above and beyond normal landlord/tenant relations to keep MHS clients housed through very difficult times, and, as a result, the 10 units have experienced a very low turn-over rate. The current high demand for the Authority’s apartments precludes MHS accessing additional apartments.
The SHIMI coalition’s first apartments were occupied in 2007, with the acquisition and renovation of 9 units funded by the Homelessness Partnership Strategy of Human Resource Development Canada.
New Dawn, through its non-profit housing agency, the Cape Breton Association for Housing Development, acted as the sponsoring agency for the initiative. With NDE continuing its role, further acquisitions were 4 apartments in 2009 and 9 apartments in 2011 which included the first with 2 bedrooms.
Funding
Our 22 units would not have been acquired, renovated and furnished without the program funding and capital contributions of the HRSDC Homeless Partnership Strategy, Affordable Housing Initiative of the Province of Nova Scotia, Mental Health Foundation of Nova Scotia, Cape Breton Mental Health Foundation and New Dawn Enterprises. In addition to these financial grants, the Province of Nova Scotia also transferred ownership of a 3-unit building at no cost to the SHIMI initiative.
The Future
While the 32 apartments is a good start, the number of persons in the greater Sydney area living with severe and persistent mental illness is estimated at 200. Crossroads Clubhouse has a current membership of 170 which would support this estimation. Of course many do not have a housing problem, either residing with family or having a regular income that will support them in adequate and affordable accommodation.
However very many do have a housing problem. The estimate of MHS is that as many as 50 individuals are still in critical need of safe and affordable housing and for the reasons outlined above these individuals are severely challenged to find suitable accommodation in the private sector. Only by building up a much larger dedicated portfolio of suitable apartments will the needs of this population be fully met.