Children living in office buildings. Adults living in tents in parks.
How does this happen in the 21st century, in Canada’s biggest and arguably its highest-profile province?
It’s deplorable, and senior levels of government are not doing enough to offer supports.
The fact Linck Child, Youth and Family Supports in Chatham has had to house high-needs children over the past four years or so is a sad tale of the state of our province.
Our children are our future, not furniture in an office.
Yet Linck, according to executive director Teri Thomas-Vanos, has housed children there for years. The latest is a seven-year-old child who stayed for four months.
Some say this is a matter of these high-needs children falling through the cracks. But in reality there are gaping funding holes in housing and support for these children.
It’s not just Chatham-Kent, but right across the province.
Unfortunately, the kids who were put up at Linck have complex needs and can’t be managed by caregivers or the foster-care system. They need a form of residential treatment, yet nothing is available in this part of the province.
With Linck having to house such children, someone has to be on site 24/7 to oversee them. That means staff have to shift away from their primary jobs and normal hours to cover the situation. They aren’t trained to deal with the complex needs either.
Granted, local MPP Trevor Jones brought in Minister of Community and Social Services Michael Parsa to visit Linck. So far, nothing has come out of that visit.
What can be done? Housing, support systems and perhaps alterations to our legal system.
Punish the fentanyl suppliers. Send them away for longer stretches of time. Highlight them to society. Make it untenable to traffic large quantities of such addictive substances.
And lay the foundations of support…for children and for our troubled adults.
Children shouldn’t grow up in an office. Our most vulnerable citizens should not be living outdoors and diving in dumpsters for food and clothing. So much more can be done rather than the apparent thumb twiddling taking place in Toronto and Ottawa.
