homelessness

The day after Thanksgiving, people met to remember those who died on the streets of Toronto the previous month.

The day after Thanksgiving, people met to remember those who died on the streets of Toronto the previous month.

The programs funded through the CEO Sleep Out are worthwhile but only skim the surface of the issue. To address homelessness and poverty in a meaningful way requires systemic change.

It was a sparse crowd at Tuesday’s monthly homeless memorial. No one stepped forward to remember these men. No one there to talk about their lives lived. Who they were. Or how they became homeless.

In the summertime, most people are preoccupied with their vacation plans. But death never takes a vacation. Particularly for homeless people who are far more likely to die prematurely.

Both men died on the same day. At the same shelter. Of unnatural causes. Because there was nothing natural about a 52-year-old and a 69-year-old dying in a men's shelter in downtown Toronto.