The term 'shelter' only came to refer to emergency shelters for the homeless in the 1980s. "Emergency Shelters" or "Battered Womens Shelters" spread the term to what had traditionally been called "Mens Hostels". (Ottawa didn't get its first "Women's Homeless Shelter" until 1983.)
Social workers like their jargon as much as anyone else, and the term has more than stuck - "emergency shelter" rarely refers to the kind of short-term, emergency, shelter such as might be used during a natural disaster. In fact, Ontario's Charitable Institutions Act, which last underwent a major re-write in 1989, doesn't even contain the word "shelter", referring to "hostels" for short-term accomodation.
In Ottawa, the city considers the organizations running the homeless shelters to be its "service providers". Other than two "family shelters" run by the city itself, the shelters are run by faith-based charities. Much as different school boards, often out of religious differences, run different school systems, the different service providers run their shelters a little differently from each other. This leads to an expensive duplication of overhead and administrative costs - and no clear standards or rules.
(men's and young men's hostel)
(Youth Services Bureau: non-religious)
There is no such thing as a "residents council" or any formal mechanism for residents to provide feedback, either to the city or province who pays the bills, or to the senior management of the shelter.
Complaints are routinely ignored, or in many cases result in a temporary "ban" of the resident, with them being sent to one of the other shelters. This has the unforeseen effect of shortening the visible "stay" of a particular resident, as it appears in the statistics supplied to the government, making it appear as if the resident has found alternative housing.
Each of the "service providers" has its own management structure; they have their own board of directors, their own management staff, their own internal policies, and their own way of dealing with "clients". (Those residing in the homeless shelters - those whom you might think would be called "residents" - are almost always called "clients".)
The way the current shelter system is funded, shelters are encouraged and rewarded to keep themselves as full as possible - even to the point of providing "emergency overflow" beds - a camp mat on the floor- to receive as many of the $41 per diems as possible.
In fact, at the time of this writing (Dec 2004) one of the largest shelters in Ottawa also runs a rooming house complex - with over 40 empty rooms. One room in the rooming house is worth $325 per month to the shelter. If the resident of that room is moved to the shelter - as they have been - the shelter then receives over $1200 per month. This represents an egregious mis-use of public funds, and shows a woeful lack of oversight and accountability in the current system.
Of course, all this is based on a system with fewer housing and living standards than the prison system - do you think it might be time for a change? We sure do.
When an adult without dependents goes on social assistance, they are eligible for a monthly amount of $520. This consists of a "shelter allowance" (more properly called the housing allowance) of $325 and remaining $195 to cover all non-housing costs.
If that adult stays in a homeless shelter, the picture changes radically, both for the individual and for the government, which pays the bill. Currently these costs are split; the province pays 80% and the municipality pays 20%.
$520 divided by 30, for an average month, works out to about $17.34 per day. This is what an individual gets to live on, for rent, meals, transportation, etc. This amount didn't change from 1995's 21% cut in the welfare rates until the end of 2004.
The "service provider" (the faith-based charity running the homeless shelter on behalf of the city) currently receives over $41 per day per client - the "per diem". This means it costs over twice as much money to keep someone eligible for Ontario Works in a homeless shelter as it costs to keep them in their own room or housing - over $1200 per month instead of $520 per month.
If you've never seen the inside of a homelss shelter, imagine an eleven by twelve foot room, with three bunk beds and six half-height lockers - housing six men. That room is currently costing the social services system over seven thousand dollars per month.
Each of these service providers has to provide the services to take care of the maximum number of residents they can house. Since the amount of money each service provider receives is directly related to how many filled beds they have, there is no incentive for the service providers to find "real" housing for their clients.