Despite a 32 per cent increase in Vancouver’s street homeless, Civil City Commissioner Geoff Plant said yesterday he remains confident the city can achieve its goal of halving homelessness by 2010.
Homeless Count 2008 recorded 781 street homeless, up 190 from a similar count three years ago.
Vancouver’s total homeless population is 1,547.
“For me, the numbers tell a story about how much work there is left to do and how urgent it is that we make progress now,” said Geoff Plant, Vancouver’s Civil City commissioner.
Plant, who has been tasked to eliminate homelessness, aggressive panhandling and the city’s open drug market with the short-term goal of halving it by 2010, said the target is attainable.
The province has purchased 16 SRO hotels and the city and the province have been working to develop new housing on 12 new sites, he said.
“There’s clearly going to be hundreds of new units of housing for homeless people, but not quite yet,” Plant said.
-jeff.hodson@metronews.ca
