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“There’s a whole other dimension to people in housing need, beyond those who are accessing our shelters or living rough on the streets,” said Kolkman.

A report released by the ESPC on Wednesday found that people waiting for housing solutions negatively impacted their mental health, strained their relationships with family and friends they relied on, and made them feel “invisible.”

Riek Tut knows how isolating the wait can be. A workplace injury at his job in a poultry factory in May 2018 led him to begin claiming about $1,400 in monthly long-term disability benefits, but it wasn’t enough to cover his $800 rent, medical bills and food.

He has now been on the waitlist for an affordable housing unit for more than eight months.

“I can’t enjoy my life,” Tut said on Wednesday, noting he has no family in the city but friends will sometimes help him out with food. “It’s a very, very difficult problem.”

Kolkman said a mix of subsidies and physical units is essential to ensuring people can remain connected to their communities, but that both streams are “chronically underfunded.”

CRH provides 5,655 housing units and administers direct rental subsidies to approximately 3,200 people in the Edmonton area, Poitras said.

The report proposes provinces to be mandated to match potential funding from the federal Canada Housing Benefit proposed in 2018 in order to alleviate the issue in Edmonton, and for benefits to be distributed through the tax system in order to reduce wait-times.

“Obtaining rental assistance to which an Albertan is legally entitled … should not mean adding your name to the bottom of a years-long waitlist,” said Kolkman.

mwyton@postmedia.com

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