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Chabot’s own struggle, in his words, went something like this: He grew up on a farm in Saskatchewan. Moved to Calgary in 1971 and soon took a job in construction. Worked his way through DeVry while raising three kids with his wife, who also worked part-time.

“I did this on my own. I didn’t need to have somebody help me. If anything, it just encouraged me to even be better,” Chabot said.

“Now, if somebody would have said, ‘OK, well you can go on pogie (welfare) while you go to school,’ I would have been, ‘Heh, I can just sit back and have a couple of beers, I don’t have to work now.’ Would that have made me a better man? I don’t think so.”

Photo by Ted Rhodes / Calgary Herald

In recent years, the city has made strides to make it easier for low-income Calgarians to access subsidized programs and services, such as recreation centre fee assistance, property tax assistance, basic home maintenance services for seniors and discounted transit passes through its Fair Entry program.

Applicants are only eligible for the subsidy if the entire household income is at or below Statistics Canada’s low-income cutoff (about $24,000 for a single person and $45,000 for a household of four).

Franco Savoia, executive director for Vibrant Communities Calgary, praised the city’s efforts to remove barriers and offer some relief for low-income Calgarians.

“The bottom quintile are people that do not have enough income, wherever their income comes from, to meet the basic needs to live in Calgary. They just don’t,” Savoia said.