Episode six features a conversation with Andrea Charest, Executive Director of It Takes a Village in Listowel, Ontario. It Takes a Village is a people-oriented, money-free, shop and social initiative offering community members support with food security, access to resources, and assistance navigating systems such as court appointments, housing, and government support with a focus on being a welcoming and inclusive place to belong.
This is the final feature in a three-part series diving into aspects of the opioid pandemic, the overdose crisis, whatever you wish to call it. It is a public health crisis which became exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to Canada’s Public Health database, there was a 95 percent increase in apparent opioid toxicity deaths from April 2020 to March 2021, with a total of 7,224 deaths, compared to 3,711 deaths from April 2019 to March 2020. Since then, deaths have remained high.
These statistics were published in March 2022 and only went as far as September 2021, but by that point, 5,368 apparent opioid toxicity deaths had occurred. This is approximately 20 deaths per day. For a similar timeframe in the years before the pandemic, there were between 7 in 2016 and 12 in 2018 deaths per day.
It Takes a Village has been approved to be the location in North Perth to support community members living rough or without a fixed address to vote.
This means that The Village can assist people in filling out a “Certificate of Identity and Residence” form, verifying their current housing situation.
If the Village staff are familiar with the people, they can be endorsed and provided with a letter they take to the polls, and that becomes their ID, and they don’t have to provide anything else.
The campaign has kicked off for the 2022 provincial elections in Ontario, and Woodstein Media is speaking with candidates in its home riding of Perth-Wellington. This time, Progressive Conservative Matthew Rae answers the questions.
A delegation from the City of Stratford Social Services presented a report to the Municipality of North Perth council on Feb. 28 about homelessness across Perth County. Mayor Todd Kasenberg asked for suggestions to strike a balance between property standards enforcement and the desire to be compassionate.
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