2.5 Creating a Community Strategy to End Youth Homelessness in Edmonton

Youth homelessness in Edmonton has been a growing concern in light of contrasting successes in applying Housing First for the adult homeless population since 2009. This chapter builds upon research on systemic approaches to addressing homelessness by reporting on Homeward Trust’s development of the Community Strategy to End Youth Homelessness in Edmonton, launched in June 2015. This Youth Strategy serves as a roadmap toward enhanced systems integration to promote comprehensiveness and continuity of prevention, housing and support options for homeless youth. Effective strategy development requires engagement of systems, community stakeholders and people with lived experience, a belief that was tested in Homeward Trust’s development of and implementation planning for the Youth Strategy over the course of a year. Edmonton’s efforts have generated early successes towards enhanced coordination and collaboration amongst community and government providers. Some examples include the establishment of a Youth Systems Committee to enable cross-systems coordination and the engagement of stakeholders to co-design a future youth homelessness system based in integrated service delivery.

Publication Date: 
2016
Publisher(s): 
Canadian Observatory on Homelessness
Editor(s): 
Naomi Nichols; Carey Doberstein