Research Challenges Homelessness Stereotypes

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Research Challenges Homelessness Stereotypes

Four Massey students are challenging the perception of homelessness in Palmerston North to draw attention to the bigger problem of “housing insecurity”.

Nadia Jones, 21, Remy Waldteufel-Irvine, 23, Daniel Ryland, 27, and Joanne Hall, 26, spent ten weeks over summer examining the city’s housing issues.

They found the city’s transient population, high rents, low wages and a lack of low cost accommodation led to higher levels of housing insecurity than in other centres.

Housing insecurity relates to situations where people lack stable and adequate accommodation; reside in temporary or overcrowded accommodation; and face barriers to entering the rental market. Ms Jones, a politics honours student, says housing insecurity is often invisible when compared to homelessness, but affects more people.

As part of the Living Lab student summer scholarship project the multidisciplinary group recorded the perspectives and experiences of 11 organisations; including housing advocacy groups, community funders, and emergency and longer-term accommodation providers.

The interviews focused on defining homelessness and housing insecurity, the scope and nature of these issues in a Palmerston North context, and the challenges the organisations face.

Research supervisor Matt Russell says the nature of the issue made it difficult to quantify, but factors emerged that show why housing insecurity is such a problem in the city.

“It’s a very difficult problem to put a boundary around, but certainly there’s things specific to Palmerston North which means we would probably have a higher level of housing insecurity than other cities.
“A lot of participants were warning of a looming housing crisis and that Palmy could be on the cusp of a serious problem.”

The group’s findings reveal the challenges at-risk people face and the housing pressures in the city. For example average rents have risen from $217 per week in 2006 to $263 in 2012 – a 21 per cent increase in six years.

While Palmerston North has one of the highest proportions of rental properties in the country the large student population and higher than average prisoner resettlement rate puts pressure on low-cost rentals. Participants pointed to a lack of one and two bedroom rental properties in the city – the type of accommodation most in demand by groups at risk of housing insecurity,

The city’s role as a refugee settlement centre has also increased demand for state-funded housing. But Housing New Zealand Corporation – which comprises of 10 per cent of occupied rentals in the city – will soon need to remove 21 houses from land prone to liquefaction following new regulations, further putting the squeeze on accommodation options.

The group says those most at-risk of housing insecurity included the elderly, recently released prisoners, single males, low-income sole parents, those accessing mental health services and women suffering domestic abuse.

Mr Russell says the students wanted to challenge the street dweller or beggar stereotypes of homelessness and raise awareness of the less visible, but more widespread problem of people who are “housing insecure”. He believes the students’ work is one of the most substantive recent studies on the issue in Palmerston North.

ENDS

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