Latest news with #CommunityCommittee
RNZ News
41 minutes ago
- RNZ News
Disproportionately high rate of homeless women in NZ
People working with Auckland's homeless are warning that there is a disproportionately high rate of women without shelter in New Zealand, concentrated in Auckland. Tomorrow, Auckland Council's Community Committee will discuss the region's homelessness crisis and a report showing the number of homeless people rose to 809 in May this year, a 90% increase since last September. Amy Williams reports. To embed this content on your own webpage, cut and paste the following: See terms of use.
NZ Herald
a day ago
- NZ Herald
Auckland woman horrified council tried to take rough sleepers' tents, sleeping bags
'You can visibly see it, if you're walking around the streets. There just seems to be a lot more people [who] have come into hard times." A few days later, Scott was walking past, when workers exited an Auckland Council van with black rubbish sacks and started collecting the belongings. She said the men who slept there were absent, but had stashed the tents and sleeping bags in a small pile under the shelter. 'They had found the place where the people had stashed all their warm stuff to sleep in and they were pulling it down out of its place. I walked straight up to them and said, 'Do not take their stuff - what are they going to do? They've got nothing else to keep them warm and it's been freezing this week'.' Scott said the council workers left without taking the rough sleepers' belongings, but she was horrified they had tried to collect it. 'It's upsetting and I don't know what the answer is, but taking people's stuff from them is definitely not the answer,' she said. 'Imagine coming back from your day and you're about to bed down to sleep on some concrete stairs, and someone's taken your last warmth or barrier for that. 'I just think it's cruel.' Auckland Council compliance manager Adrian Wilson said there rough sleepers had no designated areas to store belongings and the council was exploring possibilities for this. He said council staff would seize items when they were not removed and 'anything of value, including tents, sleeping bags and personal items are stored'. The council retained such items for six months, if they were not claimed. 'Council staff make every effort to identify the owner of any property left unattended. They initially leave notices requiring the individual to remove their items.' Auckland Council compliance manager Adrian Wilson. Photo / Marika Khabazi / RNZ Social services have warned of worsening poverty, due to economic hardship. On Tuesday, Auckland Council's Community Committee will discuss a report that updates the number of homeless living on Auckland's streets. The number of homeless people rose to 809 in May this year - a 90% increase since last September. This followed the release of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development's latest Homelessness Insights Report, which showed 14 percent of people leaving emergency housing were likely homeless. The council report identified two key risks in response to the data provided by outreach services. Increased rough sleeping, resulting in additional costs being incurred to engage, monitor and connect to social services. Acknowledging the council's role in homelessness, and continued co-ordination and investment into the sector that supports those suffering homelessness would manage the situation, but not fully mitigate it. Increased unmet mental health needs, potentially creating perceptions of unsafe environments in public spaces and within public facilities. It said continued advocacy to central government for increased resourcing to support the needs was an ongoing need. Auckland Council received more than 500 requests from the public related to rough sleepers in the past 10 months. Head of community impact Dickie Humphries said these ranged from concern about a person's welfare to reporting bylaw infringements and blocked doorways. He said the increase in rough sleepers was concerning. 'We are here to make sure that the city in this region is a thriving city for all and Auckland is experiencing homelessness [that] is the antithesis of that vision, so we find it very concerning. 'The causes are complex, and what we're hearing from our agencies and what our observations are, is worsening social and economic conditions for people, but that is felt most acutely for those who are already quite vulnerable or on the margins.' He said the council was working with social service organisations to respond to concerns from residents and actively patrol the city. 'We do have constraints on our resources and the best way to make inroads on this is to do it together. 'No one institution, no one organisation can solve this alone, so [getting] more value out of our offer here from Auckland Council to the region will come through the partnerships that we have.' - RNZ
RNZ News
16-06-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
Homelessness increase not necessarily due to government policy changes
Minister in charge of emergency housing, Tama Potaka. Photo: RNZ The minister in charge of emergency housing has been unable to say whether homelessness has increased under this government, saying frontline providers have made "a variety" of comments to him. Providers and advocates have told RNZ they have been seeing a spike in homelessness , with some blaming changes the government has made to emergency housing access. But Tama Potaka told a committee of MPs there were "a lot of other contributing factors," such as the state of the economy and the supply of rentals. The government met its target to reduce the number of households in emergency housing by 75 percent five years early, and announced on Monday that nearly 1000 families with more than 2124 children had moved from motels into homes in the first 12 months of the Priority One category. At the same time, the government has also tightened the "gateway" for those trying to access emergency housing, with the Ministry of Social Development rejecting around a third of applications . The government has dismissed concerns that stricter emergency housing criteria has led to an increase in homelessness. However, Auckland Council's Community Committee recorded a 53 percent rise in people sleeping rough, from 426 people last September to 653 people in January, while data from Wellington's Downtown Community Ministry showed an increase in the number of people rough sleeping from October to December 2024, by about a third in comparison to the year before. Appearing before Parliament's Social Services and Community Committee for Scrutiny Week, Potaka was repeatedly asked by Labour's Kieran McAnulty and the Greens' Ricardo Menéndez March whether frontline providers had told him that homelessness was increasing, and whether it was due to changes in government policy. "Various community housing providers and others have observed a number of things, including some observations around homelessness," Potaka said. "If you are meaning rough sleeping, they also observed, as did the Census, the amount of people rough sleeping between 2017 and 2023 increased." Potaka also asked Menéndez March what he meant by homelessness. "I think it's important to very, very clearly clarify whether or not you're talking about uninhabitable housing, overcrowding, people staying in motels, which has gone down by 85 percent as you know, including children, or rough sleeping. "There's a range of different forms used to define what you're talking about." Referring specifically to the gateway changes, McAnulty again asked whether providers have said specifically to Potaka whether that was a policy that had led to increased homelessness. "Some frontline providers have said that it may be the case that the gateway changes to emergency housing have contributed to homelessness," Potaka said. "So what you're willing to say is it might be the case?" McAnulty asked. "No, that's what the provider said," Potaka responded. Speaking to reporters after the committee, Potaka said providers had told him that while there had been increases, it was not necessarily because of the gateway changes. "There are different providers who have different views over the causes, and some of those are economic, you know, how bad the economic situation has been in various towns and cities in this country," he said. "Others are very, very clear about the massive upsurge in things like drug addiction and drug use. And we can go into that conversation too, about how the price of meth has halved and the usage has massively doubled for those that are actually long-term users." As part of the gateway changes, MSD staff have been assessing whether an applicant has "unreasonably contributed" to their situation, or whether they had taken "reasonable efforts" to find other options. Some advocates have told RNZ it has led to survivors of sexual or domestic violence being turned away from emergency housing because their decision to leave their situation was seen as "contributing" to their homelessness. MSD has disputed this has been the case, but Potaka said he had made his expectations clear to officials regardless. "You cannot turn people away as a result of contributing to the circumstances because they are victims of sexual or domestic violence," Potaka said. "That is not a legitimate reason to turn people away from progressing through an emergency housing application process." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
NZ Herald
12-05-2025
- Politics
- NZ Herald
Lifewise Big Sleepout back after six years amid homelessness surge
The event had become known for attracting celebrities, MPs, and business leaders from across the country. Politicians such as Jacinda Ardern, David Seymour, and Chlöe Swarbrick had all taken part in the past. Lifewise chief executive Haehaetu Barrett said the night was a time to experience the life hundreds of Aucklanders face. 'This year we want to be as authentic as we possibly can so you actually sleep rough, you're given your cardboard, and the rest you have to bring in.' The announcement came as Auckland faced an influx in the number of homeless – with some housing advocates blaming it on the Government's harder line on Kāinga Ora tenants for disruptive behaviour and rent arrears. In March, Auckland Council's Community Committee urged the Government to step in after it recorded a 53% increase in the number of people sleeping rough in the city since September. Barrett said the event is needed now more than ever. 'Back in 2014/15 our headcount was under 200, that was in the city, now you're in the thousands.' She said it included rough sleepers who weren't as visible to the public but still accessed the organisation's resources. Barrett hoped the Big Sleepout's return would smash all of its previous records. '$350,000 was our biggest [result]. We're hoping that New Zealand can support us. Our target is to get to that $1 million,' she said. 'We've had 100 [participants] in the past... we're hoping to get double that.' Waitematā local board member Sarah Trotman ONZM said she was 'absolutely delighted' to hear the event was returning. 'It's very easy to forget that people are living some pretty miserable lives out there. 'While you might spend one night having a fairly miserable time sleeping on the concrete, potentially in the rain and with the wind, it's only one night, whereas there are hundreds of people who have a miserable night every night.' Trotman, who'd participated in all nine previous Big Sleepouts and was its top fundraiser, said the event raised awareness, which hadn't been felt since it paused. 'We have lost the attention of Joe and Jane Average on the issue,' she said. 'The issue needs to be front of mind for many Aucklanders – not just those that are working with people who are homeless at the moment.' Jordan Dunn is a multimedia reporter based in Auckland with a focus on crime, social issues, policing and local issues. He joined Newstalk ZB in 2024 from Radio New Zealand, where he started as an intern out of the New Zealand Broadcasting School.
NZ Herald
29-04-2025
- Politics
- NZ Herald
Public housing tenancy terminations soar, advocates link to rising homelessness
Housing advocates have correlated the increase to a rise in homelessness and questioned where the hundreds of tenants were going. In March, Auckland Council's Community Committee urged the Government to step in after it recorded a 53% increase in the number of people sleeping rough in the city since September. Brooke Stanley, the spokesperson for youth homelessness collective Manaaki Rangatahi, said it is clearly caused by the Government's new policies. 'It's so wild to me that these guys can have this type of power to wield in our communities. Where does the Government think these people are going to go?' Kāinga Ora wasn't able to detail what happened to each specific tenant when it terminated their agreement, but said they 'typically find alternative housing with another provider, move in with friends or whānau, or potentially move into transitional accommodation'. Stanley said many evicted tenants don't have those options. 'There is nothing for them. This is going to have an impact on harm that happens within our communities and it's going to have an impact on the numbers that are going into prisons.' The head of the Kick Back youth homelessness initiative, Aaron Hendry, said the Government's stronger line is only exacerbating the problem. 'You're going to take another group of people on the housing list who potentially also have all the same challenges back into housing, and what we're doing is creating a loop where people are coming in and out of the system and we're not actually solving the issue,' he said. Hendry was also sceptical of more than 300 tenancy terminations which didn't have a clear reason. 'There's huge gaps there in terms of [Kāinga Ora's] knowledge around why people are being terminated. We think that's unacceptable. Maybe they have that knowledge but they need to be far more clear around why people are being asked to leave.' Litigation lawyer Adina Thorn said it was an improvement but believed the rate of terminations was a far cry from what was needed. 'I did some rough calculations. I thought the figure that needed to be evicted was 1,000 to 1,500,' she told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking Breakfast. 'I'm not really talking about anti-social [behaviour], I'm talking about people doing really egregious violent stuff in housing that is threatening to their neighbours.' Advertise with NZME. Housing Minister Chris Bishop said the rising terminations show the Government is maintaining its promises and handing out real consequences to unruly tenants. 'In our view it's not fair to the neighbours of those abusive tenants to have to live in fear, and it's not fair to those on the social housing waitlist who would treat the home with respect,' he said. Bishop said in most cases formal warnings, known as section 55a notices, were effective in getting disruptive tenants to improve their behaviour. 'For the tiny number of people who carry on with their abusive or damaging behaviour, there are real consequences which, in extreme cases, can involve their tenancy being ended.'
