Gina Wilson takes a moment each day to reflect on how far she’s come after battling addiction and being homeless in Winnipeg.”I just think of where I’m at right now, like just keeping a place and … being sober,” she said. “I really came a long way, and I’m really proud of myself, honestly.”The 24-year-old has been living in a Fountain Street transitional apartment block in the Centennial neighbourhood — a place she was pointed to by St. Boniface Street Links, a non-profit working to get people out of homelessness and addictions.Street Links partnered with the private owner of the apartment block to open the facility and provide around-the-clock support for people experiencing addictions and homelessness. The non-profit pays for on-site security and programming.Wilson moved into the apartment block last May with her four-year-old daughter. She struggled with homelessness on and off since 2022, and now says she’s never been happier.”There’s people to talk to around the building that are going through the same thing, so you’re kind of never really alone here because there’s always someone to have a conversation with.”LISTEN | Gina Wilson speaks about her hope for a better future:Information Radio – MBOur series looking more deeply at the first moments of some Winnipegger’s lives once they become housedGina Wilson thinks about her young daughter and her late sister when she needs motivation to continue working toward a brighter future for herself. A future with a roof over her head. It’s something she has right now in a transitional apartment block on Fountain Street. Our series looking more deeply at the lives of unhoused people in Winnipeg continues.Wilson spoke to CBC Manitoba’s Information Radio host Marcy Markusa as part of an ongoing series that takes a deeper look inside the lives of people who are taking their first steps away from being homeless in Winnipeg.Wilson, a member of Norway House Cree Nation, says losing her older sister, grandmother and son over the years pushed her toward addiction, couchsurfing and living between shelters.”I got into alcohol, and then I just slowly started to get into other things — like I got into coke and then crack — and then at that point, I wanted help,” she said.”My goal is to have a place with my daughter, like nothing special — just like a little apartment with my daughter.”Artwork by Wilson’s daughter is pictured in her room at the transitional apartment block. (CBC)Her room is neatly organized, full of curling irons and baskets of makeup. Wilson is expected to begin cosmetology school in October — something her older sister inspired her to do.Her sister, Hillary Angel Wilson, was just 18 years old when her lifeless body was discovered on the outskirts of Winnipeg in 2009. RCMP believe she was killed, but the details surrounding her death are scarce and the case remains unsolved.”She’d always do my hair, she’d always do my makeup,” Wilson said. “It was like our bonding thing, and I really hung on to it.”The young mother thinks of the people she lost when she needs motivation to continue working toward a brighter future for herself. She says a positive mindset helps her stay on track.”It’s not just like you get sober and everything is good,” she said. “You have to work on a lot of things once you get sober.”‘Grateful to still be alive’Dale Boutilier is also adjusting to a new life after living on the streets. The 47-year-old was homeless in Winnipeg for 20 years, living mostly in bus shelters until last December, when frostbite damage took part of his right foot.”That was enough to say that was it for the drugs for me,” Boutilier said.Dale Boutilier, 47, was homeless in Winnipeg for 20 years, living mostly in bus shelters until last December, when frostbite damage took part of his right foot. The experience forced him to stop using drugs, he said. (CBC)Street Links met with Boutilier after he was discharged from the hospital, and he spent about six months between Street Links’ transitional apartment block and the non-profit’s emergency shelter on St. Mary’s Road.He’s now living in a bachelor suite that’s part of a complex of connected spaces in East Kildonan, which the non-profit also has a hand in running. His disability support pays the rent and outreach workers have followed up so he receives homecare and some help with cleaning.”I am grateful to still be alive [and] doing a lot better,” he said.’Where people come to heal’Marion Willis, director of Street Links, said the loss of a rent top-up through the Canada-Manitoba Housing Benefit earlier this year has impacted how many people the non-profit can move into privately-owned housing.The benefit, which provided rent top-ups of up to $422 a month to about 4,500 individuals and families in Manitoba, stopped taking new applications last March.Those already receiving the benefit continue to get it, but Willis said the loss of the benefit for new applicants makes certain low-income housing units “unattainable,” and will make “an already tight housing market even tighter.””We have a lot of housing coming online that hasn’t actually been used in the past to support people coming out of homelessness, and so that’s the reason why we have some vacancies that we normally don’t have,” Willis said.Private landlords are a key solution to Manitoba’s housing crisis, she said. The non-profit’s partnerships with private landlords have flourished thanks to Street Links’ offering of services and staff inside their buildings — something Willis called the “magic medicine.””They’re looking at that model and saying, you know: ‘Hey, maybe we have something more to offer, maybe we could lower rents a little bit in exchange for having a service team in the building,'” said Willis.”It’s having security in a building, it’s having staff on-site, so that you really are working with individuals and addressing their needs coming in.”Sam Tourond, property manager and owner of the Fountain Street apartment block, said he purchased it in 2021 and operated it as a regular apartment block before a man was killed in the building and an unrelated fire broke out there within hours last year.Tourond said he wanted to try something different and liked the idea of using the apartment block to help the community, which led him to Street Links.The apartment’s basement and first floor hold self-contained apartment units, while the other floors contain 29 individual bedrooms with shared accommodations, Tourond said, allowing residents to create a communal atmosphere that’s beneficial to their recovery.The community-style living arrangement calls for a drug-free and respectful environment and no guests. Tourond’s hope is that other landlords use the same model in the future, but credits good communication with Street Links as a key part of the operation.It’s a place where people come to heal, I guess, and to move forward,” he said.”The idea is not to have people live here and stay here forever — it’s for them to come in and not be pushed out, not be forgotten about.”
After being homeless, woman says Winnipeg non-profit helped her find sobriety, stability
