Rising deaths of people without fixed addresses leave families, community workers mourning

Nicholas (Sam) Jackson says he and his twin sister went down different paths as they grew into adults, but the one she took ultimately ended her life over a year ago.

Sam's sister, Nicole, was homeless when her body was found near train tracks in the southwestern Manitoba city of Brandon, just a week after their 25th birthday in March 2023, he said. She had suffered a drug overdose and was pronounced dead soon after.

The two are members of Sioux Valley Dakota Nation who were born in Brandon and spent the majority of their upbringing in foster care, exiting the system when they turned 18 years old in 2016, he said.

"We kind of took two ways to heal ourselves," said Sam. "I became a powwow dancer, and she started to express it in a different way."

Nicole is among hundreds of people who didn't have a fixed address when they died in Manitoba over the last five years.

Preliminary data from the chief medical examiner's office in Manitoba says 350 people without a fixed address died between 2019 to 2023, though it's not the full picture since the office isn't always notified of every such death.

Accidents account for the most deaths, killing 150 people, the data says. That number also includes 106 confirmed drug overdoses, representing 30 per cent of all deaths. Another 51 deaths were from natural causes, 31 were deemed homicides and 23 were attributed to suicide.

Still, the cause of 95 other deaths are classified as undetermined.

However, those numbers are also considered estimates since a medical examiner has not yet finalized the cause behind about 40 per cent of all 350 deaths, and final figures are expected to change. The numbers, which were initially released to CBC in April, would not have changed significantly as of July 16, the office said.

The preliminary data shows that the number of people who died without a fixed address rose over fivefold during the five-year period, from 23 people recorded in 2019 to 134 in 2023.

Tessa Blaikie Whitecloud, CEO of Siloam Mission, believes that number grew because homelessness increased in Winnipeg after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Kind of coming out of the pandemic, we start to see significant jumps [in deaths]," Blaikie Whitecloud said, referring to the data.

The numbers are important on a human level, so community members can mourn, but she says it also matters systemically.

"If we're not tracking this, then we have no way of knowing if the situation is improving or getting worse."

'She had a whole life before she became homeless'

Sam says his sister started to struggle with housing around 2018, and she slept in places like alleys, on roofs and in trees.

He says homelessness didn't change Nicole as a person, but it created a lack of stability in her life and she had trouble hanging on to housing supports she received.

She tried to turn her life around when her daughter was born about four years ago, but was devastated when the baby's father died soon after.

"It made it hard for her. She became more involved in drugs after that," Sam said.

"My sister could have had more, and should have had more, in her life."

He says Nicole's struggles are just a piece of her story, describing her as kind, loving and fiercely protective of her friends and family.

Her death rippled through Brandon, and he was surprised to see about 80 people at her funeral, including community workers and nurses who had helped her in the past.

"She had a whole life before she became homeless," said Sam.

'No fixed address' has different meanings

When someone without a fixed address dies, they leave behind a grieving family, Blaikie Whitecloud said.

While the losses also affect her personally, she says they are more devastating to direct service workers who build close relationships with people struggling to secure stable housing.

The experiences of those living without a fixed address are also not all the same, Blaikie Whitecloud says, as people often picture absolute homelessness — people living outside with nowhere else to go — when they think of that group, but the reality is much more complicated.

"They might have a place where they've been sleeping for months. They might have a place where they, you know, can couch surf regularly, but they don't have a fixed home."

It's likely some of the people represented in the data visited Siloam, she said.

"I have the benefit of knowing a whole bunch of people who were experiencing homelessness, who were in the throes, who made it through the other side, and now are a part of transforming our community for the better," she said.

"And every one of these lives represent somebody who's not getting that chance now."

She says data can strengthen advocacy and planning efforts, but it also helps governments identify what strategies need to be taken to help save lives, citing Winnipeg's summer hydration stations as an example.

However, there's no sure way to see how the data corresponds to the number of unsheltered people in Manitoba, as the province leaves it up to local organizations to track those populations.

It has always been hard to count the homeless population, but it's gotten harder in recent years.

End Homelessness Winnipeg recently said a post-pandemic drop in volunteers likely affected the number of people who were counted in the 2022 Winnipeg Street Census, and the organization also realized that it may have been undercounting particular groups such as newcomers.

Blaikie Whitecloud says she wouldn't be surprised if the number of people who died without a fixed address in the last five years was actually higher than 350.

"We're losing out on the lived experts that could help us transform our system, so that less and less people fall through the cracks."