Osborne Village

Uh, I, God knows I did three or four.

[laughs] Every time I thought I was done, I ended up back in it, thanks to the, thanks to the escapades of, at the Osborne Village Inn and then the Royal Albert.

So I'm, I'm quite familiar with that.

I'm, I find that interesting.

Well, I played on, you know, I, I played on the street in Winnipeg.

I played on Osborne Village.

I would, I would busk.

And not, I, you know, that lasted for about a, a year and some.

But is it a loss of compassion or is it a loss of faith in the leaders who are trying to improve things as the number of homeless people in Winnipeg has grown by a staggering 43% year over year? Today on the podcast, we have multiple perspectives coming up.

Mike Green lives in Osborne Village.

Now, this is an area of Winnipeg that is busy and bustling and has faced many challenges over the years and changes, including the recent addition of a neighborhood police office.

Now, this was added to help residents and businesses feel safer, given the growing dynamics at street level.

Margot, the Abacus data survey for CBC suggests 59% of respondents in Winnipeg are starting to lose their compassion for people who are homeless or living with an addiction.

Now, the most common sentiment I heard was that people are seeing more of the side effects of homelessness and addiction.

To get a sense of what's driving these results, I visited the Augustine Centre in Osborne Village.

It's home to Oak Table, run by the outreach organization One Just City.

I got a check at the end of every month, or I should say at the beginning of every month.

It covered a modest one-bedroom apartment in Osborne Village, groceries, a cell phone payment, and a very modest lease payment on the vehicle that I had at the time.

And that was the negotiated deal.

It was like, you've got to draw to cover your necessities.

No.

But it was awesome because it was in Osborne Village.

Yeah.

So I just hit the streets.

Um, years later I wrote a song about, about that.

But yeah, you know, I'd play, I'd play on Osborne Village for change.

I would play, um, various places on the street, and I [laughs] at one point I was broke enough that I went to a welfare place and said, "Hey, listen, you know, I'm trying to play on the street.

I'm trying to meet musicians here in town, but it's taking a bit of time." You know, I tried to get, like, a check for a month just to tide me over.