Wellington West

There is a man who sleeps on the sidewalk on Wellington at night. You may have seen him. He used to sleep in a shop entrance but police have told him it's private property so now he sleeps in the middle of the sidewalk under the streetlight, no more than 50 meters from our mayors home. He keeps to himself. He does not panhandle or bother anyone. He just listens to prayer before sleep. He has been sleeping on the cement for 29 months with a slipped disc (confirmed by an MRI).

His name is Kareem. Kareem was employed at Costco and was renting a room in a house but experienced a workplace injury and is now on disability, which unfortunately does not provide adequate support. It was pretty quiet at my work last night, so I had an opportunity to talk to him a bit more indepth about his circumstances, about whether he was on a list for housing, etc. He was, in fact, on a housing list and his name came up for a space, however it was infested with bedbugs and because he did not want to sleep somewhere with a bedbug infestation, he was pulled off the list. He does not want to be warehoused in a city shelter because he does not feel safe in that environment, which is understandable.

He will not take food or water. He has repeatedly denied anything I offer because he can not reliably access a public washroom after 6 pm.

Kareem needs a miracle, or dare, I say, a city that meaningfully supports the individuals who live in it.

Last night, I was appalled to witness a half dozen drunk men heading home from a bar, and one of them was hovering over Kareem in what seemed to be a very intimidating manner. I was concerned he was going to kick him. This is what has prompted me to write about this.

Any suggestions for support?

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

To answer some basic questions:

I am unable to house him. No, I will not have him stay in my bathtub as someone has suggested.

TINY UPDATE: I did not see him on Saturday following work. I had given him my email on the Thursday, he wrote on Friday. Yesterday (Sunday), I wrote up a categorized chart with all the resources the wider community provided, including questions about gift cards, a possible gofundme, and some further clarification on his background (if he's comfortable to share, that is). He's probably quite overwhelmed so I don't imagine I will hear from him in the next few days, but I'm sure he is comforted to know that there are a bunch of folks out there, of many different backgrounds who pooled together ideas that may help him, now or later. If anything significant happens, I will do another post.