Christy Upshall, CEO, Our Peel Place
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
When did you begin your career at Our Peel Place?
Our Place Peel was a placement opportunity for me when I went to college. We were a very tiny organization at the time, with only 20 beds. At the time, it was the Peel Youth Substance Abuse program. I started my career on the front line, and I absolutely fell in love with it.
What’s your favourite thing about the services Our Peel Place provides?
We offer young people the sense of safety and stability that we offer when they come into the program. When youth are at their lowest low, they come to us. We provide – not only a roof over their heads – but counselling, education, job training, access to health care and the support they need. Youth come to us through no fault of their own. Many are escaping abuse, neglect, family conflict, violence, or human trafficking. If you don’t have a family or the support of a community — specifically youth 16 – 24 — you are very lost. They’re just young kids that got a really bad break. It’s very inspiring to see how much we can do to support a young person and how that support can turn things around for them.
How does your organization prioritize a “people first” or “bottom up”approach?
We offer training and development opportunities to ensure the employees within the organization feel valued, heard and empowered. We also have a lot of opportunities for youth to provide feedback. Programming is developed based on their stay, and we have youth advisory committees.
What’s something that would surprise readers about the sector?
The stereotype is that the young people who come to us are lazy and don’t want to work, or are addicted to drugs. That can’t be farther from the truth. It’s actually the community, the support system, the government, and families that have failed them. The sheer number of young people who are homeless, on any given night, would surprise people. We have 127 beds within the region of Peel, and they’re full on a nightly basis. And then you have approximately 300 more youth we work within the community. We work with them on their goals and to make sure they stay housed. The average age is 18.
What is one thing you want people to know?
I think there’s a lot of work to be done in prevention. We need to support our youth before they become chronic adults who are homeless and can’t get out of poverty or homelessness. There needs to be more prevention and upstream work with families and government systems to support these young people earlier. Age 12 is the age that is reported that youth become homeless, and they aren’t able to use the shelter until they’re 16. We do a lot of band-aid crisis work here. We’d like to see the systems working a lot differently from a younger age.
What is something you’ve learned from youth?
I never thought I would be working with adolescents. It keeps you young and on your toes. They are very self-sufficient and very adaptable, and they have had to survive. You learn a lot about yourself and how to survive in the situation that these young people are in. They are extremely smart.
