City of Abbotsford partners with AbbyPD, Cyrus Centre, and MCFD to help at risk-youth

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Due to the vulnerability of youth, at-risk youth in Abbotsford often intersect with homelessness, substance use and mental health challenges, street disorder, educational challenges, exploitation, and poverty. Prevention and response are often considered as two different areas to address, and as such providing continuity of care for vulnerable youth can be problematic and insufficient to meet their complex needs, which the SWIFT Program aims to address.

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“In addition to linking youth directly to the supports and services they need, through building relationships and rapport with them, the SWIFT Program is also helping to enhance overall community safety,” said Constable Shane Dueck of the Abbotsford Police Department. “Having members with positive relationships with so many of our at-risk youth is having an effect in solving violent crime. Some youth who would otherwise refuse to cooperate with police have found confidence in reporting violent crimes to SWIFT team members, which has directly led to important arrests in Abbotsford.”

Since starting to work together in September, the outreach team has already helped six previously homeless youth move into housing, located five youth who had been reported missing and helped four youth into detox or substance-use treatment. The team currently has a caseload of 60 Abbotsford youth.

“Youth Homelessness is a community issue requiring a community response; the SWIFT Program is a community response with MCFD, AbbyPD and Cyrus Centre collaborating and partnering together to serve the youth right where they are, building trusting relationships that begin the process of exiting the streets,” said Les Talvio of the Cyrus Centre.

Through its coordinated partnership, the SWIFT Program is able to connect unattached at-risk youth to a variety of services, respond to victimization, exploitation and abuse, provide basic needs including food, harm-reduction and housing, and identify already-established resources to help at-risk youth build on successes. The program is funded thanks to the Strengthening Communities Services grant received by the City of Abbotsford. The Strengthening Communities’ Services grant is funded by the Province of B.C. and Government of Canada and administered by the Union of B.C. Municipalities. The grant will fund the program for one year, and the City is hopeful the success of the program will help in securing long-term, ongoing funding.