Miramichi Homelessness Strategy

ATN Strategies partnered with our sister company, MQO Research to work with the GMSC ss Community Advisory Board (CAB) at a time when local organizations were struggling to respond to rising housing instability with limited tools and fragmented resources.

We began by mapping the existing system. Our team reviewed regional housing and homelessness studies, examined provincial and federal strategies, and analyzed CAB’s governance structure. This helped us identify real strengths to build on, along with structural challenges such as uneven coordination between agencies and weak mechanisms for shared accountability.

From there, we turned to the community. Together with MQO, we conducted interviews, hosted workshops, and carried out site visits with a wide range of stakeholders. Government representatives, Indigenous communities, service providers, and people with lived experience of homelessness all helped shape the direction of the work. Their insights grounded the strategy in day-to-day reality and made clear where people were falling through the cracks and what needed to change.

The result is a long-term homelessness strategy and workplan that gives CAB a practical roadmap for system change. It shows how to strengthen governance and clarify CAB’s leadership role, improve collaboration and information sharing, and engage more effectively with provincial systems. Our recommendations focus on system efficiency, stronger eviction prevention, and better service coordination so people can move more quickly from crisis to stability.

We captured this in a comprehensive strategy and an executive summary for decision-makers, equipping community leaders to advocate for resources, track progress, and align local efforts with broader policy frameworks.