b'SAFE HOUSING Healing with a ONWAs Nihdawin HOME program helps Indigenous women across the province access a safe space to call homeF or some time now,By Rick Garrickthe Ontario Native Womens Association has been helping Indigenous women in Thunder Bay access housing through its Nihdawin program. With the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the association moved quickly to extend the program across Ontario, understanding there would be an even greater need to help women find suitable housing. As a result, theyve made great strides in helping Indigenous women and their children at a time when they need it most. The Nihdawin program originally offered supports in Thunder Bay only, however during the pandemic we util-ized the model that was created and started spreading it to our provincial sites, says Mandy Tait-Martens, Assistant Director of Community Services at ONWA. It was really successfulwe housed over 403 individuals during the pandemic when it was really hard to even connect with anybody due to the COVID-19 restrictions. I am really proud of the team.The Nihdawin team has been creative in utilizing their relationships with private landlords to provide housing for Indigenous women and families in need. We would get the landlords to video chat and show their unit to individuals that we were working with so they could still choose where they wanted to live, Tait-Martens says. They still had that option of looking at what units would be suitable for them.40Spring/Summer 2022'