Inside Hiregood: An Edmonton temp agency built to be a ‘helping hand’

The Helping Hands team at Hiregood does a variety of jobs, from litter pick-up to festival safety attendants. (Hiregood)

A local organization is being intentional in who it helps hire by creating jobs for people who may be experiencing homelessness, poverty or other barriers to employment.

Hiregood is a social enterprise by Boyle Street Community Services that got its start in Edmonton around eight years ago.

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“We actually intended to be a temporary agency that would get people, mentor them and get them in the formal job market,” said Jodi Phelan, the chief executive officer of Hiregood.

“We quickly became a place that people didn’t want to leave.”

Now, Phelan said they’ve had around 700 people come through the doors of Hiregood on 107 Avenue, and 200 currently work for them – all of whom have needed support one way or the other in overcoming hurdles in finding work.

“We can have someone who has maybe come from a different province … maybe doesn’t have a resume for the last 20 years, or maybe they’ve experienced addiction issues,” said Phelan.

Hiregood works by offering mentorship support to people who would otherwise be at a disadvantage in the hiring pool.

They’ve also created a team called Helping Hands, which offers services for both the city and private residents.

Those groups can include youth, adults and seniors – anyone who’s willing to work. Each group is led by a mentor.

Currently, their team offers litter pick-up, needle disposal, junk removal, pressure washing, event groundskeeping and washroom or festival attending.

‘Everybody does need help’

Virgil Grendbois has done a wide variety of jobs through Hiregood in the last three-and-a-half years.

“I didn’t live a very good life. I was homeless for a number of years, until I managed to put the evil stuff away … alcohol and hard drugs,” he said.

It was once he found support and was able to pay his rent through his work at Hiregood that life became “much better, much more manageable.”

Grendbois enjoys cleaning up the neighbourhoods he visits with the team.

“I look at people who are down and out, brothers and sisters, not somebody who’s below me, but they’re struggling. They need help. Everybody does need help,” he said.

Phelan said that there are Hiregood employees who have gone on to work jobs with the city of Edmonton. Their services, she said, are in high demand.

“It’s so important because people can complain about social disorder and chaos … but a lot of people want to work,” she said.

“A lot of our people, when they first walk in the door, no one’s going to hire them, but we did, and then we teach [them] … they take it very seriously.”

Phelan said that by the time someone has worked within Hiregood, their resumes could “get them a job basically anywhere.”

Although many workers, like Lisa Boyd, aren’t eager to job hop any time soon.

“Everybody’s family. Everybody helps you a lot. You talk to a lot of people, everyone’s really familiar with each other,” said Boyd, who’s been doing jobs with Hiregood for seven years.

“I like coming into work. I like doing stuff. Otherwise, I’d be home getting bored,” she said.

Phelan said Hiregood is about “having faith in people.”

“There’s accountability here at Hiregood … When people are getting out of treatment, they have nothing to do, they become idle, and then there’s relapse. And I feel like we’ve taken a piece of that out,” she said.

‘Spaces get better, spaces get safer’

Hiregood’s next big gig is the Great Outdoors Comedy Festival this weekend in Kinsmen Park, where workers like Boyd will fill in as safety attendants.

“We’re getting them off government assistance, and then we’re creating safe spaces for people in the downtown core … we’re providing a service to the community,” Phelan said.

Parts of their work, she said, also help take pressure off other social and emergency services.

“We have proof that anywhere we go, spaces get better, spaces get safer,” she said.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Miriam Valdes-Carletti