Category Archives: Homeless

Homeless, Municipal, Provincial

Recycling schools to meet community Needs.

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I read in a local newspaper that the provincial government actually has a program that will give a grant to study whether cooperation between a school (Yale) and local recreation (ARC) would prove beneficial to local recreation programming. Then the program will pay for capital improvements to need to advance the cooperation.

Does this concept seem as inane to others as it does to me? How could access to Yale school fail to be of benefit to recreation programming? Gymnasiums, change rooms, classrooms etc, open up a wide array of possibilities for programming. The fact is that in the town/small city I grew up in schools were used for a wide range of community activities after school hours thus saving the taxpayers the expense of building facilities when school buildings, with a little creative thought, could serve the community for many purposes. Save the taxpayers putting up two buildings where one could be made to serve double duty. Georgetown, Saskatoon, Toronto, Edmonton; in all these cities I participated in programs making use of school gymnasiums and classrooms at substantial savings to taxpayers wallets.

Unfortunately Abbotsford has the Parks & Recreation Empire and the School Board Empire and we all know that empires are about building up your empire and power by increasing the buildings and workers you control then protecting your empire against any invaders.

Now I do like the concept of the provincial government funding of capital changes that would enhance usage of school buildings for community purposes. I like the idea of funds available to draw up the plans for what changes would permit maximum usage of existing school buildings for community use. I do think that we need to look beyond merely Recreation to include seniors, clubs etc.

I suppose what disturbs me about this matter is the implication that our school buildings are not part of the community outside of providing schooling. Recent articles on the proposed school closures reinforced this apparent division between community and school district. The implication in the words of the school district is that the schools are the property of the school district, not the community. If the school district can use them fine, but if they are of no use to the school district they will be sold to benefit the school district. As if it was not the community that paid for the facilities and that the community does not have a right to use closed facilities if there is a need, especially a pressing need.

We do have a pressing need for one of the empty school buildings, preferably Abbotsford Elementary, because of a total lack of leadership at Abbotsford City Hall, which has chosen to procrastinate rather than take action on homelessness and its associated social issues. Dragging their feet on this matter has allowed these problems to worsen to the point they are on the verge of exploding out of control.
They frittered away time that should have been spent planning and preparing to address the overwhelming need for shelter in this city to the point we are on the point of finding ourselves in a position of having to act NOW to provide some form of shelter and services for the homeless, or of living with them spread throughout the neighbourhoods of the city.

Abbotsford Elementary and other school buildings exist, better yet are designed to withstand the depredations of children. Abbotsford Elementary located where it is offers the best location for providing the homeless with shelter while maintaining their access to the services they need and has the potential for the least disruption on the neighbourhood adjacent to the school. Hopefully we can engage the community spirit shown on the question of closing Philip Sheffield to work with the neighbourhood to minimize disruptions, deal with problems and maximize our ability to begin to address these social problems.

It is going to take community, from local neighbourhoods to the entire city to put in place the programs and facilities needed to start reducing homelessness rather than letting it grow. Granted using Abbotsford Elementary is not ideal, but ideally we would have had leadership on these issues and be in a much better position to deal with the burgeoning crisis of homelessness. Until we can get some leadership and intelligence into Abbotsford City Hall we are just going to have to make do with leadership from the citizens and make use of facilities such as Abbotsford Elementary.

Homeless

7PM Executioner

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I have developed a severe dislike for 7PM: zero hour at the shelter, the point in time where those waiting on the seven o’clock rule for whom there is a bed available get in and you tell those for whom there is no room that they must leave and you close the gates. At which point you get to tell anyone who comes that there is no room and that there is nowhere else in Abbotsford, not even a barn, to find shelter in.

In a job that is by its nature stressful, counting down that first hour to zero has taken the stress to a whole new level. The bell tolls 7 and you become Ming the Merciless, at this time of the year often sending the surfeit off into the rain. On those very rare nights where the shelter does not fill up until after 7PM the lifting of the burden of sending people away at 7 results in a feeling of profound relief, of almost being on holiday.

With the flood of new homeless inundating the shelter these days those rare occasions of relief are to be treasured, for they are scarce and threatened with extinction. It is no longer unusual to turn away a dozen people because there is no room at this “inn”. In fact in the last couple of weeks we have twice narrowly missed (by one) turning away more people than we can accommodate when full.

I wish my words could convey what it feels like night after night to say no, in effect saying: get your hungry ass back out into the rain and the night. To see and record the numbers as the situation worsens. They are far from saints, many of them there as a consequence of bad choices and/or stupidity, but just as many are there because of mental illness, the personal challenges they face and a growing segment who is there as a result of the poverty entrenched in society by our current social and economic policies.

I could, have and will again in future list solid, materialistic, self-centered, it is all about me reasons that people should be demanding those they have chosen to represent them address these growing social issues. But not here and now as this is about feelings.

NO, this is not about “those type of people” except indirectly. It is about us and what our inaction, our complacency on these issues says about US. Those who claim “I am not responsible…” are either lying to themselves (something we all do to varying degrees), lacking in spirit or lacking in substance – that is to say: shallow. We are all responsible for the outcomes of our actions or inactions.

The current society we decry so loudly as uncaring and cold did not just spring into existence. This society is the one we have built using the building blocks of our deeds, our refusals to act and our evasions of engagement. One of those building blocks is that there are so many people I have to turn away at 7PM. We are capable of addressing this and similar issues, of building the society we claim to want – If we choose.

It is about our choices, about the fact that a significant portion of what I feel at 7PM is despair with and disgust for our so-called Society.

Homeless, Municipal

Tsunami?

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“A perfect method for adding drama to life is to wait until the deadline looms large” Alyce P. Cornyn-Selby

It looks as though Abbotsford could well have a dramatic summer on the homeless front. The Shelter is currently seeing unprecedented numbers of new faces, no longer arriving by 1’s or 2’s but in groups of 6 – 8. For the first time people who should have been guaranteed a bed, those with under 5 nights at the shelter, are failing to get a bed because of the volume of new people arriving and using the Shelter. At this point in time there are new faces, new people literally pouring into the city.

Abbotsford City Hall has always used “if we put in facilities it will attract a flood of homeless” as an excuse for doing nothing. When warned that they were facing a flood of homeless anyway and asked how they planned to deal with that, they chose not to see or acknowledge this possibility. Even in the face of common sense, human dynamics and the accelerating rate of homeless creation.

Yes Abbotsford City Hall hired a social planner and created and Advisory Committee on social issues, but to date the net result has been to allow Abbotsford City Hall to effectively procrastinate, taking no action on any of the pressing social issues facing the City, particularly homelessness and addiction.

“Waiting is a trap. There will always be reasons to wait – The truth is, there are only two things in life, reasons and results, and reasons simply don’t count.” Robert Anthony

Abbotsford City Hall, and unfortunately the citizens, are currently facing the prospect of finding the city streets awash with the flood of homeless people currently threatening to inundate the City. At which point Abbotsford City Hall will react with its patented lack of foresight, planning and intelligence. Leaving the City facing another set of expensive, messy and unnecessary problems because Abbotsford City Hall chooses not to hear or see what it does not what to see or hear.

Aristotle taught that the brain exists merely to cool the blood and is not involved in the process of thinking. One would almost think he had meet those at Abbosford City Hall.