I take pen in hand to salute Mayor George Ferguson for not only his common sense but his BRAVERY in reaching out to the homeless who are camping out in the woods across from the Abbotsford News> I have no doubt that the NIMBY’s and other like minded self-centered people are jumping all over the Mayor in terms that would make you think he was committing some horrendous crime by reacting with thoughtfulness and humanity to people in need. People who know the mayor personally tell me they are not surprised he has reached out for he is a kind and caring man. The feedback I have from the homeless who have the opportunity to meet and speak to Mayor Ferguson it that they found him to be down to earth and a considerate man.

So Mayor Ferguson two big thumbs up for the bravery you are showing. There are many citizens who not only support you in this manner but wish to support you, and for your support, in addressing other pressing need of the homeless. With your help and leadership Mr. Mayor, we can rally the good citizens of Abbotsford to reach out a helping hand in getting their fellow man (and woman) back on their feet. To help them to face and deal with their personal problems, to find employment, find homes and take back their lives. Showing communities across CAnada what a focused, caring community can accomplish.

As for the ME, ME, ME people who are no doubt driving you crazy Mr. Mayor – ignore them. at this time of Easter I remind you of those who stood along the route of Christ’s path to Calvary; jeering, striking, spitting – mired in their own self-indulgent, self-centered, self righteousness. All human communities seem to have these negative members, whether in biblical times or in present day Abbotsford.

So George, if I may be so bold, stand tall and firm in the humanity of your actions. I call upon the generous of heart and the thoughtful of my fellow citizens to phone, e-mail or write to let the Mayor know of your support for him in his bold leadership and actions.
I remind all readers of the other side of the Easter season. this is a time of resurrection, of re-birth. Christ spent much of his time among the poor and those in need, instructing his followers to help these, the poorest of their fellow man. Let us honour His Words by seizing the opportunity Mayor Ferguson has given us to step forward and be ‘good neighbours’, not only to this small group but to all the homeless in our city. Let us walk in the Light and make this a season of re-birth for those of our fellow citizens most in need. CARPE DIEM.

It is good to see that the Mayor chose to meet with those camping in the woods across the road from the News. He and council have decided that the policy of forcing them to move, when they have no place to move to, does not make sense. So they are talking to the homeless who are camped there, to city staff, each other and members of the community to come up with a better solution. In the meantime they plan to leave people camped there in peace. My understanding is that the City will be evaluating what would be the best location to designate for the homeless to set up shelter on. Should the current location be judged to be unacceptable and the people camped there asked to move that is fine, as long as a location has been chosen for them to move to.

The good thing is that, as a place to start addressing the social problems of homelessness and poverty, this is a relatively neat and tidy issue to resolve. It always builds confidence when you can start off with a ‘doable’ situation. My hopes and goals are to take advantage of the current dialogue to get the City to see, think about and address some of the pressing other needs the homeless and poor have. As strange as it may sound at this time of the year to be thinking of this, winter is coming and we need to start planning and preparing now for the coming wet and cold. While the City is seeking to give the homeless who are camping a place so they can get some stability into their lives, it is also the time to think about what we need to put in place to help them transition out a camp and into society. These same facilities and services will help in addressing the needs of all the other homeless (do not forget that those at the camp are only a small part of the homeless population of Abbotsford). If thought out, planned and implemented properly these services and the facilities that deliver them should hopefully also be able to address some of the needs of the working poor and those living in poverty in our community.

As I said it is good they started with a relatively easy task because these pressing needs are more complex and addressing them is going to be tricky. Not impossible, but tricky. Requiring flexibility, a willingness to experiment, a willingness to fail, superb people skills, mediation among all the varied interests and parties involved … and many others as well. But I feel the three biggest things needed to successfully begin to tackle this situation is stubbornness, Ideas and lots of help and support form the community. This is not a nice easy situation to address, with nice easy solutions. It is going to be complex and messy. At times it is only by putting your head down and plodding on, by bulling your way through the obstacles that you can continue to move forward. Complex, messy, no easy solutions – these types of problems and situations demand interesting and new ideas, if people actually knew what to do … but we don’t and need Ideas. This need for new approaches and ideas is one of the things needed from the community. We need the community to get behind and support the work to be done to begin to reduce homelessness in Our Community.

I see signs that now is the time for taking action. The Mayor and Council are starting to look at addressing the homeless camp issue. As they learn more about the situation and what it means to be homeless, they will become aware of all the other needs that require attention to help not just those at the camp but all the homeless. Through the council we can reach out to the community, the churches, the businesses and community organizations and groups. The most heartening sign that now is a time for DOING not talking is the reaction of the citizens of Abbotsford to the picture in the Saturday April 8, 2006 Abby News of the Bylaw (law unto themselves) officers taking down the signs. I have heard many reports of people stopping by to drop of food, clothing and bedding. It seems that the community awareness of the homeless as people in need of their help is growing. With the overwhelming need of the community’s help and support in working on reducing the homeless on the streets of Abbotsford, this generosity is a sign of the community willing to come on board. For we need the community to provide political pressure on the politicians (municipal, provincial and federal) to act. We need new and innovative ideas from the community about how we tackle the many and varied needs. We need the people to get their churches, organizations, clubs, friends, family, family pets and companies behind this push. Yes, we will need financial support. But just as or even more important is the community involvement through volunteering their time, ideas, food, clothing, bedding even a location to work out of. As I said this is a complex problem with many ways for the members of the community to contribute to address, bit by bit and piece by piece, the problem labelled homelessness – and hopefully have a positive effect on some of the needs of the working poor and l those living in poverty.

So let us come together and start. Besides I badly need to do some laundry and am quite willing to drag people, kicking and screaming, into getting a facility that would provide me the ability to do laundry. But what that facility should also include is for another (the next) time.

“Are we serious about social planning or is this lip service?” asked Coun. Lynne Harris. “I would like to see some real action taken”

Only one person out of all the members of council and the city administration seems able to see the Real World and what is taking place on the streets and in the social structure of our City. In the same article about the social planners report the reporter writes: “but there will be no quick fix to cure some of the problems highlighted.” Evidence, based on the experience that the city uses lip service not action to address social problems, suggests that no real actions will be taken in spite of councillor Harris’s expressed desire to actually act on these social problems.

Since last year the refrain from the City has been ‘we will act as soon as the Social Planner reports on what we need to do.’ I do not know about you but to me this says the Social Planner was suppose to actually do some planning, not write a report with a long list of social ills and conclude this pressing issue needs more procrastinating than the years of no action, ‘DOH, what problem?’ the city has already wasted in permitting the situation to grow and fester into a mountain. One can only wonder how many more ‘Planning Reports’, how many years of ‘study’, how much more lip service and what other excuses the ‘recommended’ Social Sustainability Advisory Committee will come up with over the coming years and decades for taking no action.

Social planner Jodi-Lyn Newnham did get one thing correct when she wrote “What will differentiate Abbotsford from other communities is how we choose to respond.” As was clear from the statistics cited on the CBC Canada Now report of April 5, 2005 about the website www.homelessinabbotsford.com and the social situation in Abbotsford, all other cities are achieving some successes in addressing their social ills. Of course they are actually facing their responsibilities and needs and taking action on them. Abbotsford has definitely differentiated itself from other communities in choosing to respond by sitting around paying lip service to the problem instead of acting and improving the social situation as other communities have done. Something for the City council and administration, together with the citizens they represent, to be proud of?