Mayor Banman told CTV news that Abbotsford had some empty emergency shelter spaces during the extreme cold weather Thursday night.
He couldn’t resist trying to score a few political points in his battle of wits with the homeless telling CTV that, if the homeless protesters in Jubilee Park won’t come in out of the cold there’s not much the City can do for them.
What an ill-informed, callous and inflammatory thing to say.
They are trying to survive in the middle of an arctic wind storm Bruce. They are afraid of leaving their stuff out in the park unattended. They’re afraid it may all blow away in the wind.
They are afraid the cops or the City might move in and take their belongings away, tear down their tents and leave them out in the cold.
They are battering down the hatches, protecting their homes and each other and surviving.
They are afraid of being denied access to the emergency shelter because they have drug addictions, alcohol addictions and mental illness problems which get them barred from emergency shelters and arrested. Haven’t you been paying attention?
What is the matter with you that you can’t stop shadow boxing with these people and figuratively beating them to a pulp with what passes for wit in a battle you seem to more and more alone in wanting to conduct?
Life has already beaten the shit out of these people Bruce. Just leave them alone. If you won’t help them, then shut up, get out of the way, and let those who will do so.
There are people in this community who are trying to bring this sorry episode in this City’s history to a peaceful, caring and humane result which respects the dignity of all those involved. Your cheap, uninformed political shots are not helping.
“They are afraid of being denied access to the emergency shelter because they have drug addictions, alcohol addictions and mental illness problems which get them barred from emergency shelters and arrested.”
Reality Check:
1) drug addictions, alcohol addictions and mental illness problems DO NOT get you barred from the shelter. Threatening other clients or staff does.
2) being under the influence does not get you turned away from the shelter.Threatening other clients or staff does.
3) under extreme weather anyone, even those whose behaviour has them under review, ANYONE who shows up looking for shelter is given shelter. Just ask those individuals who were under review and were admitted to the shelter during extreme weather nights. The individuals under review who were in the shelter last night and will be there again tonight..
Clients behaviour – disrupting the shelter to the point it interferes with the other clients, stealing from other clients, abuse of other clients, threatening other clients or staff – serious, repeated client behaviour is what gets them banned from the shelter until they meet with the review panel and sign a Behavioral Contract not to interfere with, threaten, abuse, steal from other clients.
FYI: not all shelters accept intoxicated people. According to BC Housing a high-barrier shelter requires that clients be homeless and not to have consumed alcohol or drugs on the day they are seeking entry into the shelter. A minimum-barrier shelter, on the other hand, does not require that people be sober, compliant with mental health or addiction treatment plans, or agree to participate in programs to receive services and housing support. That being said most shelters are not particularly forthcoming about their status with regard to barriers in their literature or web info and this makes it very difficult to determine availability of low/minimum-barrier shelters in this area.