UPDATE 7: Reports From The Homeless Evacuation

07/31/2014 – 17:44 Ruth Ann Braun,Jasmine Braun and Sarah Stewart brought chicken and coffee for everyone late in the afternoon and set up right across from the Happy Tree. By 5 pm there were some belongings left beside the road which officials said were to be picked up later and kept for safekeeping.

07/31/2014 – 16:18 More photos from the scene.
07/31/2014 – 14:26 More photos from the scene.
07/31/2014 – 12:39 We have some photos from contributor Win Wachsmann of the day’s activities down on Galdys Avenue

07/31/14 – 12:13 – The slow process of evacuating the men and women from the Happy Tree continues without incident.

Cover Photo: A bone tired Roy Roberts during Thursday’s Gladys Avenue evacuation. Bas Stevens photo.

Salvation Army workers have been helping put people’s belongings into storage containers and sending them on their way, who knows where, in order to avoid having their worldly possessions taken to the dump.

The Abbotsford Police Department (APD) are nowhere to be seen and have not been on site since this morning. Calvin Pete, the Shaman of the Drug War Survivors (DWS) TeePee, saved a man’s life who was in the middle of an overdose. The man was taken to hospital after Pete was able to stabilize him.

Abbotsford Today will have photos of the day’s events later today.

07/31/14 – 10:57 – Reports from Gladys Avenue this morning indicate there is no police presence anywhere near the homeless camps across from the Salvation Army.

A truck has shown up to begin the process of removing people’s belongings from the BC Hydro owned land. A number of citizens protesting the evacuation as well as many who have showed up to help the homeless people move has filled the street in front of the camp.

Traffic was briefly shut down along Gladys Avenue by protesters. Several provincial and national media crews were on site to record the evacuation.

Some residents indicated they were hoping to move last night but few seem to have found anywhere to move to as the City has erected No Trespassing signs around all City-owned land in the railway corridor and covered the property across from the Mennonite Central Committee’s news building with several truck loads of gravel.

07/31/2014 – 12:39 – Win Wachsmann Photos:

07/31/2014 – 14:26 More photos from the scene.

07/31/2014 – Bas Stevens photos:

 

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Bas Stevens

Bas is the owner and photographer at MonoPod Photography.

You can follow Bas on Facebook where he publishes many of his photos.

To see more of Bas’ photos on Abbotsford Today click here

To see Bas’ photos of the homeless during Moving Day On Gladys Avenue click here

Bas Stevens lives in downtown Abbotsford and shares the neighbourhood just as readily with his neighbours with homes as he does with the homeless, the drug addicted and others who are down on their luck.

Bas has a home and is known to most in the power structure in Abbotsford as a man who calls things as he sees them and is very involved in his community and the political process which guides it.

You can find him most Wednesday nights over at Jubilee Park during The 5 and 2 Ministries meal for the homeless. Failing that, you catch him either at Legal Grounds Coffee House chewing the ear off of a politician or giving as good as he gets over at O’Neill’s Home Cooking over on Gosling.

You stand a good chance of finding him Saturday mornings over at the Abbotsford Farm and Country Market and Saturday evenings back over at Jubilee Park.

Wherever he is Bas usually has his eyes and ears wide open. We’re proud to have him as a contributor and urge you to get to know him if you give a damn about Abbotsford. You’ll be hard pressed to find anyone who cares more than he does.