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PHOTOGRAPHY about PovertyHousingHealthDirect Actionposted on December 16, 2013 by flux

Abbotsford: Homeless Camp Under Siege

by murray bush - flux photo

Stan - here since the beginning - expects the city to move in while campers are in court
Keeping on....
Doug - here since the beginning - made police pay for tent they slashed
City of Abbotsford court order to vacate
Police presence
Still building
Out of the wind
People are still dropping off donations of warm bedding and clothes
Reference to one Oregon response to homelessness

ABBOTSFORD - The dozen people still living in a tent village in Abbotsford think this could be their last day somewhere dry and out of the wind.

The City has ordered them off the empty provincially-owned parking lot beside Jubilee Park, where they had been camping since October.  Several say they think the city and police will move in and dismantle their homeless camp while they are at the courthouse tomorrow (Tuesday) fighting the city's determined effort to make them go away.

A BC Supreme court order deadline to vacate the site came and went on Saturday without any action from the city. Pivot Legal is representing the campers, and plans to ask for an injunction to stay the order until a full hearing can be made in court.  

The City of Abbotsford already pushed as many as 50 homeless out of the Jubilee Park, next to the present camp. The park has since been fenced off. Abbotsford has taken a hard line against the homeless (but not homelessness), dumping chicken manure on at least one encampement and harrassing and slashing tents at another.  Police are outside the present site and have set up surveillance cameras.

Campers say the city has been very clear about where it doesn't want the homeless, but has offered no alternatives or possible solutions or willingness to discuss either.  

 

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