Few options for homeless displaced from tent city: advocates
Posted November 26, 2016 11:36 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – The tent city on East Hastings is no more and the move of the camp to Thornton Park was shut down, and advocates say there still isn’t a realistic option for the people who were living there.
The removal of the camp will just send these people into another cycle of uncertainty according to Jean Swanson with the Carnegie Community Action Project.
She says one of the problems is that just putting people in shelters just doesn’t work for everyone.
“Some of them can’t live in shelters because, for example if you’re a couple, you can’t live together with your partner in a shelter in most shelters and it’s still just a mat on the floor.”
Swanson says now these people will have to pack up their wet belongings and move them to another spot day after day.
“That little scene will repeat itself again and then it will repeat itself again, and meanwhile people have no safe place to live because the shelters are full and there’s not enough housing.”
She says this cycle won’t stop until there is actual housing for these people.
