Photo Credit: Bradley Vernon Lafortune (Facebook)
As the City of Edmonton continues the largest encampment sweeps in the City’s history, many of the residents effected are left feeling angry, confused and without a sense of direction.
According to the City, an encampment may be assessed as high risk where there is a serious risk of injury or death due to fire, carbon monoxide poisoning, drug use, gang violence, physical violence including weapons, public health and/or sanitation risks, environmental degradation and/or criminal activity.
Public Interest Alberta (PIA) is a non-profit, non-partisan, province-wide organization focused on education and advocacy on public interest issues. Members from P.I.A have been on scene of many of the encampment sweeps providing coffee, water, food and clothing for those dealing with the sweeps.
Bradley Lafortune is the CEO of PIA and says the release issued from the city in early December discussing the sweeps wasn’t following the normal process of communicating.
Lafortune says most people only have one hour to gather up their belongings and leave the area, however with P.I.A on site, they’re able to slow the process down and help anyone effected gather their belongings.
When asked about where people will be moving, Lafourtune says many will just continue finding safe space due to the sense of danger within shelters.
As the sweeps progress through the downtown core, the province say’s they have “more than 1,400 shelter spaces and about 300 more are coming in the near future”. The court order is set to be revisited on Jan. 11.
Lafortune says there are three big ways concerned Edmontonians can show their support which includes:
- Calling your elected representative or sign a letter of support
- Give outreach groups a call to see if they need supplies, food or harm reduction packs
- Or donate to organizations such as Bear Clan or Water Warriors who have a large impact within these communities
If you’d like more details on these outreach groups you can visit their websites here:
Many outreach programs expect another wave of sweeps to take place early morning on Friday, January 5th.
Comments