Today I rode by Ellice Park, the much contested patch of green space that the City Mayor and Councillors (the old boss, hopefully not quite the same as the new boss) have designated for a homeless shelter. They want to move the downtown street crowd from Wharf St. It's nicer for the tourists. I guess they'll break ground in the spring. Meanwhile, they've put up a 'Keep Out' sign, and fenced off the area.
If I were one of the newly elected bunch, I'd try to figure out a way to encourage the old, re-elected ones to park their egos and consider, just for a moment how utterly evil and/or stupid it is to have an empty lot, surrounded by a fence, with one sign announcing a re-zoning and another sign asking people stay out, while they harass and arrest and intimidate a handful of homeless people who are just asking for a little cooperation for a tent city. It's December, rainy and cold, there's an empty space, the city's got an 'out' (you can have the space for a tent city until we break ground in the spring), and think of all the money they can direct away from the constant arrests, not to mention the public relations challenge if people ever realize what's really going on.
If I were a City Councillor I'd write an email, and send it to all the churches, all the poverty advocates, all the social workers, all the homeless people with email access, everyone I can think of who might be interested. I'd ask who is willing to help set up a 24/7 security desk to monitor the activities in the camp. I'd write up a set of reasonable rules we might all agree upon, I'd offer space for us to meet (soon!) to discuss it, and we'd turn Ellice Park into a temporary camp with porta potties and bus tickets for transport to the soup kitchens. Maybe it'd be successful, maybe it'd offer people a place to pitch their tents (without having to move them every day), cover them with tarps, create community, get their shit together while they're waiting for the 'housing first' mantra to manifest itself. Maybe it'd be a huge disaster, in which case the naysayers could call their corporate media chums and have it all exposed and laugh their evil laughs and pat themselves on the back and go back to doing nothing at all.
One of my homeless friends told me that last night the Starvation Army was so full they ran out of mats. He had to sleep on the floor. Nice 'shelter bed' that!
If you believe tent cities are not a solution to the housing crisis , consider that it might save a life TONIGHT. It's friggin' cold out. What's the point of this particular fence around this particular green space??!!???!!
I suggest we all write to the city about this:
"Dean Fortin"
here's an email received from someone with similar ideas:
I'm sending this email to ask people if Monday would be a good day to have our first formal 'temporary emergency shelter (tent city)' planning meeting, and what times are good for people and if anyone has any ideas for where we can meet. I assume we will have 12 or more people attending.
I have sent an email to Sol Kinnis, who provides excellent workshops on collective process, in hopes that she can help us develop a process whereby we can create our plan in a timely and efficient matter. Many of us have expressed that we are interested in this idea out of frustration with the timelines provided by the city and the province and the feds for dealing with this project, and we recognize an extreme urgency in the need to provide this service.
We are facing many obstacles, however, and need to be as thorough and thoughtful in our process as possible. A primer in collective organizing is something we can all use. Hopefully this workshop will happen soon after our first meeting.
I wanted to put forward some ideas I had about what we will be addressing during this process, and this can help serve us to create an agenda for our first meeting.
The text I've created below could serve as a guideline (once we've looked at it together and made the required changes) for the plan we are hoping to put together.
Please look it over and let me know if there is anything you would add to or change about it.
I'm thinking that each of these categories will evolve into working groups, (some of us will serve on different working groups) as many require active research and communication with the public and the government.
I hope also that we can allow for various levels of involvement in this process, so as to make it as open and inclusive as possible.
Please forward this message to anyone you know who wants to take part in this process.
Chris - kalanubuffalo@yahoo.com
Questions to Consider:
Rationale
Why do we need this kind of service?
In what ways are other services lacking that this project can address?
Who Will Use This Service?
What restrictions, if any will we have?
Would it make the project more acceptable to focus on certain groups, ie, disabled, elderly, families?
Municipal/Legal Regulations and Relations
What are the regulations prohibiting this project
What are the municipalities willing to do to relax these regulations/What do they require from us? Community Relations
What are the concerns of the public towards this project?
What kinds of actions can we take to engage/dialogue with the public?
Land
Where will this happen?
Private or public land?
One or more camps?
Camp Regulations
What is allowed/not allowed in the camps?
Food
What kind of food will we provide?
How will we acquire it?
Safety/Security
What kind of training would volunteers require?
How will we keep people and their belongings safe?
Supports
What kinds of supports will we need to offer?
What do we have the capacity to provide?
How do we build our capacity to provide more?
Funding/Supplies
What will this cost us?
What do we need?
Where will we get the funding/supplies we need?
Volunteers
What is our volunteer capacity to implement this project?
What kind of commitment is required of those involved?
What kinds of structures will we have for dividing tasks?
Similar/Previous Projects
What can we learn from existing/past/attempted projects of this kind?
Administration
How will this project be governed?
Will we form a non-profit, or seek assistance from another non-profit?
How will we make decisions that affect the project?
Timeline
When do we hope to have this plan finished?
When do we hope to start providing service?
