November 7th Hearing at Courthouse
November 7th at Court…plight of Tent City, Kitchener
This is a day of destiny and prospect and opportunity for our City. An injunction hearing was deferred from July until now.
Concerns have been expressed about public safety, eyesore, hygiene and fire hazards, overcrowding, stubborn people stuck in a pitiful lifestyle. The Homeless. The Marginalized. The Un-employable. The mentally ill. The children supposedly in need of protection.
This morning I woke up in our top storey apartment at a busy intersection in the centre of town. Howling winds were noticed. I got a mental image of a young homeless family exposed to such winds, but having to take shelter under a bridge huddling with one blanket. Or another lonely one hiding behind a groundsheet propped up as a windbreak/tent of sorts.
The people at Tent City have been doing much better since the cold of March 2022.
Now my previous lawyering experience of fourteen years tells me that injunctive relief is usually of a serious emergency nature without viable alternatives. The City and other authorities spoke rather against any such emergency by granting the adjournment from July to November. I would suggest one more delay in clearance/eviction until the third week of February 2023, say February 22nd. But a delay with terms and stipulations.
Get the Tent City residents to sign acknowledgment /waivers to be gone by that February date without further recourse. Continue to impose a ban against additional housing units. Continue the revolving service of portable toilets, placed, cleaned and replaced. No campfires to be set. Zero illicit drug involvement with police follow up and charges. Continue to place security guards and visible vehicles on site. These are all toward the budget of City Social Services/ Homeless Initiatives. It could be that our City sets a new and observable standard here. Recent newspaper articles state that other jurisdictions are watching us with urgent interest on the homeless front.
Time to rest fearless is time to plan and prepare and capture new ideas. This applies to the tent folks and to the City planners.
The same sort of arrangement could apply to tents on the island in Victoria Park. They are not involved in the current hearing. I have visited both camps and have penetrated to their very centre in order to talk to the people. I have felt no hostility; have been welcomed to talk in friendly fashion, as a small bunch gathered around a few of us. I have taken telling pictures.
I remember one man with cleanup brush stooped over the grass in front of his tent. He said that he was cleaning house. I chuckled. He was good natured (probably in his late fifties, family devastated through COVID in both job and affordable home in Cambridge). He insisted that wherever I might spread a message of mercy and hope for such people, I MUST REPEAT HIS SINCERE THANKS TO THE PEOPLE OF KITCHENER FOR THEIR KINDNESS OF HEART IN RECENT MONTHS. Nice guy. Expressed himself well.
Might City Budget also install a couple of portable generators for light and sound/music and occasional appliance hookup?
Citizens could be encouraged to drop off blankets, non perishables and clean water purchased. Do many people realize how much kindness of this sort has already been offered by the Manager of the nearly new shop across, Victoria Street? He has gone un-named un-noticed.
Now up to this point in my comments, compassion has been the trigger. Injunctions must also consider the best of public interests. Americans use the term eminent domain. I hear that the Victoria plot of land is slated to be altered as a staging yard for construction of a new transit/bus terminal at the corner of Victoria and King. Very important and unavoidable land use there. But that pursuit will also await the passing of hard winter, I suspect. Give these, our friends, this further chance.
There could be thought given to other vacant yards with similar opportunity. Say, the the Siegmiller yard on Charles at Sydney.
(In retirement I have opted for many hours busking with harmonicas on the streets, and before stores and park locations. I have met many people of mixed background and situation. My thirty-three years in blue collar factory placement brought other people skills. I have enjoyed our street conversations and mutual love of music. Including homeless passers-by, of course. A new acquaintance plays harmonica and drum. He lives in a Tent City.)
After attending courthouse and passing through security scanning.Was this the Airport. Sat in on ninety minutes of the hearing and Applicant Region's remarks. A Mister Bennett speaking. He exercised a moderate path with gradual relieving of the Tent City conundrum.Or so it seemed, until he said ' before those cold days ahead'. That means almost immediately doesn't it Sir.
The hearing is not for injunction but rather for guidance as to how to enforce mandates already in place under municipal by law. The Judge seemed thorough and conscionable. Quick to seize on the meaty points, as a solid trier of facts must demonstrate. He will reserve formal findings, no doubt.
Mr Bennett listed a virtual bucket load of overnight hostel style facilities of record. But they are not the answer. Take a look at that movie The Pursuit of Happiness starring Wil Smith.
https://pastursgreen3.blogspot.com/2022/11/warm-and-cozy-after-ninety-minutes-at.html
https://puffnchord7.blogspot.com/2022/11/harmonica-after-court-house-november-7th.html
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