| The StreetLight van, which offers hot meals, counselling and a safe place for homeless youth to hang out, has been a regular fixture in front of Central Memorial Park in the Beltline for several years.
However, that’s no longer the case because city staff have asked StreetLight Mobile Youth Centre, run by the Christian organization Youth for Christ, to move.
Maria Petro, director of StreetLight, says the city told her that "they want to restore Central Memorial Park to its former glory" and asked the organization to park its van elsewhere. She says a city employee then consulted with her on alternate locations, and the van moved to the corner of 10th Avenue and 3rd Street S.E., a known prostitute stroll.
After discussion the options with volunteers, Petro says they decided to try the location because it would allow them to reach out to young women in the sex trade, but it "hasn’t worked very well" because many of the street kids who were accessing their services don’t feel safe coming there.
"Because it’s on a stroll and because it’s a dark corner, some of them feel very unsafe," she says, adding that the number of street kids they see on an average night has dropped to less than a dozen from 40 to 60 in the previous location.
However, Petro says the city has been extremely "co-operative" and she isn’t critical of the fact that the city asked the van to move. "They were very good about it. I don’t feel for a second like they said, ‘Hey, you have to get out of here.’"
The organization plans to try another location in the near future.
Other organizations that deal with the homeless are less positive about the city’s action.
David Staines, managing director at the Calgary John Howard Society and director at Raido House, an organization that houses homeless youth, says he finds the city’s decision to ask StreetLight to move disturbing.
"There’s been a sea change with regard to the perception of the marginalized class by the city," he adds.
Staines says the city seems to be more concerned about cleaning up the downtown and inner city – "in order to present an image of a city that doesn’t have a problem with poverty" – rather than helping the homeless.
"My concern is these organizations that have been helping the marginalized are starting to become targets themselves and I think we’re going to see more of that as the gloves come off."
He adds there’s an emerging mentality in the city where people think "if we got rid of all the agencies, wouldn’t we get rid of the homeless?"
"I know the city is trying to find solutions… but the reality is agencies need to be where the youth are…. Safe places that are easily accessible," says Bonnie Malach, co-ordinator of Homeless Awareness Calgary.
She questions the logic of operating the outreach van on a known stroll.
"When you put them where there are sex-trade workers and pimps, you’re putting them in a dangerous situation," says Malach.
"The city aren’t the bad guys, but they don’t always have all the information at hand."
Ald. Joe Ceci says he wasn’t aware that city staff had asked StreetLight to move, but that they generally show "a lot of positive accommodation" towards social agencies.
StreetLight isn't the only social agency that has been affected by city council's attempts to clean up the downtown area. The city also prevented Inn From the Cold and the Alex Community Health Centre from relocating in the East Village when they were searching for a new headquarters, and wouldn’t allow the Calgary Drop-In Centre to build a new sobering centre for intoxicated clients in the East Village. |
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