Today, NDP MLA David Chudnovsky came to Kamloops to listen to people in our community about homelessness. David is the official opposition critic for homelessness and mental health. I was pleased that David made time to come to Kamloops city hall. It was great to join city staff and social planning council members to discuss how we can all work together to end homelessness.
David has set up blog to talk about his homeless consultations across the province.
We talked about various anti homelessness initiatives underway and soon to be underway in Kamloops. And we talked about possible ways we could do better.
I personally expressed a desire to see all political parties and all levels of government adopt a common front to tackle this problem. From what I have learnt over the past couple of years, homelessness is a largely solveable problem (I plan to talk more about that in the coming weeks and months). I don't want it to become political football or a hot potato that is passed along to someone else.
One thing that many are starting to sense is that there is a real will to tackle homelessness as well. BC Liberal Minister Ida Chong came through town a couple of months ago and asked us about our policies on social housing zoning and secondary suites. Judy Graves, a long time advocate for the homeless in Vancouver, has said that for the first time in her work she actually sees the possibility of an end to the horrors of people not having a home.
It's an exciting time.
Comments