Picking on the wrong people, says Friendship Centre director
Joe McWilliams
Lakeside Leader
As promised, the authorities moved in on a homeless encampment in the bush south of Slave Lake on June 12, and dismantled it.
Also as promised, the people residing there were offered access to treatment and so on. All of this was reported in two official statements issued that same day – one from the Slave Lake RCMP and the other from the Mayor of the Town of Slave Lake.
As predicted, less officially, the action hasn’t solved anything, except perhaps in the immediate neighbourhood. And it has increased the number of people depending on the Slave Lake Native Friendship Centre.
“It affects us huge,” says Friendship Centre Executive Director Barb Courtorielle. “They’re all here. They have no place to go.”
Courtorielle refers mainly to a number of long-term unhoused people, who are known to Friendship Centre staff. These are not criminals, she says. They aren’t the ones causing people problems.
“They’re picking on the wrong people,” she says.
Mayor Frankie Ward acknowledges the unintended effects of shutting down the camp – as well as the recent closure of the town-run homeless shelter. But there’s no getting away from the fact crime was associated with both places. It was getting bad, the town was under pressure to do something, and something had to be done, she says.
“Stolen goods, drug activity and weapons,” she says. “We have proof.”
This doesn’t quite jibe with what RCMP Staff Sgt. Casey Bruyns said in his June 12 statement. The RCMP had started doing daily patrols of the Flat Top encampment, he said, “checking for persons with outstanding warrants and searching for stolen property. The patrols’ findings have not substantiated any correlation between the homeless and an increase in local crime.”
Be that as it may, Ward insists the correlation is there. From what she had been hearing, if nothing had been done about the homeless encampment, “I believe we would have had a homicide on our hands.”
The decision to make the June 12 action wasn’t just the town’s, or the RCMP’s.
A ‘working group’ had been established, which involved both those agencies, plus the M.D. of Lesser Slave River, AHS, Alberta Sheriffs and the MLA, Scott Sinclair. The request for RCMP assistance in removing the camp came from the office of the Minister of Municipal Affairs, Bruyns said.
“Today, on June 12, 2024, the RCMP and the Conservation officers initiated the operations. The camp was cleared out with no incident. All of the individuals at the encampment left voluntarily. The RCMP will continue to provide enhanced patrols for the time being to ensure the continued safety of all the people of Slave Lake.”
In her statement, Mayor Ward spoke about the services being offered the people moved on from the camp. These included help (from WJS) getting ID, “and connections to addictions and treatment support.”
No solutions were offered on the matter of housing – perhaps because there aren’t any. The town’s homeless shelter was funded to operate year-round, but the town pulled the plug on it (at least for the warm months), suddenly and unexpectedly, late last month. Too much crime associated with it was cited as the reason. It was attracting the wrong kind of people, Ward says. To the point that some of the regulars were not comfortable staying there. The problem wasn’t inside the shelter, she adds, but in the vicinity. She says she sat and watched people smoking methamphetamine outside the shelter, for example.
And moving forward? Ward says council realizes breaking up a camp doesn’t make the problem go away. But it’ll likely keep happening, as other camps are discovered.
“The current level of social disorder and criminal activity are no longer tolerated in our community,” she said in her June 12 statement. “The encampments pose a significant risk to public safety for all of our residents both housed and unhoused. Our community does not have the wrap-around services necessary to move those experiencing trauma and addiction down a path to recovery, and this is why the support services were made available, to assist individuals in accessing the support they require if they are willing to do so.
“Our community, our residents, our businesses and our families deserve better than what is being offered to us, as such in a decision of council last night we have also hired a public security unit on a temporary basis to offer additional evening coverage for our community.”
Meanwhile, the Friendship Centre is swamped with people wanting a meal, a shower, a warm drink. Courtorielle says the provincial government agency that deals with homelessness is going to be hearing from her.
“I’m going to let them know,” she says. “We’ve been supporting them out of our own pockets.”
