Call for Immediate Action to use Emergency Powers to House all Unhoused BC Residents
Pivot Legal Society has released this letter in coalition with several organizations (BC Association of Friendship Centre Societies, CCAP, BC Poverty Reduction Coalition). The letter requests immediate action to address the threat of COVID-19 for people who are unhoused and inadequately housed in British Columbia. The important actions to date are simply not sufficient to protect the health and safety of people who are unable to engage in physical-distancing or self-isolation for lack of self-contained housing. The letter calls for all levels of government to:
- Provide self-contained hotel, motel, or other rooms with toilets, showers, sinks and beds for every individual that wants to move from the streets, encampments, shelters, and inadequate housing including SROs and crowded reserve housing, and begin long term housing planning for all those who are temporarily housed.
- Ensure the number of units accounts for the overflow of women, trans and gender non-conforming people, and children escaping domestic violence during COVID-19; temporary foreign works and others with precarious immigration status; those who may be released from overcrowded and dangerous detention centres during this time.
- Delivery of three healthy meals daily to every room to allow people to physical distance and self-isolate as required.
- Delivery of needed safe supply, including alcohol, to anyone who requires it daily.
- Regular cleaning services and access to hygiene supplies as required.
- Adequate PPE, training and safety measures for all hotel, social services and other support staff working to support community members housed in the hotel stock.
- For those who are unable to move inside, whether because there is insufficient shelter or available shelter is inaccessible to their needs, support people to “space out” through empty park and greenspace assets throughout the province without risk of removal or persecution.