Thank you.
Secondly, they state that they “will be requesting Journey Home Community to approach and garner partner assistance from municipalities, the Federal Government and other sources to create as much equity as possible for this housing project.”
Additional parties interested in such a concept include three churches with possible available land, private investors and a large significant foundation.
We have experienced an incredible spirit of co-operation and innovation from multiple stakeholders in Metro Vancouver as we have been pursuing this dream.
A few weeks ago, Journey Home was able to assist an asylum claimant father who had arrived in Vancouver with four young children under the age of four. He was wandering the streets of Vancouver on a winter night with four young children in tow, searching for help after he had run out of funds for hotel space. Our church partner volunteer, who had lost touch with this gentleman, had left her phone number with the hotel in case he called back. Fortunately, he did, and they were able to connect and bring him to the house for a safe night's rest, but not without considerable stress for the father.
Or I think of the family we were notified of about a year and a half ago. The family arrived with the father, so a pregnant mother and two children. They were split up between two shelters, men's and women's, and not allowed to visit each other in the shelters. Again we were able to provide a housing unit and actually reunite the family.
These situations should not happen in Canada, and they don't have to. Providing some basic level of compassionate care for newly arriving asylum claimants is neither a partisan issue nor a political issue. It's a human and moral issue, and Canada can respond.
We were encouraged with the announcement last week of federal funding becoming available for housing costs for refugee claimants. We recommend that the federal government join us in this opportunity to forge a new way for asylum claimant arrivals. We recommend that a new approach include the implementation of a reception centre, to be jointly funded by government and private funding, and that the federal government support this plan as we prove its viability in the Vancouver setting. This kind of centre is both transferable and scalable for other regions in Canada. Journey Home Community, in collaboration with the Multi-Agency Partnership, stands poised and ready to move forward in Metro Vancouver.
Will you partner with us? As this approach to assisting newly arriving asylum claimants continues to gain momentum in Vancouver, we urge you to lend your approval as it comes across your pathway. Better still, would you look for ways to approve and support such a plan?
As we finish today, if I may, I will just say that we would love to engage with any of you at a more personal level for your feedback and input. Loren and I will be around tonight and all of tomorrow and would welcome the opportunity to connect.
Again, thank you so much for the opportunity today. Both of us are here to answer any questions you may have.