Nothing For Surrey

Housing spending ignores Surrey homeless, say advocates
Monday, May 14, 2007
CBC News

Homeless people in Surrey are being ignored in favour of those living on the streets of Vancouver, complain emergency housing officials in the Lower Mainland city, and they blame the imbalance on the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Darrell Ferner, who heads the group that runs Hyland House, Surrey's main shelter, said that while the provincial government recently spent $80 million to improve housing for the homeless in Vancouver and Victoria, no extra money was allocated to his city, the second largest in B.C.

He said Surrey has 50 emergency beds for a homeless population of as many as 2,000 people, while Vancouver, with a comparable homeless population, has 535 year-round emergency beds.

"The Olympics are coming and the general feeling out here is that they don't want a black eye in Vancouver.

"There's lots and lots of homeless people in Surrey that deserve better than what we're giving them. It's terrible. I mean, they're still homeless people."

Hyland House has turned away 1,700 people so far this year, and predicts more than 5,000 people will be refused beds at the Surrey shelter this year.

"Surrey taxpayers are just getting milked when it comes to representation of services out here. They're just not getting it, " said Peter Fedos, the program manager at Hyland House.