Showing posts with label mayor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mayor. Show all posts

Sunday, June 23, 2013

Chicken Manure for the homeless

I live in a town outside of Vancouver BC called  Port Coquitlam. Our claim to fame or infamy is two fold, first we are home to a Canadian Hero Terry Fox, secondly we are home to a mass murderer Robert Pickton. The city has taken steps to downplay the latter and raise awareness of the former. I also am on the Board of Directors of SHARE family services, which among other things works with homeless in the tri-cities through our food bank program. I was thinking of social justice and how little is being practised in Steven Harpers vision of Canada, with the corruption and stench that is prevalent in Federal Politics.  

However, I was upset the other day when I read online that our By-law officers had followed the lead of the city of Abbotsford in the mistreatment of its most vulnerable citizens. The actions of these men are not done on a whim, they take the actions because their supervisors, and managers allow and perhaps encourage them. The city of Abbotsford and the By-law officers in Port Coquitlam only apologized when the press published the story.  I hold our elected officials responsible, so I wrote an email to the mayor of Port Coquitlam and as yet have not received a response. My email is below:

Port Coquitalm (Poco) was in the news this morning for the actions of two by-law officers who spread chicken manure where the homeless camp out in our city.

The bylaw manager has apparently apologized. An apology in my mind is not good enough for such a terrible action. My question for you and the manager is what disciplinary action was taken against the officers, and their supervisor and manager for this action?

I do not believe that the officers would take such an action without approval of their supervisor and managers So what steps have you has mayor taken to make sure that city staff is disciplined and that this type of action does not happen again?

Makes me ashamed to live in this community

The Mayors office answered that the Mayor has asked the staff for more information and will get back to me soon, when he responds I will let you know what action--if any-- has been taken.