‘QUIET’ KART RACE COMING IN JUNE
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TRYING TO DIG OUT OF THESE TRENCHES
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PURPLE LIGHT NIGHTS ARE BACK
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Royal City Musical Theatre is celebrating 25 years with a production of Annie! See Page A12
FRIDAY
MARCH 28 2014 www.newwestnewsleader.com
Fire funds on the way But one resident says it’s taken too long Grant Granger
ggranger@newwestnewsleader.com
GRANT GRANGER/NEWSLEADER
The Hospitality Project based at Shiloh Sixth Avenue United Church will lose $150,000 in federal funding next month affecting the jobs and work of executive director Jaimie McEvoy, triage coordinator Kimberley Hayek and community advocate Robyn Kelly.
Hospitality Project funding axed Advocacy and referral homeless prevention programs will be lost Grant Granger
ggranger@newwestnewsleader.com
New Westminster Hospitality Project executive director Jaimie McEvoy says a federal funding cut means they may have to shut down next month. But first he tells a story. A family business in the B.C. Interior went bankrupt so the parents, two kids and a dog moved
to the big city, recounts McEvoy. “It’s not easy to find places that They figured it would be easier to will accept couples or a parent with find a new job in Greater Vancouver kids. It’s even harder with a family than in their economically depressed with a pet they don’t want to lose. town. But the high At the end of the cost of living caught day we had a place them off guard, and for them,” said Jaimie McEvoy it looked like they’d There’s an awful lot of McEvoy. “If these have to live out of people who don’t need to be people had to figure their truck. it out on their own homeless in the first place. They walked in they wouldn’t have the door at the Hospitality Project, got that help any time soon.” based at Shiloh-Sixth Avenue The church established the United Church, and got the help Hospitality Project about a decade they needed. ago. For the last eight years it has
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run advocacy and referral programs thanks to federal funding. But last year the Conservative government adopted a Housing First strategy to homelessness. It is now concentrating on construction instead of preventing homelessness, said McEvoy. “We support that model (Housing First) as long as it’s not the only thing that’s happening. If it’s the only thing it doesn’t work,” said McEvoy, who is also a city councillor. Please see ‘HOW PROGRAMS’, A3
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Cash donated to support the victims of a fire that destroyed an Uptown New Westminster apartment building will be converted into groceries. Coun. Chuck Puchmayr, chair of the city’s emergency advisory committee, said the fund received about $10,000. It was set up after a blaze wiped out a complex on Ash Street at Fourth Avenue in the early morning hours of Jan. 31. The fire left 36 people in 31 units looking for new homes with few, if any, possessions. In the ensuing days, the public donated more than enough clothing and household goods to replace those lost in the fire. Puchmayr said the money will be converted into supermarket gift certificates. He is trying to convince one of the city’s chains to top up the $10,000 by about another third. Please see RESIDENTS TO GET GIFT CARDS, A3