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TRADEX Sports: ABBOTSFORD rvshowsbc.com Perkin a racing Enter today at mapleridgenews.com pioneer. 17 We d n esd ay, S e p te m b e r 16, 2015 ¡ mapleridgenews.com ¡ est. 1978 ¡ (office) 604-467-1122 ¡ (de li ve r y) 60 6 0 44 - 4 6 66 - 6 3 97 97
Residents want say on new shelter B y Phil M elnyc h u k pmelnychuk@mapleridgenews.com
Maple Ridge residents want to have a say and be able to express their concerns about the city’s temporary homeless shelter when it opens in October. At the end of a long council meeting last week, Kanaka Way resident Jen Watts wanted to know if a community forum or town hall meeting will take place once the shelter opens in the old Sleep Shop on Lougheed Highway and 222nd Street, as part of an effort to disband the homeless camp on Cliff Avenue nearby. Once the operator of the shelter is formally announced, it will hold a public meeting explaining how the building will function and how to reduce impacts on the community, said Mayor Nicole Read. See Shelter, 3
Tim Fitzgerald/THE NEWS
Feeling like fall Keegan Laity, whose family has farmed the same land for more than 137 years, picks a pumpkin on his grandparent’s acreage in anticipation of the fall harvest. The Laity Pumpkin Patch has had seven generations of farmers on the property, and this year’s crop is one of the earliest on record.
Babies taken from moms at ACCW Despite court ruling that allows infants to stay with inmates By Neil Corbett ncorbett@mapleridgenews.com
Despite a successful court victory ordering Alouette Correctional Centre for Women to allow inmates to keep their babies while incarcerated, two newborns were taken from their
mothers over the summer. The Maple Ridge prison reopened a mother-child unit last summer, after it had been shut down for six years. Justice Minister Suzanne Anton toured the facility in June 2014, when the program reopened following a court case won by former inmates the previous December. The new mothers were to get prenatal education, participate in a parenting program and receive other supports.
However, in a letter dated Aug. 19, Dr. Ruth Elwood Martin wrote to Anton, noting that, “Two babies recently born to indigenous women incarcerated at ACCW were apprehended by the Ministry of Children and Family, and separated from their mothers within hours of their birth at [Ridge Meadows] Hospital. “Tragically, these babies have irrevocably lost the opportunity to breastfeed and establish vital maternal-infant bonding, which
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research has demonstrated benefits infant development and adulthood health, and reduces recidivism for their mothers,� said her letter. Supreme Court Justice Carol Ross ruled in December 2013 that the government’s decision to shut down the program was unconstitutional, and that mothers and babies rights were violated by the government’s THE NEWS/files decision to “arbitrarily end the Minister of Justice Suzanne Anton toured program in 2008.� See Prison, 8 room for mothers at ACCW in June 2014.
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