Re: Recovery centre goes to public hearing, July 31.

Mr. Koonar of the Welcome Home Society, has made some interesting assumptions.

He thinks people don’t have a problem with the Welcome Home plan and for those who aren’t fully informed on the plan he may be right.

People need to know that:

• Welcome Home is planning to house between 144 to 216 addicts and court ordered offenders in a 36 unit open facility on land currently zoned RF.

• No one has given a solution to the issue of keeping drug traffickers and gang recruiters away from the clients at the facility other than “we’ll deal with it if it happens”. Drug traffickers and the criminal element, already plentiful in this area, are drawn to a concentration of vulnerable people to increase their client/member numbers.

• Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design appears to be the city’s crime deterrent of choice (ie. only CCTV and lighting is to deter criminal activity on the perimeter of the subsidized apartment units.)

• Addicts and offenders working for the Welcome Home Society, learning life skills, do not receive paycheques. We wonder what those who leave the program prematurely will do to pay their way, especially if a warrant is out for their arrest.

• It is not clear what the plan says about the staff to client ratio, staff responsibilities and work schedules.

• The program is described to be very structured, but it is not known who will provide the structure and keep the recovering addict/offender busy after the program ends.

We are told “if all goes well” there will be a chance to argue for expansion. However we do not know how that is measured.

At the open house we were told that the measurement of success would depend on regulations and legislation coming from Victoria this fall. Therefore it seems to me that a public hearing in October (even for part of the property), prior to that information being released, is premature.

Liz Walker

Surrey