Concern grows for homeless population as ice storm pounds Fraser Valley

As freezing rain blasts the Fraser Valley and eastern Metro Vancouver, advocates for the homeless are starting to worry.

Ward Draper operates the Five and Two Ministry in Abbotsford, where he estimates there are about 400 people living on the street.

He says he’s worried many of them will spend the night outside, despite the conditions.

“Their shelter is desperately inadequate in weather like this, I mean there’s really no way to protect against this, living outside,” Draper said.

“I’m sitting here in my car listening to trees crashing down everywhere around me. You know, we have friends in the bushes, and what are the odds one of them is going to get clocked in the head with a tree branch or a tree tonight?”

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With extreme weather shelters activated, there are five shelters open in Abbotsford.

Les Talvio with the Cyrus Centre, which has shelters in Abbotsford and Chilliwack is assembling a team to look for homeless people caught in the icy rain.

But Talvio said the centre has concerns of its own.

“We have emergency lighting and secondary lighting, but we don’t have any backup power. So we’re hoping that the grid doesn’t affect us. So far so good. It’s affected all around us, but we’ve been good.”

Talvio said if they lose power, they will move people staying at the shelter to another location.

Draper said his ministry also has vans out looking for people, and that there should technically be enough space for everyone in the city’s shelters.

But he doubts many will find their way indoors — partly because Abbotsford and Chilliwack are so physically large, and partly because many people simply won’t use shelters.

He said with wet weather and sub zero temperatures, that could turn deadly.

“How many fires have we had in Abbotsford in the last couple of years in homeless camps, because trying to keep warm and stuff? It’s a very real daily threat.”

Back in 2016, B.C.’s arctic winter did take lives. The BC Coroners Service issued a public warning after three deaths, one of them in the Fraser Valley, were linked to the cold weather.

Draper said the extreme weather serves to highlight just how bad the housing situation in the region has become.