A Penticton man’s belongings have been moved out of his low-income apartment and left in an empty lot.
“I’m 57 years old, and they just created a brand new homeless person,” David MacRae, a Penticton resident, said.
MacRae said he’s lived in his apartment for 11 years but was kicked out for not filling out the paperwork.
“They brought a moving van in. They backed up the moving van to the door, they brought in a team of movers, and they loaded up the van, and they drove it over to this corner of the parking lot, and they just unloaded everything here,” MacRae said. “I had no choice but to put up my tent and sleep in there.”
MacRae said he had about a dozen large heavy-duty moving bags left with his belongings, but four were stolen the first night.
A neighbour posted his situation to Facebook and several people from the community showed up to help move the rest of his belongings into a storage unit on Friday.
”That night that we got the storage unit, it was unbelievable. Truck after truck after truck pulled up. There was four trucks lined up. We packed my friend’s van up, packed my car up, and loaded it up to the storage unit for him. And he was so happy,” neighbour Andrea Yeo said.
MacRae said he was overwhelmed with all the support.
“It was amazing. It was absolutely amazing. I didn’t expect it. That morning I woke up and thought, ‘What am I going to do?’ I really didn’t have a clue,” he said.
Penticton and District Society for Community living and the landlord could not be reached for comment.
MacRae said he has not been apartment hunting yet because he’s still hoping to get his old place back.
He continues to live in a tent in the spot where movers dropped his belongings.
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