Agency says Camp Marjorie close to moving to indoor site as FSIN calls for stronger action

An agency that serves those living in a homeless camp in Pepsi Park expects the encampment will be able to move indoors within a week.

“There is an interim facility that we are looking at that we’re hoping to be operational within seven days,” said Erica Beaudin, executive director of Regina Treaty Status Indian Services (RTSIS).

During a news conference Monday morning hosted by the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations (FSIN), she said the location of the site has not been confirmed yet.

“We’re part of the discussion but it will be the city that is taking on the responsibility of the facility,” Beaudin said.

Until then, Beaudin said RTSIS will be at the encampment, known as Camp Marjorie, helping to connect people with temporary shelter and services they need.

David Pratt, first vice-chief of the FSIN, said 90 per cent of Camp Marjorie’s inhabitants are Indigenous, people who have suffered trauma as a result of government policies that dispossessed them of their original home.

“(They’re) the original owners and inhabitants of this land, and when our chiefs signed treaties, this is not the future that they envisioned for our people,” Pratt said.

“They envisioned a future for our people when they would share in the wealth and bounty of this land.”

As Indigenous leaders came in solidarity, a man named Billy Jack, who had been living in the camp, was visibly touched.

He said their remarks helped him understand he’s not the only one experiencing “adverse circumstances.”

Jack urged people to work together for a solution.

“I’m alive. I’m a human being. I deserve to be treated as such,” Jack said with his voice cracking.

“Anybody can be human. But to be humane, you know what I’m saying? That counts.”

Anti-poverty advocates have blamed the tent city on changes the provincial government made to income assistance. Pratt called on the provincial government to conduct a review of the SIS program “to look at how those changes have negatively impacted our people.”

Speaking after Question Period, Social Services Minister Lori Carr said the program has only been fully implemented since September and did not rule out future changes.

“We are continually watching for any changes that have to happen,” Carr said.

One of the concerns about the new SIS program has been about how rent is no longer paid directly to landlords. Instead, benefits go to the clients, who are responsible for paying their bills themselves.

Carr said most clients have been able to pay their rent and utilities on their own but the ministry is willing to change the process for those who cannot.

“This will be just specific cases, people that truly cannot do it on their own,” she said.

In the ministry’s interactions with camp residents, Carr said it has found some of them have not been on SIS at all.

“We actually have 30 applications that were on the go. We’ve actually placed 10 people already,” she said.

Those at the camp were in agreement that the antidote to the problem is not simply housing but a wide array of services that need long-term and adequate funding.

“It’s mental health. It’s access to services. When you look at the determinants of health, it’s education. It’s discrimination. It’s racism,” said FSIN Fourth Vice-Chief Heather Bear.

“It’s all these things together that we’ve been calling for. It’s coming to a head and this is the end result.”

— With files from 980 CJME’s Lisa Schick