Homeless camps growing again after B.C. govt. ignores them, doesn’t fund Chilliwack cleanups

CHILLIWACK — The 2023 B.C. budget as tabled yesterday by MLAs may have rightfully set aside $867 million over three years for mental health and addictions services.

But when it comes to funding cleanups for Chilliwack residents who want to keep toxic junk out of critical waterways and pristine forests, there’s nary a peep from provincial officials tasked with keeping encampments from proliferating.

After all the wonderful work done by Chilliwack-area volunteers to help clean up a homeless encampment along Chilliwack Lake Road and another near the Vedder Bridge the past few months, Chilliwack resident Ross Aikenhead said he’s heard nothing from Minister of Forests Bruce Ralston, an NDP MLA, about funding for cleanup efforts. He had contacted him in the past month in hopes of getting the minister responsible to act.

“It’s sort of an exercise in futility but we did get a lot of junk off the riverbed,” Aikenhead conceded. “Without the government actually doing something it will never end. They need to enforce the existing laws. FLNRO (Forests, Lands, and Natural Resources Operations) doesn’t do anything but shuffle the problems off on everyone else.”