Well, the mid-winter holidays are over and now we will see what the New Year brings. Traditionally, the mid-winter holidays are about peace on earth and goodwill among humans. So several cities in Canada thought it would be a good time to go out and destroy some tent camps put up and occupied by the homeless in their jurisdictions. Busting up camps and destroying people’s meagre belongings, just like they see being done on the world news.
Our so-called leaders are not solving the problem, but just forcing them to move elsewhere. Like many, I thought we had a Charter of Rights and Freedoms that discouraged this sort of behavior. These citizens of Canada are refugees, make no mistake about that — they are economic refugees because they can’t afford the cost of renting a place.
If Canada was serious about solving the homeless problems, they could start today and have most of the problems solved in a few months. All they need to do is hire some of the bush workers from the North who know how to build and set up remote bush camps using tents and tent frames. If they can build camps in a week or two, just think what they could do in Canada’s southern cities.
In a few days, tent frames for the homeless would start to appear in vacant lots and open spaces across the land, especially in the cities where they are needed most. They would be set up to house the homeless until more permanent places can be built so they are a temporary fix. You could probably fit 10 to 20 of them into a normal-sized building lot with more in bigger lots, which would create small communities. The standard size for tents in feet is 10 x 12, 12 x 14 and 14 x 16, so they could build them in various sizes. One to eight people could fit in each one depending on their needs. The crews could also set up tents for communal cooking and a shower tent with a washer and dryer in it.
They can be used in summer and winter and in mineral exploration; those camps are being put up and moved around all the time. They can be quite comfortable to live in and it would be fixing many of the problems the homeless face. Some could even learn how to set up the camps and do basic carpentry. They could then be hired to set up even more camps. Suddenly, some of the homeless people would have temporary jobs.
If we can afford to build refugee camps around the world for people from other countries, then we can do it for our own refugees and homeless. So, let’s solve that problem first and give them a comfortable heated tent camp to live in.
Once you have that problem well under control, start to turn some of the tent frames into one-room insulated bush cabins. Trust me — a bush cabin is even more comfortable than a tent frame. Make the little homes moveable and start to find them permanent places. They could even be moved to other cities, towns or villages as needed. Meanwhile, you are teaching people trades and that is something of which we are in short supply.
Every refugee city camp over a certain size should have a social worker, a teacher, and some form of security. This is an emergency. They keep telling us that on the news and it seems to be getting worse, so let’s start to solve the problem. People having a place to call home will help solve other problems as well.
Building a house can take years and building the number we need is a monumental challenge. Trying to solve the problems by building houses for everyone will take years — decades, even — and the current way we are going about, it might take centuries.
That’s the beauty of the tent frame solution. People can see it as starting to solve the problem now. It gives them a home, as do one-room bush cabins and mini-homes. It is doable and it would give people hope. Hope itself will help solve most problems.
Have a good New Year.