Imagine being homeless……… in Winter.
Now imagine being homeless when the temperature is -14 degrees and there is nowhere to go. Its hard to imagine being that cold, and without any prospect of shelter.
That’s why we are asking you to take action on twitter and email in soldarity with our allies in Canada – Sudbury Coalition Against Poverty (SCAP) and Ontario Coalition Aginst Poverty (OCAP).
SCAP are asking people to help create a twitterstorm at the city of Greater Sudbury in Ontaro demanding they take action on an emergency homeless shelter.
This is to replace the gap created when the Elgin Street Mission stopped opening its doors at night throughout the winter, and is a follow up to the Sudbury Coalition’s ongoing attempt to convince the city to take responsibility for filling this gap. Currently the city pays the mission to be open only on cold weather alert days, when the temperature drops below -15 degrees (or -20 with the wind chill). This is inadequate as it leaves the homeless unsure as to which days they can expect to find open doors, and it there is need for a safe warm space even when the temperature is above -15.
You can tweet through-out the day, but we want to focus the most action around 4:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m on Thursday 30th Jan.
OCAP have acted in solidarity with DPAC on our previous campaigns, during our last week of action, they Demonstrated at the British Consulate in solidarity with us, and recently they have joined us in tweeting against the hateful Benefits Street programme on Channel 4
They are valued friends of DPAC and we want to show solidarity with OCAP and SCAP in a campaign which might mean the difference between life or death to the people who live out on the streets in Sudbury, Ontario.
You can read more about the SCAP campaign here and below are some tweets that you can either copy and paste or just click on the “tweet” button.
You can also and .
If you don’t have twitter but want to add your voice, please email the Sudbury City Council. You can also help by sharing this page on facebook or through email.
*** Stop Press ***
Last night members and supporters of Sudbury Coalition Against Poverty took direct action and interrupted tonight’s city council meeting with a statement, signs, and chanting to demand council end its inaction on emergency night-time shelter for homeless people but their protest was effectively ignored by Mayor Marianne Matichuk (@mayormarianne) you can read about the action here https://sudbury.mediacoop.ca/story/activists-interrupt-council-meeting-challenge-sudb/21085
Please feel free to let @mayormarianne know what you think of this – as always keep it polite – don’t give her an excuse to ignore you, just ask her why its OK to ignore homeless people being left to freeze.
And then please feel free to use the tweets below to send a message to Sudbury City Council
Will @mayormarianne take action to bring the homeless in from the cold? https://www.thesudburystar.com/2014/01/26/coalition-still-pushing-for-city-run-shelter #sudbury via @sudburycap
Caring individual takes homeless in when city of #Sudbury leaves homeless out in the cold https://bit.ly/1dKY0Ve #sudbury via @sudburycap
City of @GreaterSudbury is not doing enough to help the homeless. Time to change https://bit.ly/1aZaAug #sudbury via @sudburycap
I support @sudburycap in their work to get an emergency homeless shelter https://sudburycap.com/2014/01/20/cold-shelter-entire-winter-community-start-maintenance-benefit-csumb-funding-policies-chpi-funding/ #ocap
Toronto opens Metro Hall to the homeless. Why won’t @GreaterSudbury do the same with Tom Davies Square? #Sudbury https://www.insidetoronto.com/news-story/4303064-toronto-s-metro-hall-opens-as-pilot-warming-centre-during-extreme-cold-weather-alert/ #OCAP
I’m showing international solidarity, because no one should be left out in the cold. @GreaterSudbury needs an emergency homeless shelter. https://www.thesudburystar.com/2014/01/26/coalition-still-pushing-for-city-run-shelter #Sudbury
End Poverty and low pay in jobs.