Homeless Survival Struggles
Over the years, Red Braid has organized nearly a dozen tent cities in as many communities. We believe tent cities have a dual character – as survival spaces in a dangerous world where homeless people have half the average life expectancy of the general Canadian population, and also as spaces of political transformation where homeless working class and Indigenous people can realize their collective political agency. Out of these spaces, political leaders emerge with visions that transcend their immediate conditions. In 2019, our years of organizing alongside unhoused leaders crystallized in the formation of the June 8th Poor People’s Network, which stretches throughout British Columbia, uniting poor people’s struggles and making revolutionary politics relevant to unhoused people.
Updates and Events
Homeless activists occupy Surrey modular housing being demolished for condos
Homeless activists and supporters have occupied Nickerson Place modular housing, known as the "TD mods." They are protesting its closure and redevelopment as luxury condos and demanding permanent, low-income housing.
Block the closure of Surrey’s “TD mods,” fight for tenant-run housing
In the midst of a global pandemic and spiralling economic crisis, Surrey is demolishing one of its few non-market, welfare-rate housing developments.
BC Housing closes Surrey modular housing building as homelessness and COVID-19 rates surge
BC Housing is planning to close down 46 units of low-income housing this week, as COVID-19 rates surge and hundreds, if not thousands, of BC renters face homelessness in the coming weeks with the end of the eviction moratorium in September.
Strathcona Tent City Residents speak out against Parks Board Control bylaw enactment
The residents of Kennedy Trudeau (K.T.) tent city and their supporters speak out against the amendments to the Parks Control Bylaw that were passed July 14th regarding temporary shelter in parks.
Sudden mass evictions of supportive housing building in Maple Ridge
At noon on July 27th, three residents of one of the Coast Mental Health-run supportive housing buildings in Maple Ridge were surprised with sheriffs at their doors and a moving truck outside.
Strathcona Tent City residents to speak out against new anti-“camping” Parks Board Bylaw
The residents of Kennedy Trudeau (K.T.) tent city and their supporters denounce the proposed amendment to the Parks Control Bylaw regarding temporary shelter in parks. Residents challenge the anti-poor rhetoric, the homeless containment strategy, and demand permanent, adequate housing now, not the increased policing and normalization of homelessness.