Tri-Cities
Unceded and Occupied Kwikwetlem Territories
Red Braid began organizing in the Tri-Cities in 2019, after local homeless leaders asked for our support to start a tent city. We helped organize a march from the Port Coquitlam Court to an empty lot owned by the City of Coquitlam, next to the Tri-Cities’ only homeless shelter, and founded We Exist Tent City in June 2019. While the tent city lasted only minutes before the RCMP shut it down, the homeless activists who created the camp accomplished their first goal – they forced themselves into public view, made their struggles a political issue, and cast themselves as the protagonists of the fight.
Updates and Events
Coquitlam Bylaw evict couple from their riverside cabin
Coquitlam Bylaw told Sharon and Sid they would come today, January 21, to throw away their belongings and that tomorrow, Wednesday, January 26, their home will be bulldozed. Sid and Sharon do not want to leave their home in the midst of the double crises of Covid-19 and homelessness.
Homeless activists storm the Tri-Cities Homelessness Task Force, chanting “You Talk, We Die!”
This morning, a group of ten homeless activists and Alliance Against Displacement organizers stormed the Homelessness and Housing Task Force meeting in Port Coquitlam, chanting, "You talk, we die!"
We Exist Tent City Founding Declaration
We Exist Tent City is taking unused City-owned land to protect ourselves against the hostility of the government, bylaw and RCMP officers, vigilantes in the public, and the dangers – the cold, isolation, overdose, and bear-attack – of living scattered, alone, and invisible in the bush.
We Exist! Rally Against Anti-Homeless Hate
Support the Tri-Cities homeless! Come to a rally to say no to the Tri-Cities Model of disappearing the poor, no to police harassment of homeless people, no to social isolation and overdose death, and yes to homeless power and homes for all!