Yukon minister directing ‘crackdown’ on tents outside Whitehorse shelter

Health and Social Services Minister Brad Cathers plans to deal with makeshift shelters outside the Whitehorse Emergency Shelter by cracking down. Cathers says he directed his department to convene with the Justice and Public Works Department as well as the RCMP and City of Whitehorse bylaw. Cathers says he's taken action to quote get rid of tents but he says more work is needed. When asked about it in the legislature Tuesday, Cathers says he's referring to cracking down on substance use and drug dealers at the shelter and he says the shelter has vacancy for people congregating in front of the building. Cather says he never visited the shelter and he won't engage with drug dealers. An RCMP statement says if Connective, the non-profit that runs the shelter or another agency calls for assistance then police will assist if appropriate but police aren't generally tasked with removing tents or personal property unless it's based in the law such as a court order or police investigation. RCMP says decisions about police operations remain under the RCMP's purview. Liberal MLA Deborah Lee Raiti posed the original question when she said the situation at the shelter is getting worse. But she says a crackdown is not what she's looking for. If the government doesn't have answers, then, Raiti says, the community needs to step up. Raiti suggests the Yukon government strike up a task force to check in with each person outside the shelter and ask what they need. Lane Tredger is the official opposition housing critic. Tredger told the Assembly that the makeshift shelters from Monday were taken down Tuesday. Tredger wonders where people who lost a place to sleep will stay tonight. Dana Hatherly, CBC News, Whitehorse. To get a better sense of life outside the Whitehorse emergency shelter, the CBC's George Moradis stopped by on Tuesday morning. That's where he met 28-year-old Gail Reindeer Blake. Originally from Fort McPherson, Northwest Territories, she grew up in foster care and now has a room at the shelter. But despite having a place to stay, she says she prefers to spend much of her time outside. Here's part of their conversation. You know, it's always something. And for me to see my people out here like this, living like this, no, I'd rather sleep outside with them than in a warm comfy place because I know how it feels and I live out there with them because I can't bring them in. It's not a shelter. A shelter is where you take people and you make them feel welcome whether they're dirty or not you know you make them feel like they're welcome. My head has been going like this for how many days what do you want the minister to know if you could sit down with him what do you want him to know about this community this place oh i want it i want to see the minister myself no a minister if he wants to know something he could come and ask me himself because he's watching us suffer like this tell him come and sit on these streets tell him come and live our life. Tell them, feel how we feel. We got no say. We're told what to do, what it is.