Winning halfway house bid revealed

By Jordan Nicurity The Vernon Daily Courier http://www.dailycourier.ca/

Today Corrections Canada will be making another presentation to council regarding the possibility of a halfway house located in Vernon. Brian Lang of Community Corrections, will be trying to answer an array of questions that seem to be growing in number. In a letter from Lang posted on the city’s website, he names the Okanagan Halfway House Society – which run three halfway houses in Kelowna – as the successful bidder of the halfway house. Lang urges the city to release this information “to ensure transparency and to allow for the next steps in the project to begin.” However, the city has stated that they will not give the project the go ahead until Corrections meets a list of requirements, including divulging the results of an inquiry into the conditions surrounding the murder of Bill Abramenko – something that Corrections has refused to do until the trial of Eric Fish, who is accused of the murder, has been completed.

Bob Ens, director of the Okanagan Halfway House Society, knows that the project may never get council approval. “To be perfectly honest it is a tragedy what has happened in Vernon. If the consensus is that the community in no shape or form wants a facility, we would definitely not move forward,” said Ens. “Community support is the key to a facility’s success.” Ens added that the Fish trial, set to begin preliminary hearings in Jan., could take two or three years to complete, leaving the city with a tough choice. “The community needs to decide if it wants to move on, but the reality is that if city council doesn’t allow a zoning variance, nothing can go
forward.”

Coun. Juliette Cunningham has said that although the possibility of the city blocking a halfway house through a zoning application is too far in the future to speculate on, there are some questions that need to be answered by Corrections. “We’re not trying to be obstructionist but we need to be comfortable that the community supports this. That’s why we’ve asked these meetings to be public.” The Okanagan Halfway House Society’s bid was successful, according to Ens, because it was not a mixed use facility and that the 14 potential parolees would benefit from a smaller “home-like atmosphere.” “Our experience is that having a home-like environment is more conducive to integrating these guys back into the community. Staff can have one-on-one contact with parolees.”

Although no potential sites have been discussed, Cunningham said that the unease people feel after the previous incidents involving the old halfway house would make any location a tough sell to residents. “People are concerned about affordable housing in their neighbourhoods, so you can imagine what they think about a corrections facility.”