Frustration at Rockridge Apartments
Resident says homeless drinking and fighting in stairwells creates safety risk
Randi Beers
Northern News Services
Published Friday, December 5, 2014
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Since moving into a Northern Property REIT apartment building a little more than a week ago, Chris Funk said her husband has kicked homeless people out of their building 11 times, called the RCMP four times, called their property manager twice and reached out to their maintenance helpline twice.
Two residents at Rockridge Apartments on 54 Avenue are frustrated because homeless people enter the building and party at night. - Randi Beers/NNSL photo |
The couple, who live in Rockridge Apartments on 54 Avenue near Tin Can Hill, say most nights they hear shouting, swearing and fighting, smell cigarette and marijuana smoke, see people passed out in their own urine, empty vodka bottles, cigarette butts and half-smoked marijuana joints strewn across stairwells.
Tuesday morning, Chris' husband, who asked to not be named, found a large puddle of blood in the building's foyer.
"There was so much blood there that the puddle in the middle hadn't coagulated," he said.
"This is what children who left for school through that door this morning had to step over."
He and Funk say their property manager isn't returning phone calls and the person reached on the Northern Property's help line say there's a two-to-four month wait to replace the building's outer doors, which don't latch properly, because they're waiting on a part from Edmonton. Funk's husband doesn't believe the delay is because they're waiting on a part.
"It's a standard door," he said.
Colleen Wellborn, Northern Property's regional property manager, says she hasn't received any calls from tenants at Rockridge regarding the situation, but she says she's aware there's a problem and has been working to fix it.
"We ordered new doors in September from our local supplier and we've gotten weekly updates. I'm being told the expected arrival date is now Dec. 12," she said.
"I understand our supplier is extremely short staffed and our exterior doors are 18-gauge steel and have specific hardware I don't think you can get in Yellowknife ... but I still think three months is too long."
In the meantime, Wellborn said tenants can call the building's 24-hour helpline and any disturbance complaints will immediately dispatch security to the building.
She added guards also do random nightly checks of Northern Property buildings around town, although Funk said she has yet to see any security presence in her building.
"They said we'd have a security guard but we haven't seen one yet," she said.
"It sucks ... there's children in this building and my brother comes with his grandkids too. I don't want them to see this either. They see the cigarette butts and vodka bottles, they see it right when they walk up the stairs - it's everywhere."
Funk's husband says he feels empathy for the people who use his building as a shelter because he realizes they have nowhere else to go.
Despite his empathy, he believes the people who use his building as a shelter create a safety hazard for its residents.
"It's only a matter of time before somebody says something to one of these people and they get assaulted," he said.
Const. Elenore Sturko says RCMP responded to a complaint, made by Funk and her husband, Monday night. She says RCMP was able to disperse the group, but one person was charged with assaulting a peace officer in the process.
She says RCMP attended the property two more times Tuesday night.
The Salvation Army's men's emergency shelter has 31 spaces, including beds, bunks and mats, and does let intoxicated people into its building as long as they don't pose a threat to themselves or others, according to Salvation Army Capt. Ruth Gillingham.
The Centre for Northern Families runs an emergency shelter for women with 11 beds, two couches, and a number of mats. Margaret Beauchamp, shelter co-ordinator, says they don't turn people away due to lack of space and intoxicated women are allowed at the shelter after 7:30 p.m. as long as they behave themselves.
Sturko says the RCMP will take a person into cells for the night if they feel they can't take care of themselves and there's nobody else to take care of them.
"If we find a person causing a disturbance by being drunk in a public place, we will lodge that person if we want to stop the continuation of that offence," she said, adding RCMP will also call an ambulance for people they feel are dangerously intoxicated.
