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People living and working in Edmonton’s Chinatown are speaking out over how people leaving correctional custody are being released into the inner city neighbourhood.
It comes after Global News obtained surveillance video showing several people getting out of corrections transport vans at different locations in the area north of downtown, where much of the city’s social services and homeless supports are concentrated.
Community leaders say the concern is not that people are being released from custody, but where and how those releases are happening — particularly when social service providers are closed.
One incident happened late Friday night near Kim Fat Market near 99 Street and 107 Avenue.
Kathryn Luu, interim executive director of the Chinatown Business Association, provided Global News with security footage showing a white corrections transport van pulling up near the business shortly before 10 p.m. Friday.
The video shows several people getting out of the van and walking onto the street.
Luu says she approached the corrections officer to ask what was happening, but the man refused to engage in conversation.
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“He looked at me, and then he drove off,” she explained.
“That was very unprofessional and very dismissive in some ways.”
Luu questions why people were being released in the area late on a Friday night — a time when services were not open.
She said she would have preferred to see people handed over directly to a service provider, such as Hope Mission, the King Thunderbird Centre or the province’s Navigation and Support Centre.
“I do think that there is a better system that can help do handovers for people to get the necessary help that they need,” Luu suggested.
The situation adds another challenge for a neighbourhood already dealing with issues such as fires, vandalism, theft, people defecating and urinating in public, and other forms of social disorder.
Community leaders say the drop-off near Kim Fat Market does not appear to be isolated.
Earlier this month, surveillance video provided by the Yorkton Equity Group showed another person being released from a corrections van.
That incident happened in the morning hours in a private parking lot near Pacific Mall, just off 97 Street and 105 Avenue.
Karl Miu with Yorkton Equity says he had heard reports of people being released in the area, but was shocked when he saw it happen himself.
“We need change,” Miu said.
“We don’t want Chinatown to be a dumping ground for everything.”
Community leaders say they are concerned Chinatown could increasingly become a destination for people leaving custody without a clear connection to supports.
Sandy Pon, co-chair of Chinatown Transformation Collaborative Society, says it’s created a lot of frustration.
“What are the owners of these buildings going to do for them? Nothing.
“People dropped off in the middle of the night when everything is shut down? How are they going to get help?”
Pon says there needs to be better coordination between corrections and service providers to ensure people leaving custody can connect with appropriate supports.
“There’s a big disconnect in communication between the Ministry of Safety and Correctional Services. That is provincial and federal,” Pon said.
“Where’s the decency for everyone? For the businesses, for the people that live in the area and also for the people that have been released?”
In a statement, the Alberta government said it has met with Chinatown representatives and support services and procedures are in place to help create transition plans for people being released from custody.
“Approximately 80 per cent of the individuals in custody are on remand status, release dates may not be known ahead of time, and therefore Corrections works with the individuals to assist in coordinating release planning, recognizing the individual cannot legally remain in custody and must be released,” a spokesperson for the Ministry of Public Safety and Emergency Services stated.
Community leaders say they want a system that ensures people are not simply left on the street without a clear path to support.
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