Pubdate: Tue, 26 May 2009
Source: Abbotsford News (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Abbotsford News
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/BkAJKrUD
Website: http://www.abbynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1155
Author: Neil Corbett

STREET PROBLEMS TOO MUCH TO TAKE

The drug trade and prostitution on the streets of downtown Abbotsford
is driving the owner of at least one business out of the downtown area.

After four frustrating years, Nina Lehtonen said she's going to have
to set up her McCallum Road pet grooming shop, Fetching Fur, in her
carport.

"Crackheads and hookers hanging out in this area are affecting our
business big time," said Lehtonen. "... I am forced to move."

She said some customers won't patronize her store, located in a small
strip mall at the corner of McDougall Avenue, when they see people
using drugs, or sleeping against the wall.

Lehtonen had a homeless man squatting in her doorway every evening.
She felt sorry for him, but after picking up garbage and cigarette
butts, and washing away vomit and other messes, she asked him to move
on. But he's there virtually every morning.

To discourage him from sleeping in her doorway, she resorted to
Lambchop. "This is the song that doesn't end, it just goes on and on..."

The repetitive ditty played all night. Still, he wouldn't move. Then
she tried a strobe light, blinking through the night.

"Joe," as she knows him, was unfazed.

And he's not the only problem.

"Hookers are being picked up off my property," she
said.

She's had customers tell her, "Do you know there's a needle in front
of your shop?"

Neighbouring businesses have called to warn there were people near her
back door using drugs.

"I've lost a lot of clientelle," said Lehtonen. "I have worked my butt
off for four years to make this business work."

Her neighbour Denise Wheeler, operator of Love Essentials and
Lingerie, is also frustrated. Along with the McCallum shop she has run
for 27 years, she had another downtown location she operated for 19
years. Business is down, and she closed the younger shop.

When a group of drug users threatened her employee, the woman quit.
Now Wheeler, who lives on Vancouver Island, is trying to keep the
business going herself.

"You're in business for 27 years, and then these people take over,"
she said.

"They threaten people's lives and nothing happens to
them."

She said many days she makes three or four calls to police to have
people removed.

"I can't take the crime around Abbotsford," she said. "I lived here
for 32 years and raised my children here, and I wouldn't raise
children here now.

"What's wrong with the City of Abbotsford, that they aren't doing
more?"

Lehtonen said well-intentioned charities have used the strip mall
parking lot to offer a mobile soup kitchen to people living on the
street.

The result is a huge mess left for the business people to clean
up.

Lehtonen said that given the close proximity of schools, Abbotsford
Collegiate and Abbotsford Middle, she believes there should be a more
concerted effort to clean up the area.

"Kids walk by and watch them do their drugs," said
Lehtonen.

Crime and homelessness in the downtown core have been ongoing issues
for a number of years, and Wheeler acknowledged that Jubilee Park was
a gathering place for drug users when she arrived in Abbotsford more
than three decades ago.

The Abbotsford Police do prostitution stings on a regular basis, and a
two-day blitz at Jubilee last summer resulted in seven arrests for
drug possession, drug trafficking and outstanding warrants.

However, after the crackdown, police conceded they had not solved the
downtown's problems over the long term.

"Social issues such as drug addiction, mental illness and homelessness
are complex and deep-rooted," then-Abbotsford Police spokesman Casey
Vinet said at the time.

"We are doing what we can, but we also know that an enforcement
approach by itself will not solve all the problems the area
experiences."

Mayor George Peary was not available for comment Monday.
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake