GOING DOWNTOWN: ABBY'S CORE STRUGGLES WITH PROBLEMS

Uultsje De Jong scratches his head and looks out the front window of Legal
Grounds Coffeehouse Inc. on South Fraser Way in downtown Abbotsford.

"Yeah, I've seen her around. You can spot them a mile away can't you?"

From within the upscale coffee shop De Jong is pointing out a prostitute,
a heroin addict, walking down the street.

De Jong is the executive director of the Abbotsford Restorative Justice and
Advocacy Association and chairman of the Abbotsford Detoxification and
Rehabilitation Committee.

The admitted "social activist" (with a conservative fiscal and political
bent) pauses as he tries to sum up downtown Abbotsford's problems. It's
clear from his measured response there is no quick fix.

The system, he says, is broken.

"We need to do more than what we're doing because what we're doing is not
enough."

He says the drug trade has taken over and brought its ancillary problems
with it - crime and prostitution.

Men with addiction problems will "go out and rip something off out of your
car or break into your house just to get his fix. Girls don't do B and Es.
They'll go and turn 10 tricks."

To the end of September 2001 Abbotsford break-ins jumped from 940 the
previous year to 1,166 - an increase of 24 per cent. Car thefts jumped 67
per cent to 823 in one year.

Prostitution has increased exponentially.

A year ago, he says, five woman regularly worked the stroll.

"We have about 40 girls on the street right now," De Jong says, adding
they're all addicted to drugs - mostly heroin.

"A couple of those girls are around 14 years of age."

His claims are bolstered by Denise, an Abbotsford hooker who takes a break
from her 11 a.m. Pauline Street troll to talk about Abbotsford's sex trade.

"It's probably tripled," the 39-year-old woman says of the increase in the
number of working girls since the previous year.

"Every girl has her story - some girls are in trouble, some are runaways.

"There's a 15-year old and a 17-year old. The 15-year-old is already wired
to crack and heroin."

Denise has been walking the streets of Downtown Abbotsford for a year and,
despite the early hour, she smells like alcohol.

Her teeth are brown and unhealed lesions dot her upper chest, neck and face.

With a hint of resignation she says, "They're never gonna get rid of it.
The faster Abbotsford accepts it, the better."

She maintains she needs money to care for her four kids, to pay the hydro bill.

Carrie, on the other hand, makes no bones about the fact she has an
$80-a-day habit.

She says that buys her "a couple of crack and a couple of points (of heroin)."

The 45-year-old Abbotsford woman charges "$45 and up" and usually works at
night to cover her drug habit.

On this day she's working daylight hours because she was up all night and
has a debt to cover.

"I just got the shit beat out of me. Look what they did to my nose with a
pipe. I think I've got a broken rib too."

She's in too much pain to get help for herself and, besides, she has more
important matters to attend to.

"I gotta come up with 45 bucks by 3:30 or they're gonna beat the shit outta
me again."

De Jong says it's the tragedy that's endemic to the downtown.

Robin Morin lives in the adjoining neighbourhood and is active in
Neighbourhood Action Group.

"When I see dirty needles and used condoms I know that these are not my
neighbours," Morin says. "We really need to do something. This is our
neighbourhood and it's being overrun with drugs and prostitution.

"Everyone's afraid to leave their homes because they'll get broken into."

One neighbourhood woman said she sees hookers strolling the area at 7 a.m.

"The girls actually fight each other," she said.

De Jong said sex trade workers used to only strolled the streets by night.

"Not any more. We're getting to the point where it will be all day, every day."

He is concerned local governments are content to contain the city's social
ills in this one place and he points to the fact agencies needed by
impoverished, drug-addicted people - Community Services, the Salvation
Army, the welfare office, the liquor store, four bars, a methadone clinic
and more - are all within the core.

He does not favour safe injection sites or needle exchanges nor does he
believe they reduce problems.

Both he and Morin point to the fact there are only 47 detox beds in B.C.'s
Lower Mainland - 13 for women, 34 for men - and most are blocked off for
First Nations, Correctional Service Canada and the Ministry of Children and
Family Development.

"If you want to get your daughter into rehab . . . you're not going to get it."

De Jong says the problems will diminish with more attention from the
municipality and more resources.

"It all comes down to money. If they want to do something about the drug
problem all they have to do is put money toward it," De Jong said.

But, he adds with a sigh, "We still live in a society where we value money
more than we value our daughters."