Our Neighbours Need Us: What’s Happening with the Penticton Encampment
By Alexandria Johnstone, Lead Legal Advocate, Access Centre Posted March 12, 2026
It is cold outside tonight. It was cold last night too. And unless something changes, it will be cold again tomorrow night, for the people in our community who have nowhere else to go.
I am writing this because people I care about, people I have sat across from, people I have fought alongside, might soon be told to take down their tent and disappear. And I am not okay with that.
Who I Am
My name is Alex. I have worked here in advocacy for six years, across most of our departments. I have sat with people on the hardest days of their lives. I have helped people fight for benefits they were owed, navigate systems that were never designed with them in mind, and find footing when everything felt like it was falling away.
I care deeply about the people I work with. Unhoused people matter to me, not as a file, not as a statistic, but as human beings who deserve the same dignity and safety that the rest of us take for granted. That is why I am writing this today.
What Is Happening
The Province of BC has taken the encampment to court. A judge will decide whether the people living there can be ordered to leave.
The court hearing starts March 23. That is 11 days away.
If the judge sides with the Province, the people living in the encampment could be told to pack up and go, very quickly, and with nowhere lined up to go to.
For most of us, moving is stressful. For someone living in the encampment, a sudden forced departure could mean losing the few things they own. Losing their medications. Losing their ID, which can take months to replace and without which a person cannot access almost any service or support. Losing the people around them who keep them safe. Losing the one place that felt, even a little bit, like home.
A response has been filed on behalf of encampment residents and the defense has the legal right to participate in this case. There are real, meaningful arguments to be made. But those arguments need a lawyer to make them in court, and right now, we do not have one.
We have reached out to lawyers at multiple organizations. We have not yet found someone with the capacity to take this on. That is why we are asking publicly, because we are running out of time and we are not willing to give up.
To Anyone Who Feels Frustrated
I know that not everyone in Penticton feels the same way about the encampment. Some people are tired. Some people are worried about their neighbourhood. Some people have called the city, written letters, and feel like nothing has worked. Those feelings are real, and they make sense, and you are allowed to have them.
But I want to gently offer something to sit with.
The frustration many residents feel is often the result of a system, not a person. When governments cut housing funding, reduce mental health services, and download responsibility onto cities and individuals without the resources to cope, the visible result is an encampment. What we are seeing on that land is not a failure of the people living there. It is the end result of decades of decisions, made far away from here, that treated housing as a commodity to be bought and sold rather than a basic human right.
This is what NIMBYism, “not in my backyard” thinking, does at its core. It pushes the problem somewhere else and calls it a solution. It says: not here, not these people, not my concern. But it never actually solves anything. It just moves the pain around until it lands somewhere with even less support.
And neoliberalism, the idea that the market will sort everything out if government just steps back, has left us with a housing crisis that the market created and cannot fix. People are outside not because they chose it, but because the systems that were supposed to catch them were deliberately dismantled over time.
Being frustrated is understandable. Directing that frustration at the people suffering the consequences, rather than the systems that caused it, is where we have to be careful. Our neighbours in the encampment did not create this situation. They are living inside it.
Who These People Are
I think sometimes when we hear the word “encampment” we forget that we are talking about people.
People who grew up here. People who have children who miss them. People who have been on housing waitlists for so long they have stopped counting. People who have disabilities that make navigating systems harder. People, many of them Indigenous, who have already survived so much, who carry so much, and who deserve so much better than what they have been given.
They look out for each other out there. They share what little they have. They have built something that feels like community in conditions that most of us could not imagine surviving. There are people in that encampment who check on their neighbours every single morning to make sure they made it through the night. Let that sink in.
They did not end up there because they stopped trying. They ended up there because we, as a society, have not tried hard enough for them.
They deserve better than this. Not as a political statement. As a basic human truth. Every single person sleeping outside tonight, in the cold, in March, deserves warmth and safety and a door they can close. That is not too much to ask. It should never have been too much to ask.
What Needs to Happen, Right Now
The most urgent need is a lawyer. Someone is willing to help, for free or at low cost.
If you are a lawyer, know a lawyer, or have any connection to legal organizations that do this kind of work, please reach out today. Not tomorrow. Today.
And if you are not a lawyer but still want to help, that matters too. Sharing this post, talking about this with your neighbours, showing up with kindness toward the people most affected, these things are not small. Community pressure and community care are real forces. Use them.
Every day that passes is a day closer to March 23.
How Access Centre Is Helping
This kind of court case is outside the usual scope of our community law work, but we are not walking away. We have been part of this community for years and we are not about to stop showing up now.
I will continue to advocate and share knowledge wherever I can throughout this process. Our team can help encampment residents with human rights concerns, help people protect their access to income assistance or disability benefits if they are displaced, and connect people to legal aid and other support organizations.
We will show up however we can. That is a promise.
Please, If You Can Help, Reach Out Today
If you have legal experience, legal connections, or any resources that could support the people in this encampment, please contact our Executive Director Lucy directly. Lucy has her finger on the pulse of this situation and is the right person to connect with.
lucy@accesscentre.org 250-493-6822
Please Share This Post
The more people who see this, the better the chance that the right person, the one who can help, will find it.
Share it on Facebook. Post it to your Instagram story. Forward it to lawyers, social workers, teachers, faith communities, or anyone you think might care. Text it to a friend. Print it and put it up somewhere.
The people in that encampment are cold, they are worried about what’s next, and they are hoping that someone in this community will see them.
Be that person.
Alexandria Johnstone, Lead Legal Advocate, Access Centre
Note: This post is written to help people understand what is happening. It is not legal advice. I am a legal advocate, not a lawyer.
