Highway of Tears disappearances spur many to action

The well documented cases of missing women along the Highway Sixteen corridor, has spawned a grass roots campaign to try to help further disappearances from taking place.

On April 17 and 18, Prince Rupert will be a stop on conference on human trafficking and sexual exploitation, one of the participating groups at the conference will be The Children of the Street society.

They recently received am 85,658 dollar grant from the provincial government, as Part of the Partners in Prevention program, to raise awareness of the issue of the threats to young women.

The Daily News featured a story in Tuesday’s paper to explain their plans to spread the word and find solutions to the contributing factors that put the young women at risk.

FORUMS TRY TO STOP HITCHIKING
By James Vassallo
The Daily News
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Page one

The Children of the Street Society – who will be in Prince Rupert
April 17-18 as part of a conference on human trafficking and sexual exploitation – is receiving $85,658 from the provincial government to help prevent further disappearances along Highway 16 by increasing awareness.

“This is a very valuable project that will help to educate people, particularly young women about the dangers and risks associated with hitchhiking,” said Bulkley Valley-Stikine MLA Dennis MacKay.

The project hopes to build awareness of the sexual exploitation of children and prevent the further disappearance of young women along Highway 16.

The organization will facilitate 40 workshops in 10-communities from Prince Rupert to Prince George, hoping to reach 2,000 participants.

The Coquitlam based organization will work with local organizations to promote and implement further education and awareness projects.

Projects that prevent violence against women and girls – by focusing on the attitudes and behaviors that lead to violence – are receiving up to $150, 000 each as part of the one-time Partners in Prevention grants first announced by the Province in November 2006.

Projects range from men’s workshops offering releveant training and support to online awareness campaigns and respect-building projects geared to youth. Nine organizations are sharing in $1.2 million in funding through this program.

The projects funded through Partners in Prevention supplement the more than $48 million in annual provincial funding toward violence prevention work, transition house services, safe homes, second stage housing, counseling and out reach services that connect vulnerable women, and their children with the services they may need when fleeing abuse.

The funding is the latest development resulting from the two-day Highway of Tears symposium last April. As a result of that event, $25,000 each was provided by the Ministry of Children and Family Development and the Solicitor General to help implement a host of recommendations from a free shuttle service to setting up a toll free line for people to report the location of hitchhikers seen along the highway. In October, a coordinator was hired to work at implementing these recommendations.

Since then the RCMP have expanded the scope of their investigation into the disappearance of women along Highway 16 and the coordinator has held a small number of community forums.

In March, the Regional District of Kitimat-Stikine became the first municipality to display signs, posters warning hitchhikers about the dangers of the Highway of Tears.