For some time, a property in the 200-block of Nickel Road in Kelowna has been a topic of conversation around town.
On Saturday (Sept. 17), members of the neighbourhood got together for a peaceful protest to come with more ideas of how to handle the house that makes the neighbourhood feel unsafe.
“[We want] to bring awareness to the community and to city hall of what is going on and the impact it has taken on our environment where we live here,” said Andrew Kuiask. “I’m losing neighbours left, right, and centre because they’re being intimidated, bullied, heckled, harassed and we shouldn’t have to move because of the drugs, the stealing, and whatever else goes on here.”
The house has been a subject to many police visits and incidents for more than a year, including an extensive police presence just a couple days ago.
“[The police] are pretty much here everyday,” said Andrew.
Kuiask told Capital News that people are coming in and out of the house constantly and the person who’s trying to get possession of the house isn’t in the house anymore and hasn’t been seen for a while.
“It’s nonstop,” said Andrew. “Something needs to be done more, that’s why were getting the community together to brainstorm ideas and come up with hopefully some solutions.”
The people in the house also have a generator on all throughout the day and night everyday.
Andrew and the rest of the neighbourhood were sitting across the street in protest and made signs. Many cars that drove past honked and rolled their windows down to voice their support of the protest.
On the other side of the street, the people in the house picked up on the protest and cleaned up the front of the house.
Here’s what it looked like at 12 p.m.:
And here’s what it looked like by 1 p.m.
A RCMP vehicle was parked on Nickel Road, down the street from the protest.
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@cunninghamjordy
jordy.cunningham@kelownacapnews.com
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