Transportation should be less of a worry for Algoni Moussa and family with the City of Salmon Arm providing them with free public transportation to the end of 2018.
Council agreed to provide bus passes, up to $1,200 for the remaining months of the year, to Moussa, wife Antoinette Raymonde Nzengou and their six children, refugees from the Central African Republic, at the request of Richard Currie, one of a group of Shuswap residents sponsoring the family.
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While council was favourable to the idea of helping the refugee family, the request, coming from a private citizen, proved a stumbling block for councillors concerned with process and precedent. Coun. Kevin Flynn said he was struggling with the request coming from a private citizen instead of the community organization like Rotary or Shuswap Settlement Services Society. Coun. Tim Lavery was of a similar mind.
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“I do know some of the parties involved and I think they’re reliable…,” said Lavery. “I’m prepared to do this as a one off but when requests come in again I think we need to be asking for a sponsoring organization.”
City corporate officer Erin Jackson said she’d spoken with Currie and that he’d initiated his request after speaking with a Rotary member who advised that previous refugee families had benefited from transit passes.
“They are not affiliated with Rotary specifically, this family – It’s a private sponsorship with three families in our community sponsoring the Moussa family,” said Jackson. “He did say they are connected to settlement services but the request wasn’t actually initiated through settlement services.”
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