This letter is in response to the April 3 letter by Chris and Karleena Perry in regards to newly proposed low-income housing in Akinsdale.
I am 23 years old and spent the better part of a decade living in St. Albert, going to elementary and junior high school there. It honestly saddens me that there are still such closed minded, arrogant people living there. When I moved to St. Albert, my family was coming from a military post off of the base in Toronto. My mother did not make that much money and in fact, we moved into the first house we had ever owned when coming to Alberta. We even bought our first car. We lived next to some of the slummier neighbourhoods in Toronto and I was in fact a minority at my school as a Caucasian child. But my life changed forever when I moved to St. Albert because when I started school there, I was forced into a group of children that were so judgmental and so rude.
Don’t get me wrong, there were good kids, but because of the money and the lifestyle that these kids were exposed to, they thought they could get away with whatever they wanted. It sickens me to think that anybody could think that "lower income people" were the ones that would bring drugs into St. Albert because when I started junior high school in 2000, when I was a mere 12 years old, crystal meth started to spread all over St. Albert and most of my rich, "innocent" friends whose parents gave them everything started constantly doing this drug. As I got older, it was cocaine, which a lot of high schoolers did.
It really angers and upsets me that somebody could claim that lower income people don’t work hard or don’t deserve to have the good things in life. I am very fortunate to have at least a few hundred good friends in my life now, and at least 70 per cent of those people make less than $30,000 a year. You cannot tell me that those kind, loving and generous people are criminals who don’t deserve a higher standard of living. It is insulting and incredibly infuriating.
If it wasn’t for those few people in St. Albert that seem to live in that old-fashioned, outdated world, it would be a beautiful place to enjoy your life.
You don't live anywhere near the proposed area. You certainly shouldn't have any say because of your obviously warped opinion on a suitable society. Please go back to the 1800s and leave the rest of us realistic, compassionate people in 2010.
Lisa Slater, Spruce Grove
