The story in yesterday’s Royal Gazette <$>about the Canadian Hotel should be cause for concern for anyone who is concerned about homelessness and safe housing.

But it begs the question of whether one Government department knows what the other is doing.

The Department of Planning, rightly, is concerned about conditions in the Reid Street building, which has been deteriorating for several years. The Department has demanded that the landlord, Edward (Ted) Powell, install a sprinkler system.

It is no secret that Mr. Powell would like to replace the Canadian Hotel with a modern multi-storey building, and it is not unusual for landlords to hold off on repairs when a building is slated for demolition.

Given that the rents cannot be particularly high for the apartments in the building, it is not very cost effective for the landlord.

To be sure, most of the tenants in the building would prefer to be somewhere else too. But it is the only home they have — and it is a lot better than being out on the street.

And that is the choice they are apparently being given. According to the tenants, they were told on Sunday to be out by the next day; something they are choosing not do.

Tenant Leslie Brookes said he was told by the Housing Corporation that the earliest he could be housed was March, meaning he faced a month of homelessness.

For now the situation is at an impasse. Planning says the sprinklers have to be installed immediately because the building is a fire hazard. The landlord says the tenants have to move immediately. The tenants say they will not go.

Some supporters of the Progressive Labour Party are distressed by this turn of events.

They say — somewhat unfairly — that they would be disappointed but not surprised if this happened under the United Bermuda Party given its conservative and pro-business roots.

But a PLP Government is supposed to be the government of the working man and the dispossessed. It is supposed to be helping people who are in trouble — not getting them into trouble by driving them out into the streets at a time when affordable housing is still hard to come by.

And they are right. Those who voted for the PLP in the last Election did so because they felt it was more in touch with the social needs of the community.

Three years have passed and there is no sign of PLP politicians going down to the Canadian Hotel to see what can be done to help. Instead the PLP Minister of the Environment’s civil servants are insisting that the tenants move and the PLP Housing Minister’s civil servants are telling them that they have no where to put them.

This cannot be what Premier Jennifer Smith meant when she said November 9, 1998 was a date with destiny. Destined for what? Homelessness?Around aloneAlan Paris, the Bermudian planning to sail solo around the world in September, has combined the challenge of a single- handed circumnavigation around the world with an educational challenge for students.

His effort deserve support from the whole community, both for the challenge he has undertaken and for the fact that school children will have a chance to learn about the world as they follow his progress.