Parents keep watch near inner-city schools

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Winnipeg Free Press, Monday Novenmber 11, 2008
Reproduced with permission.
Photo: Wayne Glowacki /Winnipeg Free Press

Volunteers on lookout for drugs, sex trade

Vanessa Folster is helping keep the neighbourhood near William Whyte School safe for kids.

Vanessa Folster has a simple goal -- let kids be kids.

The volunteer parent monitor at Mount Carmel Clinic walks a loop around William Whyte School four times a day, doing her best to ensure negative influences on the community's youngest members, such as drug deals or sex-trade solicitation, are kept to an absolute minimum while they walk to and from school.

"It's all about harm reduction and keeping kids safe," she said.

Equipped with a walkie talkie, Folster is able to relay information to the school whenever she sees something untoward going on. (She walks a block or two before radioing in so she doesn't raise any eyebrows.) The school then contacts the proper authorities.

She didn't need to do any training before she took on the position as she was already walking her kids to school and telling school authorities about what situations they had to dodge on the way.

"It was something I was doing anyway. I didn't like my kids going to school alone. If it was something I didn't want my kids to see, I was sure there were other parents who didn't want their kids to see it either," she said.

Folster is one of 15 volunteer parent monitors who walk their beats around seven inner-city schools -- William Whyte, Strathcona, Dufferin, David Livingstone, King Edward, Machray and Niji Mahkwa -- four times a day.

Tammy Reimer, co-ordinator of volunteers at Mount Carmel, said one of the biggest problems that used to plague the community was the presence of sex-trade workers on the corners. Since the volunteer parent monitor program started, they've taken their soliciting elsewhere.

"They used to be on every second corner but this year I've only seen one. When women are working in a school zone, it means johns are also in the area. It's difficult for parents to tell who's a john and who's a pedophile," she said, adding the volunteers have also helped reduce gang activity, vandalism and crime in the community.

Folster has become a sort of King of Kensington figure in the neighbourhood, getting a wink or a shout-out from countless people during each shift.

"I didn't used to know anybody in my community except my neighbours. Now I know everybody. I've helped catch dogs that have got out of the yard, I've known the mail men, I've helped pull strollers up the stairs. It's nice to be known as a safe person to go to," she said.

Her biggest fans are, naturally, the kids she's watching over. One time, a large dog was loose on the streets and Folster was telling every child she encountered to walk as quickly as they could to school. One group of boys told her they couldn't.

"They said they had to help me because they needed me. The kids felt the need to protect me. It made me cry," she said.

Folster is also reaping some personal benefits from her volunteerism. Since she started, she has lost 40 pounds and subsequently changed her eating habits. In fact, all of the volunteer parent monitors last year lost a combined 260 pounds.