Victoria refugee centre urges support for refugees from other countries as interest pours in for Ukrainians fleeing violence

While a refugee centre in Victoria says it's been inundated with offers to house Ukrainian refugees, staff say there are refugees from other countries who are in urgent need of help and are being ignored.

The Victoria Immigrant and Refugee Centre leases a building in Oak Bay from the municipality.

But with the lease on the building ending soon, a group of displaced people may be out of a home by mid-April.

"They cannot find a place to stay because there’s just again nowhere to go," said Karen Hira, with the Victoria Immigrant and Refugee Centre.

"The worst case scenario is that the lease terminates, it’s the end date, and they’ve not found a place to stay," she said.

Hira adds that the region's housing shortage is impacting local refugees as well, with some landlords assuming her clients can't afford rent.

'IT'S HURTFUL'

Hira says she sees a large discrepancy between what some current clients face, and the support that's been offered for people fleeing Ukraine.

"We’ve had a number of people calling and offering housing, which has been amazing, but when we let them know we’re not providing specific services to Ukrainians but we do have people in urgent need of housing, they retract their offer and they’re not interested in providing that housing to refugees from other countries," she said.

At an agency where many staff are racialized newcomers, Hira says it's tough not to take it personally.

"I’m born and raised here," she said. "My family are immigrants from India. Like, of course it’s hurtful."

Oak Bay Mayor Kevin Murdoch says he's not surprised that people can't find housing, and he hopes community members will offer their support to anyone who needs it.

"I'm hoping that the whole community would step up at any times of crisis like this for anybody who's coming," he said.

Well before the invasion of Ukraine began, the Inter-Cultural Association of Greater Victoria says there was a backlog of refugees coming to Greater Victoria.

"There’s dozens of millions of displaced people, so this is not something that’s going away," said Elie Kozma with the inter-cultural association.

The refugee centre says that while it appreciates that people are eager to help people fleeing Ukraine, staff ask that similar support be offered to all their clients.

"Why are they not willing to open their homes to people from certain communities or religions or countries?" said Hira.

"I think people need to kind of sit with that a little bit and answer that question for themselves."