By ROY WOOD
The couple driving the plan to bring a Syrian refugee family to Osoyoos fears the effects the Friday attacks in Paris might have on enthusiasm for the project.
Speaking to an Osoyoos town council committee Monday, Michael and Vera Ryan said the project “may be facing some headwinds” following the murderous rampage in the French capital. The terrorist group ISIL has claimed responsibility.
Anti-refugee sentiment in Europe and North America has been on the increase following the attacks, which killed 129 people.
“The passion to assist is being threatened by the rise of apprehension and fear,” said former Osoyoos councillor Michael Ryan.
He emphasized that the Syrian family that has been selected to come here are “victims fleeing or their lives.” Ryan said the backlash against refugees brought to mind the words of former US president Franklin Roosevelt: “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.”
Ryan said the Osoyoos-bound family includes a father, mother, a five-year-old boy and an eight-year-old girl. They are in a refugee camp in Lebanon. He said the family has been through a security check process and Canadian consular officials will meet the family and issue visas.
He said the family is “registered refugees” who have been deemed “of high importance.”
The federal government will lend the family money for transportation to Canada and repaying that loan is one of the uses to which money raised locally will be put.
The Ryans were at council as part of the fundraising effort, which has a target of $30,000.
The most recent iteration of the campaign is headlined “One Hundred People Who Care and Can Share — $100 to change a life.” The idea is that if 100 Osoyoos residents can donate $100 each, the goal will be reached. So far, $11,000 has been raised.
The funds will go toward supporting the family for at least a year after their arrival in Canada. They are expected to arrive in Osoyoos some time in the next four months.
The facilitator of the program here is the Catholic Diocese of Nelson. This came about, said Ryan, because it already has a sponsorship agreement with the federal government, which ensures that the funds raised will be used properly and that the refugees will be supported as long as necessary.
It also provides the capacity for the Osoyoos Refugee Project to issue charitable donation receipts for income tax purposes.
Vera Ryan urged Osoyoos residents to bring the same sense of “compassion, caring and kindness” to the project as they did to helping the victims of this summer’s wild fires.