People First Radio

Kelly McKowen spent years talking with people who were unemployed in Norway. In his book Down and Out in Utopia, the assistant professor of Anthropology at the College of William And Mary provides a look at what can happen if you lose your job in one of the world’s wealthiest and most egalitarian countries. McKowen […]

Community came together in Qualicum Beach Wednesday, September 30, to mark the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. The day begin with a gathering at ts’xwelikwshenawtxw, “the house at the foot of Mount Arrowsmith.” As people spoke over coffee, crafting, and knowledge sharing activities, People First Radio producer Joe Pugh spoke with Kim Recalma-Clutesi, Ogwi’low’gwa, […]

The Gold Coat Program at the California Men’s Colony State Prison sees long term inmates serve as caregivers for inmates with dementia. Filmmaker Petra Volpe first learned about the program 12 years ago, which prompted a visit, and led to the development of a feature film inspired by the program, called Frank & Louis, which […]

Justin Ducharme says his debut feature film Seventeen was inspired by his own experiences living in Vancouver. “ Something that I’ve always been really interested in as a filmmaker, and a lot of my work explores is this contemporary urban Indigenous queer experience,” he said. Seventeen is set in and around Vancouver, and follows 3 Indigenous sex […]

In 2013, walking a Winnipeg labyrinth helped Corey Bialek consider a contemplative question: what would it mean to not be depressed? The labyrinth was not curative, but it was therapeutic. “There’s no real magic to it, but the idea is you sort of like sift the central thought as you walk through, opine on what […]

Speakers in Parksville and Courtenay joined a chorus of voices all over the world coming together in their communities to mark International Overdose Awareness Day. Observed August 31 or the days leading up to it, International Overdose Awareness Day began as a barbecue remembrance event at the Salvation Army Needle Exchange in Melbourne Australia 25 […]

Rob Csernyik is an investigative journalist who lives in Atlantic Canada and covers the gambling beat. He’s the author of A Losing Hand, a new book that takes a look at the issue of gambling related suicides in Canada. “ We have a very robust industry of legalized gambling, and yet we also have…a big preoccupation […]

The Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction(CCSA) has shared a resource meant to help smaller Canadian cities address substance use harms. “The Playbook for Action has over 50 evidence-based interventions that a community could draw from,” said Chandni Sondagar, a senior knowledge broker with the organization. The playbook is a document outlining a number […]

Peers Victoria Resources Society recently marked its 30th anniversary. The organization helps sex workers in the capital region. “Sex workers in our area often can encounter stigma when accessing health and social support,” said Executive Director Leigh Elliot. “So folks may not feel comfortable disclosing the work that they do, which can limit the sort […]

A team at the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction is working on a framework for a standardized unit of THC in Canada. “The concentration of THC found in cannabis has really increased over time,” said Shea Wood,  a senior knowledge broker at the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction. “Compared to some […]

A project from UBC’s Housing Assessment Resource Tools (HART) team has identified public land across the province and scored it for housing potential. HART Associate Director Craig Jones spoke with People First Radio about the map. “Anybody in B.C, I don’t care if you are a community member, in government, in a non-profit builder, for-profit […]

A team in the Comox Valley has been working to understand and address the barriers faced by people when they visit the hospital. Sharon Karsten, a professor at Vancouver Island University, and Christohper Hauschild, a Mitacs research fellow employed by VIU, are involved with Walk With Me, a community engaged research project. One of its […]

During the outbreak of a new and potentially fatal disease in Toronto in 2003, it fell to psychiatrists Bob Maunder and Jon Hunter to help people in the SARS ward cope. The two have been focusing on coping in their professional lives ever since, and have recently co-authored a book on the subject, Coping: Fix […]

Journalist and author Jessica Barrett argues we can’t solve our housing crisis until we solve our crisis of home. Barrett is the author of No Place Like Home: The Missing Key to Our Housing Crisis, which combines a macro view of the Canadian housing landscape with stories of individual people – including Barrett. Over a […]

A group out of UBC says distraction blocking apps are often marketed at neurodiverse people, but little is known about how they are actually used. Kevin Chow and Marvel Hariadi were among the authors of a study that looked into the issue. They spoke with People First Radio about digital well being tools and inclusivity. […]

A UBC law prof argues that homelessness in Canada is governed by a patchwork of municipal bylaws. Alexandra Flynn is co-author of The Bylaw State, a book that explores municipal government responses to homeless encampments from a legal perspective. Flynn says that the idea for the book came when she and coauthor Joe Hermer were […]

After a decade of work with vulnerable populations, Cory Herzog-Fequet went back to school looking to help shine light on a structural issue. “It’s very meaningful to work one-on-one with people, but…you just see the same issues over and over and over perpetuating indefinitely because they’re systemic and they’re structural,” he said. “I focused on [&#8230...

After years of construction work, new shelter space is expected to open this month in downtown Nanaimo. The Salvation Army Centre of Hope is located at 19 Nicol St. Formerly known as the New Hope Centre, it houses a shelter and other support programming. Construction has been ongoing since 2023 for a new four story […]

Yo Bro Yo Girl co-founder Joe Calendino is working to prevent young people from leading the life he used to live. A few decades back, Calendino was a full patch member of the Hell’s Angels. Dealing with drug addiction, and involved in a high profile fight in a Kelowna casino in 2005, he was kicked […]

A new audio drama airing on Radio Sidney tells a story of elder financial abuse. Beware Mysterious Mark is a 10 part series airing Thursdays through July. Producer Bill Collins spoke with People First Radio about the play, and the issue it seeks to bring awareness to. “It is a traditional kind of radio play. […]

When it opened in 1921, the Weyburn Mental Hospital was hailed as the last and largest asylum in the British Commonwealth. Managing Madness co-author Erika Dyck writes that in the beginning, it was a symbol of both progress and a bygone era, embodying a set of contradictions from the outset. Dyck is a Canada Research […]

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Dr. Jill Wiwcharuk has been practicing medicine for 15 years, largely working with people living on the streets. Since December, she’s added a new dimension to her work, social media influencer. Wiwcharuk posts under the handle streetdrjill. On Instagram, she has more than 75,000 followers at the time of writing. Her videos cover topics related […]

A Nanaimo supportive housing site celebrated a decade of giving people a home in the community. On a sunny April day, staff and residents at Boundary came together for a 10th anniversary BBQ. Boundary is in central Nanaimo near the hospital, it’s run by Vancouver Island Mental Health Society(VIMHS), the organization behind People First Radio. […]

Erin Dej, associate professor in the department of criminology at Wilfrid Laurier University, has been helping craft a curriculum to teach high school students about homelessness. “We recognize that young people are seeing homelessness, that they are aware of it, and they have questions,” Dej said. “We wanted to create curriculum to help them work […]