'I don't want to see people die': Volunteers in Summerside band together to help homeless

On a cold, sunny February morning in Summerside — Prince Edward Island's second-largest city — Ivy Inkpen sits in her car next to the city's community fridge in a downtown parking lot. 

"Someone made potato soup in containers, which is a nice hot meal," Inkpen said from the front seat, turning to peer into the back of her car. 

"We have a box of sandwiches, another box of sandwiches with chocolate bars, and I have two more boxes of sandwiches in the back seat on the floor."

This is a regular morning for Inkpen: sitting in her car packed with donated food, waiting for anyone who needing a free meal to come along. For the past few months, she's been here six days a week.

The Summerside community fridge is a small wooden shed that houses a pantry area on one side and two fridges on the other. Anyone is welcome to either leave a donation or take what's there. 

Inkpen and her volunteers use this parking lot next to the fridge as a home base from which to hand out packaged lunches to people in need, and collect donations from community members.   

Along with food, she's got blankets, sleeping bags and warm socks in her car to give away. 

"I don't have an office. This is my office," said Inkpen. "People come here every day to give me things to help the homeless people in Summerside."

Much of the conversation around homelessness on P.E.I. in recent months has centred around Charlottetown, the province's capital. The municipal and provincial governments recently dismantled a large encampment that cropped up as the city's housing crisis hit an all-time high last summer. Many of those who had been living at the encampment are now staying at a new emergency shelter that opened in December. 

But homelessness is also a growing problem in Summerside, according to Inkpen and her group of volunteers. 

There are more than 90 people in the area who are experiencing some form of homelessness, said Inkpen — either renting motel rooms, couch-surfing, or living in barns or old campers.

Inkpen worked as a social worker in British Columbia for 30 years and came back home to P.E.I. a few years ago to retire. 

Her work in Summerside began when she stepped in to help someone who had been evicted. It snowballed from there.

"People started telling me about people living in tents all around the city. So I found some people that were in the tents and I tried to give them blankets and food to make sure that they were OK," she said.