Several community members have come together to help support over a dozen seniors who were slapped with parking tickets while trying to access a free meal program in Kamloops on Thursday last week.

In an update, Caroline King with the St. Vincent De Paul Society says initially they were under the impression that Precise Park Link had issued the parking tickets to the seniors on Thursday, however, she claims they found it afterward it was Bugs-Gon who had the tickets issued.

“It’s kind of upsetting because when I spoke to the owner, Deb, she said to me, ‘Oh, I had nothing to do with it, and please have them come back and park as long as they park straight and just work with them to park straight.’ But why? I don’t want to have anybody parked there. You give them tickets and then you want to have them come back and park?”

King concedes Deb, the owner of Bugs-Gon, who also rents the other half of its building to Park Link, opened the parking file sometime over the last few days.

“They are dealing with it now they’re going to close the file. They recognize that I accepted responsibility and that I’m working really hard to address it, and I did witness the owner Monday afternoon speaking with bylaw on the issue.”

While the tickets are not being expunged King does note several Kamloopsians’ have stepped up to help the seniors impacted by tickets.

“We have a lot of people who have stepped up and offered to help us and Joe Doyle from the gym and Salter Realtor would like to help us pay them, and some of the seniors have already paid their ticket.”

However, moving forward, King says this situation has changed the way they operate services at the St. Vincent De Paul Society.

“For instance, the meal that we’re having on December 22, we’re closing all other services that day and only doing the meal so that we can limit the parking,” explained King.

“It also means that unfortunately, we’re going to have to be a little stricter with people around us to make sure that our parking is available to us. We’re definitely going to be watching very, very closely so that nobody is ever near that property again.”

While disappointed about the situation, King is hopeful people work together to help one another out.

“I just think people are really frustrated with a lot of things happening around the world and in the community, and I get it, it’s frustrating, but I think we have to find ways to work together to find solutions because we’re all trying to get along and we’re all trying to do good work and I just don’t think this needed to happen.”