The Peardonville overpass in Abbotsford, B.C., is nearly invisible. With its overgrown infrastructure and abandoned exits littered with shopping carts and trash, it’s entirely forgettable to the passing eye. Equally invisible are the homeless people who stay here, living (and often dying or overdosing) in tents in the thicket of weeds.
This and other places like it in the Fraser Valley community—like South Fraser Way overpass, Clearbrook, or the Hub Pharmacy alleyway—are where Joseph Sikora conducts his boots-on-the-ground ministry to help people suffering from addiction, which includes, among myriad other things, giving free haircuts to the homeless.
“There’s people dying in there all the time, people getting shot, stabbed, bear-sprayed. Like, it’s just disgusting,” Sikora, 43, told The Epoch Times, speaking of the city’s notorious tent cities.
“We got about 10 volunteers,” said Sikora, a Kelowna native. “We went from one day a week to two days a week.”
Sometimes, they parked square in the middle of the camp to meet the homeless and hand out food. Soon after, they noticed a video of street barbers cutting hair for free on social media.
“Why don’t we cut hair in the homeless camps?” Sikora thought.
They started bringing clippers, shears, and barber’s capes and chairs to homeless camps, and soon photos of smiling faces long starved of their dignity appeared on Facebook. Donations flowed in from online.
But beyond funds, Ground Zero became a lifeline for addicts, many of whom Sikora believes would otherwise have perished.
“The reason why we’re out there doing this is so we build a connection with them,” he said. “Then when they want a way out of their lifestyle, they will call us and we will help them get into detox and treatment. That’s it.”
Since launching, Ground Zero has lifted over 60 people off the street and into sobriety, according to Sikora. He eventually became a full-time community support worker and received government grants for his ministry; however, the federal government recently deemed Ground Zero not a viable solution for homelessness and withdrew funding. Community support is essential now, as Sikora has returned to work in construction, managing his ministry work on the side.
Hitting Bottom
As a former addict, Sikora’s motivation stems from life experience. Once a rebellious teen with an “authoritarian” father, he quit school at age 14 and started selling and using hard drugs like cocaine, later advancing to opioids like fentanyl. He’s lived in crack houses and hung with gun-toting drug dealers. That got him respect from his peers, who used to bully him.“I knew what I was doing was wrong,” he said. “I had this pulling on my heartstrings, the Holy Spirit telling me, ‘Joseph, you’re doing wrong. This is not good. This is not what I want for you.’”
Life became unmanageable. Friendships and family ties unravelled. “I literally lost everybody in my life that I thought had meaning,” Sikora said. “I literally was like, ‘I can’t do this anymore.’”
He took corrective steps, yet his saga wasn’t over. He entered a Christian teen recovery program in Ontario, but relapsed into addiction. After becoming a father, he lost custody of his son to a mother mired in prostitution. He then hit rock bottom.
Fortunately, rock bottom brought a messenger.
Now 20-something and homeless, with a broken jaw wired shut after being attacked, and resorting to dumpster-diving for food, one day Sikora was stopped on the roadside by a random stranger.
“He saw me pushing my buggy up the road, and I was crying,” Sikora said. “I hadn’t slept in 23 days. I [had] drug-induced psychosis. I was paranoid.”
The stranger said in gentlest voice, “Hey man, can I talk to you?”
“He looked at me right in the eyes, and he says, ‘God has a plan for you,’” Sikora recounted.
The stranger added, “God has a destiny for your life, and this is not it.”
Tears flowing, Sikora prayed. Then he called his brother, a former addict who now runs a recovery program in B.C.
Not long after, Sikora flew home to Kelowna. Working in construction, helped by loved ones, he detoxed and stayed clean, though he admits he’s still “not free and clear of the demons” of his past. In January, he married a fellow recovered addict and mother, Jennifer, and honeymooned in Cancun. She had gone on Sikora’s first ventures into the homeless camps four years ago.
Today, they drive cargo vans full of food in from Costco. They also deliver everything plus the kitchen sink to needy households.
“And I still do haircuts, second Sundays each month,” said Sikora, who now calls Abbotsford home.
‘The Problem Goes Much Deeper’
Those who come for a haircut often don’t really need one, Sekora says. That’s not always why they’re there.He pins down the root of the problem he sees in Abbotsford.
“Trauma,” Sikora says. “Broken relationships, addicts losing losing their children, not having access to their children, ... divorces, and unresolved heart issues.”
Nor is the solution a government program, he adds, where “chances are, you’re only going to get sober and you’re not going to recover.”
“The problem is not the drug. The problem goes much deeper,” he said. “You need to allow God into your heart so he can heal it.”
He recalled the story of Massimo, a former homeless drug addict in Abbotsford, one of dozens who Ground Zero has helped.
“He was on about 2,800 milligrams of morphine a day. He was also using about half an eight ball of fentanyl a day,” Sikora said.
Massimo was on opiate replacement therapy, receiving drugs from the government. His girlfriend had called the ministry.
Massimo is now clean and working.
“He just boggles my mind,” Sikora said. “To this day, he is doing well. He is no longer on any sort of opiate.”
