Despite no power or water, majority of Vernon trailer park residents staying put

The thrum of a generator almost drowns out the sound of the radio playing outside a trailer at the Crown Villa Mobile Home Park in Vernon.

It’s been four days since the park had its power cut off and a resident close to retirement age is putzing around on her deck.

“It’s warmer outside than it is inside,” she says. “It’s 14 Celsius inside.”

It’s a damp and grey day, which would be exacerbated by the knowledge that there was nowhere warm to escape to.

The woman has bought a gas generator, but she said it’s not powerful enough to run her electric stove or a heater. Instead, she’s heating water on her barbecue and having a sponge bath. The lack of power means the well doesn’t work.

She can at least put the radio on and charge her phone.

She’s remarkably upbeat for a person whose home has no electricity or water, but is clearly putting on a brave face.

“I paid good money for my home. It was supposed to be my retirement,” she said. “It is very stressful. I put all my money into this place, and now I can’t even sell it.”

She’s one of 11 tenants at the trailer park, which had its power cut off last Friday by Technical Safety BC. The provincial regulator first warned the park’s owner, Carol Goldstone, that the electrical system was dangerous and in desperate need of upgrading five years ago.

Residents say they only heard of the electrical issues in December.

“I bought this place in 2019. (Goldstone) never disclosed any of this,” she said. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t have bought in here.”

The woman has been to see family and filled up large jugs of water. It works, but is very much a temporary fix.

She worries about what will happen in the winter. Aside from the lack of heating, the pipes will freeze, and flushing the toilet with a bucket won’t be an option.

Moving the trailer to another park also isn’t an option. It’s too old, and other parks won’t have it. Renting is simply too expensive. 

On the other side of the park, Kye, who didn’t want to leave his last name, is heading out. He has the heat blasting in his truck to keep warm.

“It’s been a little chilly the last couple nights,” he said. “This morning’s probably the worst.”

He says he’s waiting on a portable solar AC power station, which can also be charged from a regular outlet. 

“I can go to my mom’s place and charge it,” he says. “It charges in less than an hour.”

Kye is younger than most at the park and says he’s lived there for 12 years.

He’s been using his camping stove to heat up water. 

“It’s a slow process for me,” he said.

He also seems remarkably resilient.

“I don’t need too much, I guess,” he said. “I’ll stick it out and do the best you can.”

Across from Kye’s trailer, Denise Harder is putting on a brave face.

She’s living in her trailer with her 84-year-old mother.

“It’s been a struggle,” she says. 

There is a gas camping stove on her deck, which she’s been using to cook with, and her sister has been bringing her water. She said she can’t afford a generator.

Her mother is bundled up in her winter coat on the coach, drinking a hot cup of tea.

“We’re just really super tired, and we just want our power back,” Harder said.

She has no plans to move.

“Try getting an 84-year-old woman out of her home that she’s owned for almost 33 years,” Harder said.

“Not gonna happen.”

Some have moved on though.

A senior who required oxygen, and therefore power, moved to an apartment in town. 

“He wanted to live and die here,” his former neighbour Lisa Cantafio-Anderson said.

His trailer faces out onto the fields and now sits empty.

Cantafio-Anderson said another woman with a young child moved in with her mom. Another family found a place in Enderby.

They still have their rent to pay, and still own the trailers.

One resident only moved there last September, paying $120,000 for their trailer.

Cantafio-Anderson lives there with her husband and 10-year-old son. 

“We don’t have much, that’s why we’re here,” she said. “That’s why we’re not going anywhere.”

The family have been going to her mom’s for showers and to do laundry, and a friend lent her a battery to keep the fridge going.

It’s not enough for constant power, so it’s hooked up for two hours and then off for four hours and then back on for two hours.

“We got a fire pit out here to keep warm and… we have an (outdoor) cooking station,” she said.

Standing outside her trailer, she’s wrapped up against the cold.

“I’m under three heavy blankets in the house because the house is actually colder than it is out here,” she said.

Only 10 minutes from downtown Vernon, the trailer park is a sleepy oasis, full of large trees and backs onto hundreds of acres of farmland.

Cantafio-Anderson has lived there for 11 years.

“When we first moved here, I loved it, and I was telling people it’s like camping 24/7,” she said. “And now I am camping 24/7.”

She doesn’t plan to move.

“We’re doing it because we’re determined people,” she said.

But it’s not easy.

“It’s been so stressful,” Cantafio-Anderson said. “Then the not knowing what she’s doing or how this is going.”

An online fundraiser was launched, but it only garnered $2,100 of the needed $80,000.

Cantafio-Anderson believes people think it a scam and that the money is going to the landlady.

“We’re not trying to benefit her. We’re trying to benefit us,” she said. “There’s 11 of us sitting here… (and) we need power.”

With pad rents at Crown Villa going for $265 and $295 a month, residents question why Goldstone didn’t increase the amount to cover the cost of essential repairs?

“We asked her to raise it. She turned around and said no,” Cantafio-Anderson said.

The electrical issue is one of many that has plagued the mobile home park in recent years.

In the spring of 2022, the septic system started leaking and Interior Health ended up going in and fixing it. It then sent Goldstone a $20,000 bill.

Goldstone inherited the park in 1988 from her father, who built it in 1974. Residents complain she hasn’t kept things in order.

“Despite ample opportunity and clear deadlines, the owner has consistently failed to make the required repairs, resulting in further deterioration of the electrical equipment posing greater safety risks,” Technical Safety BC said in a statement when the power was finally cut off.

Residents also complain that the 77-year-old didn’t tell them about the situation with the electrical system.

“I tried not to frighten anybody,” Goldstone said. “You don’t want to scare people and panic people because then what happens… they start selling and somebody comes in and picks (the trailers) up cheap because they’re afraid. No, I didn’t want that to happen.”

She says she tried to handle it, but couldn’t.

Goldstone has repeatedly said she doesn’t have the funds to do the pricey repairs, and as she herself lives on the property, she also has no power or water.

She bought a gas stove and has a generator. Like the others, she brings in buckets of water.

“I don’t want to whine. I’m not a whiner and a complainer,” she said.

She also said she now has a plan.

“I’ll tell you the bad press did me more good than it did bad,” she said. 

Goldstone said she’s been approached by numerous people who have talked about her repositioning her assets.

She’s very vague on the details, but says she’d go into some sort of 50/50 partnership.

BC Assessment has the 2.8-acre site valued at $800,000. Goldstone says she doesn’t know how much the property is worth or how big it is.

According to Goldstone, she has a few investors interested, and the current trailers will be allowed to stay, with the investors then developing the site with more housing.

While she could have looked for an investor before the power was cut off, she said she didn’t think of it.

“I knew I couldn’t go to a bank,” she said.

Outside of the lack of funds, Goldstone can’t explain why she didn’t look at options before the power was cut off.

“That’s old news,” she said. “Let’s move it into the new news now. We’re going to get this moving forward.”

And for now, the families and seniors who stayed behind will have to adjust to a life with power, heat, or water.