Vancouver park board under fire for clearing campers at CRAB Park

Article content

Vancouver’s parks board says it’s within its legal rights to kick campers out of CRAB Park despite an earlier BC Supreme Court ruling that allowed campers to stay due to a lack of adequate housing in the city .

“We continue to comply with the ruling,” said park board Commissioner Brennan Bastyovanszky, who serves as chairman. “The city’s court order (seeking to evict the day campers) was based on the group that camped there two years ago.”

Article content

Article content

On Tuesday morning, park rangers backed by Vancouver police loaded the belongings of about 20 homeless residents of the park’s hillside into garbage trucks to enforce a city bylaw that dictates that temporary shelters in city parks They must be dismantled every morning. Only 14 residents are approved to live in a smaller designated encampment.

The municipal action has been criticized by legal advocates.

“I don’t think the park board can recover from this,” said Alexandra Flynn, associate professor at the University of BC’s Peter A. Allard School of Law.

Flynn said the enforcement action does not meet the legal standard set by a British Columbia Supreme Court ruling that previously denied the park board the legal authority to evict people from shelters during the day, which was based on the conclusion that there was not enough space. for residents in indoor shelters.

“Simply assuming that those who take refuge in CRAB Park can find ‘elsewhere to go’ does not give the necessary priority to their rights or ensure minimal impairment of those rights,” Judge Matthew Kirchner wrote in the January 2022 decision.

Article content

Article content

Homeless residents have been living in makeshift structures at CRAB Park since May 2021. Last month, campers at CRAB Park were ordered to move to a temporary area on the south hill while the site was remediated before allowing return of 16 designated campers. Two have since moved into housing inside.

The park board has said it will gradually reduce the area designated for camping until the entire area can return to regular park use.

Flynn, who was at the park Tuesday morning, said he saw park rangers get rid of belongings, including Indian drums and teddy bears, of campers who were not allowed to move to the new designated camp area. .

“In his decision, Kirchner said that the rights of park users protected by the charter … should be weighted more heavily by the city than the rights of park users, such as dog walkers.”

But park board commissioners Bastyovanszky and Tom Digby disagree.

“We continue to serve the sentence,” Bastyovanszky said. “The city’s injunction was based on the group that camped there two years ago.”

Bastyovanszky said 10 designated residents left once park rangers informed them about the planned cleanup in March. “They have not returned any phone calls or our attempts to contact them,” he said.

Article content

For the approximately 20 residents of the temporary area, the park board has created an appeals process.

“The park board is not meant to solve the city’s housing problems; there are another 10,000 people who have that park as their local green space and access,” Bastyovanszky said.

Fiona York, a local housing advocate, says the park board’s appeal bids come too late.

“The appeal process only became available after they were forcibly evicted and disappeared a long time ago,” York said, adding that it can be difficult to find people without an address, phone or email.

“How does the park board plan to engage you in a multi-step appeal process?”

This week, York said CRAB Park residents involved in a BC Human Rights Tribunal complaint against the city and its park board for alleged discrimination decided to withdraw from mediation and proceed to a hearing. The complaint was filed on December 4, 2023.

“At this point, it appears that any meaningful accountability requires a court hearing,” York said.

Bastyovanszky, who is no longer a member of the ABC Party but serves as an independent, criticizes the designated park funding used for enforcement.

Article content

“The city and the province must take care of housing; that is not a parks board jurisdiction. We have a really limited budget, (Mayor Ken) Sim keeps cutting our budgets and not allowing us to fund the proper operation of our parks as they are, and yet they are charging us with these costs,” he said.

“People are still wondering where these millions of dollars that could be applied elsewhere in the parks are going, and it’s because of this type of enforcement,” Bastyovanszky said.

Park rangers, with Vancouver police on standby, have been scouring the sanctioned camp every two hours to ensure compliance with the legislation.

Digby says he believes the current bylaws strike a good balance.

“Unsheltered people have a right to be there, but constitutional rights are not the only rights that matter; there is human dignity and health that we wanted to help residents monitor,” Digby said, citing the 90,000 kilograms of debris and materials, 20 Propane tanks and six generators were removed by city crews during the cleanup.

“We are like the owners: They are tenants of our park, so we had to ask questions: Are there too many needles and too much human waste around here to be safe?”

Article content

[email protected]

Bookmark our website and support our journalism: Don’t miss the news you need to know – add VancouverSun.com and LaProvincia.com to your favorites and subscribe to our newsletters here.

You can also support our journalism by becoming a digital subscriber: for just $14 a month, you can get unlimited access to The Vancouver Sun, The Province, National Post and 13 other Canadian news sites. Support us by subscribing today: The Vancouver Sun | The province.

Article content