Police, park rangers continue Oppenheimer Park decampments Friday

Vancouver Park Rangers and police were once again down at Oppenheimer Park Friday clearing out campers and tents.

The VPD says a 29-year-old woman was arrested for allegedly interfering with park staff.

Crews have been down at the park several times over the past few weeks removing tents.

Posts on social media and advocates have been vocal about park rangers throwing out a camper’s belongings with little regard to the person they belong to.

Activists have been raising questions about the ongoing decampment efforts at the park. Last week, Kaylee — who volunteers as a legal observer with the group — told CItyNews that she and others have been trying to be at the forced evictions every day. She said rangers have been enforcing bylaws in a seemingly arbitrary manner.

“The city should not be able to throw out belongings that they haven’t made any effort to find the owners of,” she said. “To just assume that the owner won’t be able to repair or fix or clean the tents after coming back to it is just ridiculous.”

The City of Vancouver previously told CityNews that items are only discarded if they are deemed to be soiled or drug-related.

However, what exactly “soiled” means isn’t clear, Kaylee says.

“It seems to change by the day and we have absolutely no recourse because when they deem [an item] soiled, we can’t exactly put it into small claims court because there’s just no resources for that. So people lose their stuff … and it’s just humiliating to stand there and argue with rangers and beg them to give you your things back.”

With files from Srushti Gangdev and Hana Mae Nassar.