Vancouver begins CRAB Park ‘clean-up’ despite concerns from residents, First Nations leadership
Posted March 25, 2024 10:01 am.
Last Updated March 25, 2024 7:11 pm.
Vancouver Police Department officers and Vancouver Park Board rangers are at CRAB Park Monday, as the groups begin enforcing a “clean-up” at the legal encampment.
According to CityNews reporter Monika Gul, around a dozen officials have been on site to enforce the clean-up, which the City of Vancouver believes is needed because of numerous safety concerns with combustible materials and unsafe structures.
Listen to CityNews1130 LIVE now!The city has previously said people who leave the encampment on their own will be allowed to move back once the clean-up is done in early April.
Numerous residents were still within the designated encampment area on Monday morning, Gul noted. The fenced-off area is blocked from media and legal observers, she added.
By mid-afternoon on Monday, the park board tells CityNews every resident has left the designated area.
Advocate Andrew Hirshpold told CityNews that residents feel like their concerns are not being taken seriously.
“It saddens me, it maddens me. The whole thing is done with improper procedure,” he said. “They don’t do engagement.”
Stop The Sweeps Vancouver, a housing advocacy group, shared on social media Monday that the “city has begun destroying homes” in the legal encampment.
“Feedback given by residents was rejected, deflected, or ignored. Residents want to and can lead this cleanup with a signed agreement. This is not happening because this ‘cleanup’ is about destroying the CRAB Park Tent City,” STS said on X.
STS says residents of the park were given “less than a week” to move their homes, and is calling for the city to “halt this eviction.”
‘This is not a decampment’: officials
In a statement Monday afternoon, the city affirmed that the clean-up plan is “not a decampment.”
“This is a response to health and safety, including non-compliant and unsafe structures in the General Manager’s Daytime Area of CRAB Park. The safety of those sheltering in the park, our staff, and the public remain our priority, and we are committed to working with the community to address issues that impact the health and safety of those sheltering in the park,” it said.
It said a variety of supports will be on-site during the clean-up, including cultural supports, health and outreach teams to “offer mental health supports and will provide snacks and water,” and BC Housing’s new outreach team.
“At the request of those sheltering in the park, staff have erected two gazebos for a kitchen and donation tent,” the city added.
The city explained that five people remained in the cordoned-off area after 12 p.m., and the city is continuing to work to have them relocated.
“Out of respect for most people who were sheltering in the Designated Area and who have already relocated, the Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation and the City of Vancouver will be adhering to the original timeline and proceeding with the work as detailed in the operations plan,” the city said.
‘Demolition of community,’ First Nations leaders say of plan
The First Nations Leadership Council previously condemned the clean-up plan, calling it the “demolition of a community.”
The FNLC said the structures in the park are vital to keep unhoused people safe and warm, and is “none other than a forced eviction.”
“[It] is a blatant disregard of human rights exposing a distinct lack of empathy and compassion for the dehoused. Without readily available housing alternatives, confiscating the structures that have been put together by park residents is totally unacceptable,” the FNLC wrote in a statement March 18.
The group is calling on the park board and the City of Vancouver to “halt” the decampment and adhere to the January 2022 Supreme Court decision which previously denied the park board to prevent people from sheltering at CRAB Park during the day.
In 2022, the BC Supreme Court ruled in favour of CRAB Park residents, denying an injunction that would allow the park board to evict residents. It also set aside two orders that prohibit sheltering in the park.
The CRAB park encampment has seen several evictions impacting dozens of people since 2020, when many people moved into the park on the waterfront area after the tent city at Oppenheimer Park was dismantled and residents were evicted by injunction. One of the factors the court considered in its decision in 2022 was the history of encampments in parks on and near the Downtown Eastside.
Current CRAB Park residents have a designated space to move their belongings — a fenced-off hill next to the existing camp — while the city cleans and repairs the area, but it is causing tension for the residents.
“It’s not suitable,” Bradbury said. “And they put the fencing around a pen like we’re cattle. It’s ridiculous and they should be ashamed of themselves.”
Melina, a volunteer with Stop the Sweeps, explained some residents are worried about the temporary space, adding it’s not ideal for an outdoor shelter.
“Realistically, the space they designate is not the same amount of room, so the idea that people are able to move all their stuff from there, it’s just not realistic,” Melina said.
“The hill is on an angle, it’s going to be muddy. It’s a much more challenging place to live, and considering the rain is coming, it’s going to be a real nightmare.”
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