Vancouver police provide update on ‘barrage’ in Downtown Eastside
Posted March 20, 2025 4:14 pm.
Last Updated March 21, 2025 6:44 am.
Vancouver police say violent crimes and assaults in the Downtown Eastside have decreased since it launched a specialized task force last month.
‘Task Force Barrage’ was launched on Feb. 13, with a purported focus on targeting organized crime, violent offenders, and street disorder.
More officers have been deployed to patrol the area to target suspected drug traffickers and organized criminals.
Vancouver Police Department Insp. Gary Hiar says nearly 200 weapons were seized in the first four weeks of the initiative.
Hiar says assaults with weapons also decreased 30 per cent compared to the previous four weeks.
In September last year, Statistics Canada data showed the overall per capita crime rate, based on police reports, was down in B.C. by about three per cent since 2018. The violent crime rate often cited by business leaders, shows it was up by more than 32 per cent since 2018, having spiked sharply in 2019, but it has been mostly unchanged since then.
Vancouver and Victoria have both seen a nine per cent rise in violent crime, per capita, since 2018, StatsCan data showed.
As of early November 2024, police in Vancouver shared that violent offences were down 6.6 per cent from the previous year; property crimes were down 10.7 per cent; and calls for service were down 0.4 per cent. Police say there were 12 “culpable” homicides in Vancouver in 2023; in 2024, there were only nine.
Meanwhile, police response time in Vancouver increased by 0.8 per cent – five seconds slower than the same reporting period in 2023.
Last month, Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim said the task force will cost an estimated $5 million. Coun. Pete Fry told 1130 NewsRadio he thinks the initiative misses the mark.
In February, Fry asked, “If this hasn’t been a priority, what has been the priority? Because we [already] have one of the best-funded police forces in the entire country, and if we haven’t been targeting organized criminals in the Downtown Eastside who were preying on vulnerable populations, what have we been spending our money on?”
Other critics warned the ‘barrage’ of seizures and arrests will likely lead to an increase in wrongful arrests and trouble for innocent people living in the area.
Harm reduction and recovery advocate Guy Felicella tells CityNews that a lot of the weapons are carried by people who don’t feel safe living on the street.
“There are no homes for people to go to so if you want to significantly reduce a lot of that, I suggest continuing to put supportive housing so people can get off the street,” Felicella said.
He believes the larger police presence in the area could also lead to an increase in toxic drug poisoning deaths.
—With files from Maria Vinca, Charlie Carey, Lauren Stallone, and Sonia Aslam
