Every week, we'll send you an update on what happened at City Hall, School Board, and Park Board in the last seven days. Hear directly from OneCity Councillor Lucy Maloney, OneCity School Board Trustee Jennifer Reddy, and OneCity Park Board Candidates on the goings on in City government.
City Council Update:
Last Friday morning, Mayor Ken Sim and his ABC majority voted to include two plebiscite questions on the ballot focused on the continuing painful and overlapping crises of addiction, mental illness, and untreated suffering on our streets:
“Vancouver has experienced unprecedented levels of street disorder, open-air hard drug use, and disruption to community safety and individual health. Therefore,
1. Are you in favour of the City of Vancouver strengthening its laws to forbid open-air hard drug (Heroin, Meth, Fentanyl, and Crack) use in public spaces?” and,
“2. Should the City of Vancouver formally ask the Province of BC to convert portions of the old St. Paul’s Hospital, or another similar site, into a secure medical facility that provides acute voluntary and 100-plus involuntary care beds for individuals posing a serious risk to themselves or others due to severe substance use and mental health disorders?”
I voted against the Mayor’s motion because it will do nothing to address the very real issues of public safety and open drug use on Vancouver’s streets, will cost Vancouver roughly a half-million dollars, and make it more difficult for people to cast their vote.
If Mayor Sim and his ABC councillors were truly unaware of how Vancouverites feel about open hard drug use, they could have asked the City of Vancouver engagement team to put a survey on Shape Your City, or actually asked people.
We didn’t need to wait for a ballot question to begin this work or advocate to senior levels of Government for solutions. Premier David Eby described Ken Sim as “pushing on an open door”.
During the Special Council Meeting, I moved an amendment to advance the tools the City of Vancouver actually has to reduce street disorder and increase public safety in ways that improve conditions for residents, businesses, and vulnerable people, while supporting dignified pathways to treatment and recovery. Unsurprisingly, it was not supported by the ABC majority.
Targeting people for using drugs in public — while at the same time taking away their options for supervised consumption — only pushes substance use into the shadows. People will use these deadly drugs alone, increasing the risk of preventable deaths and brain injuries.
People’s concerns are real. I hear them every week — from my Downtown neighbours, from parents on the way to school, from exhausted and under-resourced outreach workers, and many others.
We need to do the real work of fixing this issue, instead of pursuing costly political stunts that do nothing but further demonize an already vulnerable population.
We need to build a Housing First approach into how this city defines public safety, because you cannot treat your way out of this crisis if there is nowhere to go when treatment ends.
My amendment contained a plan built on twenty-five years of Vancouver evidence and experience, the Four Pillars approach relying on broad consensus across all sectors and community leaders in the City — funded, staffed, ready to direct today.
And now, thanks to Mayor Sim and his ABC council majority, the City will spend a half-million dollars asking residents questions that we already know the answers to, that will change nothing.
If I’m re-elected, I’ll work with my OneCity council colleagues to address Vancouverites’ public safety concerns via a range of evidence-based measures. Keep an eye out for the details in the coming weeks!
If you’d like to see more OneCity councillors in City Hall please donate to the OneCity Victory Fund and sign up to volunteer.
You can reach me at [email protected] or [email protected]. Have a great weekend.
- Lucy Maloney
OneCity Vancouver City Councillor
Park Board Update:
OneCity out on the streets, in your community, at your local farmer’s market!
This weekend, we’re hitting the West End Farmers Market, as well as the Trout Lake Farmers Market – talking to folks who care about how our public spaces are used, and how we can do better.
In knocking doors, hitting the pavement, we always get some good feedback. We heard about the desire for a River District Community Centre, the need to protect green spaces, and the need for transparent, accountable governance!
We also released some policy pieces, including one about surveillance technology in public spaces – something that has been shown to be disruptive and harmful, especially to marginalized folks. We deserve public spaces that are safe, where you can find belonging, where you can exist without the concern of being filmed by covert, wearable recording devices.
This is just one aspect of our public safety plan – that takes a holistic approach to protecting Vancouverites and the folks from beyond who use and love our spaces.
Tyler Petersen
OneCity Vancouver Candidate for Park Board
