The Dominion - Vancouver

The Cornerstone of Gentrification in the Downtown East Side

taramichelle — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 16:00:12 +0000

From the Woodward squat ten years ago, to a displaced neighbourhood

VANCOUVER—Towering 43 storeys at the corner of Abbott and Hastings Streets, in the poorest neighbourhood in Vancouver—the Downtown East Side (DTES)—sits the new Woodwards.

The $400 million project, launched by the City of Vancouver, is a mixture of market and social housing, commercial stores, offices, a public atrium, part of Simon Fraser University's (SFU) downtown campus and a community space. It takes up three quarters of the block, or 1,222,230 square feet.

The block looked very different on September 14, 2002, when a number of people from the DTES and their allies occupied the then-abandoned Woodwards department store in a bid to have the site made into social housing.

“There was gentrification happening all around the world and we saw it coming,” said Shawn Millar, who broke into the Woodwards building with around 60 other people to begin the occupation. “The saying was, 'As Woodwards goes, so goes the neighbourhood.'”

On September 21, police arrested 54 squatters and sealed the building, only to see them return the next day and set up a tent city on the sidewalk. Their numbers swelled to 150 as homeless people and their allies set up camp.

Police later arrested tenters and City workers disposed of their belongings in garbage trucks. The City promised temporary housing for squatters, as well as room in the future Woodwards social housing project.

According to Carnegie Community Action Project (CCAP, an organization that advocates on DTES housing, income and land issues), co-ordinator Jean Swanson, there was no mention at that time of having condominiums at the site.

"At the last minute developers put in two condo towers,” said Swanson. “They said the rich needed to be there in order to make the project pay. Instead the area around Woodwards became a zone of exclusion.”

“Thirty per cent of the Woodwards is social housing, but only 15 per cent is actual welfare-rate social housing that were part of the original demands,” said Ivan Drury, a researcher for CCAP. “A good part of the project is supportive social housing, which is not in accordance with the Residential Tenancy Act and so can be run with immunity.”

Commercial space in Woodwards was offered a ten-year tax break as an encouragement to set up in the neighbourhood, which was deemed to be a high-crime area. Shops such as Nester's Market and London Drugs changed the space by policing it with private security.

“[When you go in there] you're treated like a thief,” said Millar. “They have a sign: 'Where The Community Shops.' It's not where the community shops. The community is not welcome there.”

The September 15 sixth annual Women's Housing March, organized by the DTES-based Power of Women group, called out many high-end cafes and other shops that are now taking over the DTES for making the neighbourhood unwelcome to low-income people. This pattern of gentrification began with the stores situated in Woodwards.

In September 2010, SFU moved its School for Contemporary Arts from its Burnaby campus to Woodwards, into what became the Goldcorp Centre for the Arts.

“We were concerned about the naming of the building because it's alleged that Goldcorp mining in Latin America is pursuing an environmentally and socially destructive policy,” said Dr. Ian Angus, a Professor of Humanities at SFU who was part of a faculty group that took these concerns to the university president. “Naming the school this way connects SFU to corporate practices that have come under widespread criticism.”

Despite student protests that called for an end to the association between SFU and the mining company, SFU has yet to address concerns about Goldcorp's $10 million donation to the university.

After the City of Vancouver paid $50 million of the $70 million price tag on the Centre for the Arts, SFU was left to raise the rest through private donations. Half of Goldcorp's donation went towards paying for the construction of the Centre, while the rest was earmarked for cultural programs. SFU Woodwards hosts events and talks as part of its community mandate.

“It's disgusting because Goldcorp has demonstrated itself to be abusive,” said Christopher Pavsek, Assistant Professor of Film with the School for Contemporary Arts. “It puts to lie anything SFU has said about caring about human rights.”

Woodwards developers' major concession with regard to the DTES neighbourhood, other than fractional social housing, was a community space. A call was put to community groups to to create this space. Of four main groups that attended these consultations, three pulled out and left just one to take the space. The group, known at the time as Creative Technology, became W2 Community Media Arts.

“The place was designed to fool,” said Jim Carrico, who represented one of the many smaller organizations making up the community groups involved with the consultations. “The whole building was designed to not have real mixing. It was built into the architecture. For us, the main floor was off-limits. We were given a smaller space. It was not about helping the groups involved. [The groups] had to come up with the money to finish the space.”

As a result of this perceived exclusion, Carrico left the consultations.

W2 has burgeoned into a number of projects including a cafe, meeting space, arts society and radio show on Co-op Radio. It has also become a controversial space because of its existence in the DTES.

“We had fundraising events to keep W2 running,” said Donna Chen, the organization's former Volunteer Co-ordinator. “We had majority middle-class white males partying in the DTES. How much is this befitting of W2's mission and mandate?”

Strategies like this have had repercussions from the DTES community.

“I don't trust [W2's] motives,” said Lyn Highway, who has worked with a number of social services organizations in the DTES. “I still to this day boycott them. They're in the cornerstone of gentrification in the DTES...They're so eager and willing to participate in that and be at the forefront of its community acceptance.”

Ten years after the squat, the Woodwards building has lived up to its promise of mixing in a different way. It combines housing, commercial space and education, under the guise of community benefit via social housing and a media space.

“What we really need is for the social housing programs to be restored,” said Swanson. “We need self-contained housing with enough space to think that is resident-controlled. The City needs to slow down gentrification and stop pushing low-income people out of the DTES.”

Isaac K. Oommen is a freelance journalist and academic researcher based in the Unceded Coast Salish Territories. Murray Bush is a Vancouver-based photographer and regular contributor to the Vancouver Media Co-op.

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BC Government Weighs in on Musqueam graves

Tim McSorley — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 18:37:10 +0000

BC orders halt to construction on intact burials

c̓əsnaʔəm—The province of British Columbia has finally weighed in on the protection of the sacred Musqueam grave site dug up by a condo developer in South Vancouver. But the BC Liberals didn't bother telling the Musqueam.

After more than two months of protests at the site, late last week the provincial government ordered construction permanently halted at the spot where intact burials were discovered. A permit amended by the province orders developer Lan Pro Holdings to return the immediate area where the graves were desecrated to close to their "original condition." It does not refer to the rest of the Marpole Midden, where the condo site is located.

The permit change was announced Friday, but the Musqueam only found out through the media.

"We had no idea until the media calls started pouring in for a reaction. They didn't`t tell any of us, not even the band office. We never did get the press release they sent to everyone else," says Mary Point, who has been active at the site demonstration.

Point says the order is a start, but covers a small part of the development site.

"We need to protect the entire site," she says, adding that it makes no sense to protect one small part but not the entire burial grounds.

The Musqueam have continuously occupied the Midden village for more than 4,000 years. The Musqueam have been trying to negotiate a land swap with the developer since the first graves were disturbed in April.

The province, the city, the developer and the First Nation are now scheduled to meet Tuesday to try to move negotiations along.

Murray Bush is a Vancouver-based photographer and regular contributor to the Vancouver Media Co-op, where a version of this article was originally published.

Ongoing Musqueam protest to protect ancient village and burial site, Vancouver, June 2012.

A New Guide to Making Beautiful Trouble

dawn — Wed, 23 May 2012 05:20:43 +0000

"It's like an Anarchist Cookbook for the 21st century, but without the bombs"

VANCOUVER—Every chair, couch space and rolling computer seat, as well as some floorspace and standing room, were needed to accommodate the dozens of people who came out to the Purple Thistle Centre on Tuesday evening for the Vancouver launch of Beautiful Trouble: A Toolbox for Revolution.

Along with local contributor Harsha Walia, co-editors Dave Oswald Mitchell and Andrew Boyd were in town to discuss the book, a sort of encyclopedia for creative activism. More than 70 artists, authors, organizers and other shit-disturbers contributed entries.

"It's like an Anarchist Cookbook for the 21st century, but without the bombs," quipped Boyd. His other marketing brainstorm likens the book to the offspring of 1960s Yippies founder, activist prankster and writer Abbie Hoffman and community organizer Saul Alinsky, author of the seminal 1971 book Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals.

Boyd's joking aside, the comparison of Beautiful Trouble to Alinsky's Rules for Radicals has its merits. Both works focus on strategic planning and organizing for effective actions and campaigns. To that end, each of the modular entries in Beautiful Trouble's four main categories—tactics, principles, theories, and case studies—is accompanied by sidebar references to other entries in the various sections as well as to books and websites for further reading.

"It actually came from the field of architecture," said Mitchell of the book's modular organization, derived from the concept of pattern language in architecture. "It puts the tools into people's hands so that they can apply them to their situation."

The collective organizing experience and activist knowledge of those gathered at the youth-run Purple Thistle would likely add up to a few centuries' worth. As people commented on slideshow photos of past actions, such as a famous snapshot of a lunch counter sit-in for racial desegregation in the southern United States, co-editors Boyd and Mitchell described some of the tactics, principles and theories at play in each example.

Local South Asian activist and writer Harsha Walia participated in the Beautiful Trouble project, contributing the entries "Challenging Patriatchy as You Organize" and "Consensus is a Means, not an End" to the Principles section of the book. She had not seen the final edited version of the publication before Tuesday.

"It was all kind of compiled in this wiki-type thing," Walia said of the process for contributors. She added that the book really encourages strategic thinking, reflecting that often when people are organizing, they are not really focused on the differences between strategy, tactics, goals and so forth.

"There's all kinds of ways that we don't really think things through," said Walia.

One of the tactics discussed at the launch was Prefigurative Intervention, an action that creates "a little slice of the future we want to live in." Its common uses are listed in the book as follows: "To give a glimpse of the Utopia we're working for; to show how the world could be; to make such a world feel not just possible, but irresistable."

Walia shared her reflections from a seat at the back of the room alongside some of the women who participated in the tent city that took place during the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. At the end of the tent city, housing was found for some 80 homeless participants, but Walia considers it to have been more than just a successful direct action.

"The community that developed at the tent city was a prefigurative community," she said. "A lot of people refer to it as a place of freedom."

Boyd envisions that people will use Beautiful Trouble in two different ways: as an introduction to new ideas for people who are new to activism, and as a sort of reference book for "veterans."

"It's like a network of ideas and principles and tools," he commented, describing the book as "rhizomatic."

"I don't think that it really works reading it cover-to-cover," added Mitchell. "You just sort of navigate by association."

The launch of the book Beautiful Trouble: A Toolbox for Revolution will be followed by the launch of a website in the same vein as the design and purpose of the print publication. In fact, blank module formats are included in the book so that anyone can outline a tactic, principle, theory or case study to submit a new entry to the web-based project.

"We will be able to continue to add modules as they come up," explained Mitchell, adding that the website will be just as important as anything in book in that it will encourage activists to think in strategic terms.

Because publisher OR Books is printing the book on demand, Beautiful Trouble will likely not be available at many bookstores anytime soon but can be ordered online.

Mitchell and Boyd have moved on to book launch events in other cities and will be in Edmonton on May 23, but hopefully the discussions about strategic and creative activism that they inspired on Tuesday evening will continue in Vancouver.

Sandra Cuffe is a Vancouver-based journalist and regular contributor to the Vancouver Media Co-op, where this article was originally published.

Beautiful Trouble

Indoor Work Spaces Prove Safer for Sex Workers

Tim McSorley — Tue, 15 May 2012 23:28:17 +0000

Study shows drop in abuse, HIV rates when sex work brought indoors

VANCOUVER—A recently released study by the BC Centre For Excellence in HIV and the University of British Columbia proves what community advocates have been saying for years: safer indoor spaces for sex work save lives.

The study interviewed 39 women living in supported housing projects on Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. Run by RainCity Housing and Atira, these projects are self-identified women-only (in terms of staff and residents) and include safety measures such as cameras in the buildings, sign-in sheets for guests and harm reduction supplies. Sex workers who live in these buildings are allowed guests, which means that they can bring in their clients.

The women who live in these buildings were largely homeless before moving in, or living in buildings that did not allow guests. This lead to interactions with clients where the workers had very little power or control. “It’s common sense if you think about it,” says long time sex work advocate Trina Ricketts. “Imagine yourself preparing to work outside in the cold, negotiating services and fees in strangers’ cars. Then imagine yourself preparing to work out of your apartment building, which happens to be staffed with caring, vigilant support staff committed to helping you stay safe no matter what.”

The findings are that these projects help empower women to better negotiate safer sex with clients, which is a factor in preventing HIV transmission. “We have previously shown that displacement and lack of safer indoor options for street-based sex workers are directly associated with elevated rates of violence and HIV risk,” says Dr. Kate Shannon, the senior author of the study. Of course, having easy access to healthcare workers with harm reduction supplies also helps.

Workers also reported that being housed inside made them feel safer from police harassment and violence. While many of the workers interviewed for the study were quite weary of police, they found that they felt safer when placed in one of the housing projects.

As one sex worker explains: “On the corner, doing it in the car, I used to be scared all the time, paranoid about cops, scared of getting charged. It is a lot easier now. It is different.”

Less fearful relationships with police as well as access to trained healthcare staff and harm reduction supplies are meeting survival sex workers where they are at. “We have created policies and practices that support women’s choice and ensure their health and safety are protected,” says Amelia Ridgway, Manager of RainCity Housing. “Women have the right to govern their own bodies. We believe that housing is a human right and this is about providing women with the most basic human rights around protection from violence within a harm reduction framework."

This study reinforces the need and effectiveness of safe, indoor sex work spaces which is very encouraging for the sex work community. “Safer sex work spaces support better health and safety, period,” said Dr. Patricia Daly, Chief Medical Health Officer, Vancouver Coastal Health.

Kathleen Cherrington who has organized events such as the International Day To End Violence Against Sex Workers says that perhaps more intentional work spaces may be a next logical step. Not everyone wants to bring their work home with them. “Some sex workers have children and need a place to work that isn't from home. So we also need brothels that are for those wanting a place to work that is away from home,” says Cherrington.

The West Coast Cooperative Of Sex Industry Professionals has formulated a business plan which includes a collectively run sex work space where workers can take their dates. This would be a multiple room establishment where folks could pay per use. Their vision is described as similar to a bath house, with showers, towels and safer sex supplies avaialble to both workers and patrons. The hope would be that as patronship increased, costs could be kept low. Unfortunately, this plan was formulated quite some time ago and has not come to fruition due to both a lack of funding (capital) and legality issues.

This study comes on the heels of a legal development that the sex working community sees as encouraging. The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that prohibiting bawdy houses is unconstitutional, as it increases the dangers faced by those who are forced to work on the streets. While the Conservative government is currently in the process of challenging this decision, it may very well find its way into the practices of law enforcement in Vancouver.

In the meantime, Ricketts feels that more housing, like the facilities in the study, are sorely needed in Vancouver and that no survival sex workers should go without a home. “In my opinion, being homeless is violence,” she says. “So providing housing is paramount to reducing violence against women.”

Eli Mills is a contributor to the Vancouver Media Co-op.

This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

Trina Ricketts

Oil, Gas and Banks Head South

Miles — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 10:56:15 +0000

Mining companies are only part of Canada's corporate presence in Latin America

LOS CABOS, MEXICO—The hard fought battle against the Keystone XL pipeline, which was slated to carry tar sands crude across Canada and the United States to port in Texas, kicked struggles against Canadian-owned oil and gas companies up to a new level. Resistance dominated headlines in Canada, while rural folk, Indigenous people, celebrities, and climate activists in the US took direct action to block Calgary-based TransCanada’s plans. In northern BC, Indigenous-led resistance to the proposed Enbridge pipeline, along with a host of other US-owned infrastructure projects, have become front and centre issues for environmentalists and activists across Canada.

The role of Canadian oil, gas and pipeline companies in other parts of the world is, however, less discussed. Many activists have focused on the behavior of the Canadian mining sector, a natural choice given the size of that sector compared to the oil and gas industries in Canada. “In Canada, a major difference between the oil and gas and mining sectors is that while many of Canada’s largest companies are oil and gas producers, some with integrated operations, they are not particularly prominent in the global arena just now,” reads a 2008 report by the Economic Commission on Latin America.

It’s been four years since that report was released, and it might be time to revisit the idea that the Canadian oil and gas sector hasn’t gained prominence on a global scale. Take the case of Latin America, where a host of oil and gas companies based in Calgary and Toronto have been increasing their holdings throughout the hemisphere, taking advantage of the same lax legal standards Canadian mining companies enjoy.

A study by Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP found that in 2010, Canadian oil and gas companies made over $35 billion in mergers and acquisitions in Central and Latin America, and the region is the second most attractive place (after the United States) for Canadian oil companies to invest outside of Canada. Colombia in particular has quickly become a favourite destination for this new surge of Canadian oil and gas investment.

At the same time as the Canadian Senate approved a free trade agreement between Canada and Colombia in June of 2010, a government-hosted bidding fair on oil and gas properties was taking place in Cartagena, Colombia. "I have some good news for our Canadian friends. The Senate has just approved a free trade agreement...so that opens the way for a lot of opportunities and our government is very happy about that,” said then-Colombian Energy and Mining Minister Hernan Martinez to corporate representatives bidding on oil and gas concessions in Cartagena that day.

Canadian oil companies were among the chief supporters of the agreement, which was roundly criticized because of the continued killings, kidnapping and displacement of Indigenous people, trade unionists, peasants, dissenters and the poor in Colombia. A free trade agreement with Peru was approved by the Canadian Senate a little later, on the heels of a massacre in the Amazon province of Bagua where an estimated 100 people were killed during protests in defense of their lands.

A preliminary list of Canadian oil companies active in Latin America

CALGARY
Gran Tierra Energy Incorporated: Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, Peru
Parex Resources Incorporated: Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago
Canacol Energy Limited: Colombia, Guyana, Brazil
Talisman Energy Incorporated: Colombia, Peru
Nexen Incorporated: Colombia
Petrominerales: Colombia, Peru
Quattro Exploration and Production: Guatemala
Quetzal Energy Limited: Colombia

VANCOUVER
Petro Vista Energy Corporation: Colombia, Brazil
TrueStar Petroleum Corporation: Guatemala

TORONTO
Pacific Rubiales Energy: Colombia, Peru, Guatemala

Pacific Rubiales and Talisman, two of the most important Canadian oil companies in Colombia, have already come under intense criticism linked to the high environmental and social cost of their operations.

A class action lawsuit brought against Talisman in 2002, which was later dismissed, alleged that the company was involved in funding war in southern Sudan. “Talisman Energy finances and directs the Government of Sudan’s ethnic cleansing campaign and must be stopped before all of our villages are destroyed and all of the people are killed,” said Taban Deng, a former government official, in 2002, from what is today Southern Sudan.

In some ways, it seems that little has changed in the 10 years since Talisman was active in Sudan. In December of last year, Amazon Watch released testimony from a priest who traveled into northern Peruvian Indigenous communities near Talisman’s operations. “The presence of Talisman is generating conflict between those who accept and those who don't accept the company, and a conflict like this here in the jungle runs the risk costing many lives,” said Father Diego Clavijo. “What they are doing here [in the Pastaza river basin] with some ex-leaders is also dividing people, and it is going to cause death and destruction,” he said. “We are on the verge of genocide, genocide between peoples, due to infighting over the presence of the company here.”

Talisman made inroads in conflict-ridden Colombia in 2010, when they bought 49 per cent of BP’s oil and gas projects in Colombia, including more than 2,000 kilometres of pipelines.

Pacific Rubiales, for its part, operates the largest oil project in Colombia. The company, which at one point had a military base with 600 soldiers stationed on its property, has been subject to ongoing strikes by the United Workers Union (USO). Numerous incursions by riot police to break up strikes have resulted in serious injuries among workers. Pacific Rubiales is working hard on public relations, having recently sponsored a prestigious golf tournament in Colombia, inaugurated with a celebrity swing by Bill Clinton.

Along with Nexen, another Calgary-based company, Pacific Rubiales has announced that it has discovered natural gas reserves within its Colombian concessions. A number of other Canadian companies have recently displayed renewed interest in the vast jungle regions of northern Guatemala, which is populated by communities primarily of Mayan descent. Increasing conflict in the region, exemplified by a horrific massacre of 27 peasants in San Benito, Peten, last year, has not been linked directly with oil and gas interests, instead being linked to the activity of drug cartels.

Tracing the fault lines of Canadian oil and gas companies in Latin America and the Caribbean also requires looking at Canada’s role in the banking sector throughout the region. RBC and Scotiabank are both major players, with banks and ATMs popping up throughout countries with heavy mining and oil and gas investment.

"Today, RBC has bought off every single aspect of the [Royal Bank of Trinidad and Tobago], and now financially dominates the landscape," said Macdonald Stainsby, an activist and writer who returned from the island nation earlier this year. “[RBC has] openly called for financing of new oil plays, in particular they’ve brought up tar sands,” he said. Stainsby, who runs the website oilsandstruth.org, increasingly devotes time to making links with communities organizing against tar sands in countries like Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela.

Building these links of solidarity and continuing to raise awareness about the impacts of oil and gas projects on local communities, while at the same time organizing against war and repression that so often accompany these projects, is work that must continue if we are to have any chance of collective survival on this planet.

Dawn Paley is a freelance journalist and co-founder of the Vancouver Media Co-op. A version of this article was published in the March/April print edition of Watershed Sentinel.

Oil Death Jeans Improved

We Need to Fight Back!

stephlaw — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 11:31:28 +0000

Community March Against Racism takes to Vancouver streets

VANCOUVER—Hundreds of people took to the streets of Vancouver on March 18 for the annual Community March Against Racism, marking the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination on March 21. The march, organized by No One is Illegal (NOII)–Vancouver, began at Commercial Drive and 14th Avenue and made its way along the Drive to Grandview Park.

Along the way, stops were made to gather for songs and speakers. After Coast Salish drumming and singing in the middle of the busy intersection of East Broadway and Commercial, Kat Norris of the Indigenous Action Movement asked for a moment of silence "for all of our people on the street, for all of our people incarcerated, for all of our people suffering in their homes..."

Further along the Drive, the march paused once again. "There was a man that was lit on fire on this street by neo-Nazis, and very little was done about it," explained rally emcee Harjap Grewal.

Robertson De Chazal and Alastair Miller, both reportedly members of neo-Nazi group Blood and Honour, have been charged for the 2009 attack against a Filipino man, who had been sleeping on a discarded couch near Commercial Drive. The attack was one of several in recent years that targeted people of colour.

"Feeling safe to walk these streets should not be just a Canadian fiction," a group from the Kalayaan Centre recited in a collective poem. "So-called progressive Van city, silencing histories."

NOII's Grewal highlighted the fact that in the early 1900s, Vancouver was home to race riots and racist legislation—and today racist attacks and legislation remain. "We need to see how these things are linked, and we need to fight back."

"Aqui estamos y no nos vamos. We are here and we're not going anywhere!,” said activist Richard Marquez. "We can't rely on the cops, the courts and the legislators. We’ve got to rely on the people's movement."

Sandra Cuffe is a writer and aspiring janitor currently living in Vancouver.

This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Coop.

Community March Against Racism

Canada is a Racist State

No fences, no borders

Carnival Band

"Stand With Us to Fight"

Tim McSorley — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 12:42:20 +0000

Hundreds protest Enbridge pipeline and oil tankers at Heiltsuk-led rally

VANCOUVER—Hundreds of people from First Nations, environmental and community organizations, and others from Vancouver and beyond, rallied against Enbridge's Northern Gateway pipeline and coastal oil supertanker traffic earlier today, filling the Vancouver Art Gallery grounds.

A march led by the Heiltsuk Nation of the Central Coast departed from the Coastal First Nations office at Granville and Hastings Streets and wound its way through the downtown business district to join another group waiting at the Vancouver Art Gallery. The rally marked the 23rd anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill off the coast of Alaska, which spilled hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil on March 24, 1989.

"Only seven percent of that oil was cleaned up," said Coastal First Nations Executive Director Art Sterritt of the Exxon Valdez spill. "Our well-being as First Nations is dependent on our lands, on our waters.

“Our people, the Heiltsuk people, have always had a position: No oil tankers on the coast! That position has never changed,” Heiltsuk elder Edwin Newman said, addressing the rally. “We are pleading with our coastal neighbours to stand with us to fight this issue.”

“When we stand together, we are a powerful people,” added Newman, whose call for unity was echoed by speaker after speaker.

"We are Canada's energy union and we stand with you on this issue," Jim Britton, Western Region Vice President of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers' Union (CEP) told the crowd. "We do not support Enbridge. We do not support Northern Gateway...This isn't just about oil. This is about us. This is about our communities."

If built, the proposed 1,200-kilometre Northern Gateway oil pipeline would transport a half-million barrels of tar sands bitumen from Alberta to Kitimat, BC. The proposed twin pipelines' 30-metre-wide right-of-way would cross hundreds of rivers, streams and watersheds along its route through numerous unceded Indigenous territories. The crude oil would then be transported on massive oil tankers through delicate coastal ecosystems and Indigenous territories and finally across the Pacific to Asian markets.

"The world that we have lived in for the past 10,000 years is shifting around us," Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org, an organization dedicated to building a global movement against climate change, told the rally, situating the coastal struggle against pipelines and tankers within the global climate justice movement. "The planet is starting to become unglued because we are raising the temperature."

"We know, we absolutely know that this fight is going to completely eclipse the [fight for] Clayoquot Sound," Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, President of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs said. "We know that this fight is going to intensify."

While the struggle against Northern Gateway has garnered massive support and international attention, it is not the only pipeline project facing opposition in the province. Grassroots Wet'suwet'en community activists have been resisting the proposed Pacific Trails natural gas pipeline that would connect to a new Liquefied Natural Gas port on the Central Coast. The project would traverse the unceded lands of many of the same First Nations opposing the Enbridge project. In its case, however, the elected leadership of several First Nations along the route are supporting the Pacific Trails project.

Another lesser-known pipeline project already runs through the lower mainland. The Kinder Morgan oil pipeline brings tar sands crude across the Rockies along its Trans Mountain pipeline to terminals in both Burnaby and Washington State. Only two months ago there was a spill in Abbotsford, BC, following a major oil spill at the Burnaby terminal site in 2007.

Kinder Morgan is expected to announce its expansion plans for the pipeline, according to Ben West, Healthy Communities Campaigner for the Wilderness Committee. The company is reportedly looking to increase the quantity of crude transported from 300,000 barrels per day to 600,000 or 700,000.

"Kinder Morgan has been trying to do this as quietly as possible," West told the rally. "We have to stand together to say no to all these projects!"

As the rally wound down after two hours in the rain, the loudest expressions of support were heard for 11-year-old Sliammon First Nation singer-songwriter Ta'Kaiya Blaney. She recalled going to the Enbridge office in Vancouver one year ago to express her opinion about the Northern Gateway pipeline.

"I was escorted out and I was told that if I didn't leave I would be charged for trespassing," Blaney recounted to the ralliers, who showed their support with enthusiastic cheers.

Before performing her song "Shallow Waters," Blaney told the hundreds gathered on the Monday afternoon of the message found in the song: "If we do nothing it will all be gone."

Sandra Cuffe is a writer and aspiring janitor currently living in Vancouver.

This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

Questions? Comments? Drop us a line: info@mediacoop.ca

Heiltsuk Nation elder Edwin Newma

Rally against pipelines at Vancouver Art Gallery

Khader Adnan's Unpublicized Hunger Strike

stephlaw — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 09:26:43 +0000

Vigil called on CBC to end the silence

VANCOUVER—Khader Adnan, a Palestinian political prisoner, ended his 66-day hunger strike on February 21, after reaching an agreement with the Israeli government in which he will be released on April 17, four months after he was first detained. During his strike, Adnan lost about one-third of his body weight and put his life in danger, according to a doctor who examined him last week on behalf of Physicians for Human Rights.

There was next to no mention of Adnan's strike in Canadian media, though, according to Vancouver Palestine activists who held a vigil and picket at the CBC building in downtown Vancouver on February 16. The activists were calling for CBC to end its silence about his case.

"Khader Adnan is invisible in Canadian media. We see [Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister] John Baird saying that Israel has no greater friend than Canada, at a time when Khader Adnan is protesting his arbitrary detention without charge, settlements are expanding and the illegal occupation continues," said Khaled Barakat, a Palestinian community activist. "We think it is very important to say that Baird does not speak for all Canadians."

Activists from a number of Vancouver-based organizations, including the Boycott Israeli Apartheid Campaign, Canada Palestine Association, Canadian Boat to Gaza, Independent Jewish Voices, Seriously Free Speech, Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, and others joined the picket, where protesters distributed flyers informing the public about Khader Adnan's case, held signs with his image and candles honoring his struggle and sacrifice.

Khader Adnan is a Palestinian political activist, baker, husband and father, and was put into administrative detention by the Israeli occupation military forces. His hunger strike was undertaken to demand the end of administrative detention in Palestine.

Administrative detention is detention without charge, based only on secret evidence, indefinitely renewable by Israeli military judges.

“My husband is dying inside an Israeli jail. The world should make sure I am able to see him,” said Randa Adnan, Khader's wife, before Tuesday's announcement was made. “And it should pressure the Israeli government to release him before it’s too late…Israel denied Khader any fairness or decency…But maybe the rest of humanity will show more mercy."

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch had also called for Khader Adnan to be charged or released. Thousands of people around the world called for his release. In Palestine, dozens were injured at protests calling for his release, where they were attacked with tear gas and rubber bullets.

Despite those calls, domestically and internationally, an Israeli military court of appeal upheld Khader’s administrative detention as late as Monday, Feb. 20. That was before Khader struck the agreement for his release in April. He has still not been charged with any crime.

Charlotte Kates is a Palestine solidarity activist with the Boycott Israeli Apartheid Campaign and Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network in Vancouver, unceded Coast Salish territories. This article was originally published by the VMC.

Questions? Comments? Drop us a line: info@mediacoop.ca.

khader

Khader2

The Spirit Lives On

Tim McSorley — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 15:39:48 +0000

Women’s Memorial March bolstered by thousands; Sisters in Spirit finds new home

DOWNTOWN EASTSIDE—Kept out of the missing women’s inquiry, women’s and Aboriginal groups took to the streets for the 21st annual Women’s Memorial March in Vancouver on Feb. 14. Thousands joined the march to honour women who have gone missing or been murdered in the Downtown Eastside and across Canada.

Aboriginal women are hit especially hard by violence. Sisters in Spirit, a project of the Native Women’s Association of Canada to compile cases of missing or murdered Aboriginal women, had documented 582 cases before its funding was cut off by the federal Conservative government in 2010.

Led by drumming and singing, the march proceeded solemnly from Main and Hastings streets through the Downtown Eastside, an area where the issue of missing and murdered women has been particularly acute. Some participants held panels with the names of women who have gone missing or been murdered.

Participants fell silent as the procession stopped at different points along the route where women had been killed or last seen. Aboriginal elders burned sage and prayed.

“Sham” Inquiry Slammed

For years, residents and workers in the Downtown Eastside had noted that women were disappearing and had tipped police off to a man in Port Coquitlam, but little was done.

The Missing Women Commission of Inquiry is investigating why police took so many years to put a stop to the serial killer. Uncovering a disturbing pattern of misogyny and racism, the inquiry is shedding some light on how the police have failed Aboriginal women and sex workers.

A number of community organizations representing women in the Downtown Eastside and Aboriginal women have refused to participate in what they call a “sham” inquiry, after the provincial government declared it would provide them no funding for the hiring of lawyers. Human rights and legal experts say that to deny these women legal counsel is essentially to render them voiceless.

Sisters in Spirit Rises Again

The defunding of the Sisters in Spirit initiative has been seen by critics as another betrayal of marginalized women. Established by the Native Women’s Association of Canada in 2005, Sisters in Spirit had developed a complex database of information on missing and murdered Aboriginal women, providing invaluable statistics and illuminating a national crisis that has prompted shockingly little response. The project’s supporters have argued that it was defunded because it often focused on the complicity of the justice system, all levels of law enforcement, and news makers in ensuring that cases of violence against Aboriginal women across the country were systematically deprioritized.

Recently, the project has found a new home in the office of Ottawa’s Coalition to End Violence Against Women. Renewed at a grassroots level, Families of Sisters in Spirit picks up where the original project left off. Project volunteers say it fills an information void, as police do not track numbers of missing and murdered Aboriginal women.

“It’s so sad because I post these pictures of missing girls almost every day,” Bridget Tolley of Families of Sisters in Spirit told the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network. “But very rarely I post anything about [cases] being solved.”

It’s no easy task to fight for justice in a society where violence against women, and especially the most marginalized, is allowed to continue, and where resources to bolster this fight are limited. But having no funding, according to Families of Sisters in Spirit’s Kristen Gilchrist, is an advantage.

“We don’t fear the punitive nature of the government,” she said.

This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

The Spirit Lives On 1

The Spirit Lives On 2

Canadian-owned Mine Fuels Violence in Mexico

stephlaw — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 09:29:17 +0000

Residents of San José del Progreso are deeply divided over the mine

SAN JOSE DEL PROGRESO, MEXICO—It's been almost three years since hundreds of people took direct action to temporarily shut down Vancouver-based Fortuna Silver's gold and silver mine near Oaxaca City, Mexico. Since then, the neighbouring community of San Jose del Progreso has been deeply divided and residents have faced a series of difficult and sometimes deadly confrontations.

Three people have been killed so far, most recently, Bernardo Mendez Vasquez, who was shot seven times on January 18, 2012 by a municipal police officer. Locals say municipal authorities ordered the police to attack residents who were refusing to allow a new water system to be installed on their land because they feared it would be used to supply the mine with water.

Mine operation came to a two-month halt in 2009 when Zapotec community members from San Jose del Progreso and surrounding villages held it for nearly two months. The blockade ended with a massive police raid, during which demonstrators were beaten and 23 people were jailed, some for up to three months.

Fortuna has thus far avoided being linked to the violence by playing up the fact that people in San Jose are fighting with each other. CEO Jorge Ganoza has repeatedly referred to it as “senseless” violence.

"It is in no way related to our activities or involves company personnel, and we really hope that the people of San Jose, with the assistance of the state authorities, will find a long-term solution to this senseless violence,” Ganoza told the National Post regarding the recent killing.

The mine, known locally by the name of its subsidiary, Minera Cuzcatlan, went into production in late September 2011. Its opponents maintain that Fortuna Silver’s mine is the root of social problems that plague the once peaceful region.

In a press conference following the police shooting of Vasquez, mine opponents made it clear that they see a direct link between Fortuna Silver and the violence.

“The social and political conflicts that have ended the lives of three people are due to the appearance of the mining company, without the consent of the people, and not [due] to the control and power over the municipality as expressed by various authorities in the state government,” reads a statement signed by over a dozen Oaxacan organizations.

The existence of the mining project is something that residents of San Jose del Progreso cannot ignore. The main access road into the town passes directly in front of Fortuna’s massive operations, complete with the company's own power station, offices and a huge stockpile of ore, all surrounded by high chain link fence.

“In one year [the company] managed to cut the town in half, to divide the people, and the dispute became present in all spaces: in the primary school, in the secondary school, in the kindergarten, in the health centre, in city hall, in all of these situations,” said Bernardo Vasquez Sanchez, who lives in San Jose and works with the Co-ordinating Committee of the United Villages of the Ocotlan Valley.

In the centre of the village, which is home to about 1,200 people, Sanchez pointed out that there are two different taxi stands, one used by people in favour of the mine, and another by those who are opposed.

City hall has effectively been shut down since January, when municipal authorities and municipal police fled after the murder of Vasquez.

“Basically the entire town is divided in two parts, one part that has a mayor, and another part that does not have a mayor,” said Sanchez, who has worked with other community members to formally requested the dissolution of powers of the municipal government.

Sanchez and others are worried the project might eventually become an open pit mine, further threatening the region’s already fragile water system. Given Fortuna’s track record, there is reason to be worried: Simon Ridgway, chair of Fortuna’s board of directors, was subject to two arrest warrants in Honduras because of environmental contamination from an open pit mine now owned by Goldcorp Inc.

Father Martin Garcia Ortiz, a priest in San Jose del Progreso, was beaten and kidnapped by people in favour of the project in 2010. He was later jailed and then released without charge and subsequently decided to leave the parish.

According to sources in Oaxaca City and San Jose del Progreso, a group started by the mining company, called “San Jose in Defense of our Rights,” has taken on a paramilitary role in the community, intimidating opponents of the project.

“Things are so broken that there’s no other way out, the only way, I think, is that the company leaves,” said Father Ortiz.

Dawn Paley is a journalist and co-founder of the Vancouver Media Co-op.

A longer version of this story was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

Questions? Comments? Drop us a line: info@mediacoop.ca.

Fortuna Silver's mine

Bernardo Vasquez Sanchez

Homelessness and Police Brutality

mccabe.melissa — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 10:20:41 +0000

A dispatch from the In our Own Voices writing project

VANCOUVER—In the winter of 2000, I was co-managing a four bedroom house in Walley, BC. My co-manager and I became friends, but eventually he wanted to have a relationship. When I refused, he started to become verbally abusive and controlling with me. I took the abuse for a while, until I started to get incredibly stressed. I decided to leave in the spring of 2001. In a state of extreme depression, I left with a couple of bags and took the bus into Vancouver, where I ended up homeless.

During the day I panhandled for food and smokes, and at night I stayed wherever I could find a quiet and safe spot on the streets such as in a park or in a doorway. I felt alone, scared, and lost in the cracks and in the crowd. I could not sleep at night because there was no privacy, only constant harassment—whether it was the police, private security, drunk people leaving the bars, violent men, or somebody trying to rob me. A few guys tried to get me to do sex-work on the street for them, but I refused.

While I was panhandling, people would always hassle me and yell at me to move away from their store. I would often get sworn at or told to get a job. I felt judged by the people walking by and I was so ashamed of myself. I wish I could have made them understand how hard it really was. It was overwhelmingly difficult just to survive and I would never want to be homeless again. There are approximately 11,000 homeless across BC, with 3,000 people homeless across the Lower Mainland.

I had been on the street for a few months when someone told me to go to the Downtown Eastside to access support and services. I found a welfare worker who helped me get into the Bridge Shelter, where I stayed for one month, after which I got into Bridge Housing in June 2001.

I had to start all over again to establish my life. I found the Downtown Eastside Womens’ Centre. When I first walked in the doors, I did not want people to know me or know where I came from. But I met some friends who told me about the different activities available and I joined various programs and groups. Being a part of the DTES Power of Women Group showed me how to stand up for myself and others, which helped me regain my confidence and I began to feel good about myself again.

One of the issues I have continued to raise my voice against is that of police brutality in the Downtown Eastside. This is just one of the many stories that inspired me to take action.

I had been living in a supportive housing building for women for about nine years. As opposed to private single-resident-occupancy (SRO) housing, one of the benefits of supportive housing run by non-profits is that it maintains the confidentiality of the tenants who live there. Unless it is an emergency or a tenant has called 911, the police can only enter with a warrant.

One day the police arrived at my building looking for a tenant. They did not have a warrant and no one had called 911. The building staff refused the police access into the tenant’s room. I was sitting in the lobby of our building and witnessed the whole incident. At first the female officer got agitated and was demanding that they be allowed into the tenant’s room. The staff did not give in, which just made the police officers angrier, stating that they had a right to go inside. I saw one officer go towards the staff member to grab her arm. I ran out to try to inform people about what was taking place and to get some help.

When I returned, the staff was in handcuffs and had been taken outside. I heard them saying that they had arrested her and would charge her with obstruction of justice. By that time a crowd had gathered and staff from next door at the Downtown Eastside Women’s Centre had also arrived. Eventually, the arrested staff member was let go.

This whole incident made me very angry. There are so many stories of police arrogance and violence, and most are worse than what happened to this staff member. In this situation they were not even following their own protocol. I was scared that if this could happen to a staff member what could happen to someone like me who has less authority in this neighbourhood? It made me feel very powerless and vulnerable, especially as the incident occurred in my own building.

I have lost faith in the police. I fear that if I ever needed them to help me, they would turn on me instead. They do little to protect against actual violence, like all the murdered and missing women. Instead, they are violent towards us, frequently arresting people for minor things like jaywalking, or harassing people who are just standing on the street. It deeply frustrates and angers me that we let the police use their power and badges in such negative ways, and that society allows them to power-trip and do what they want. I imagine a Downtown Eastside where we are free from the arbitrary beatings and the brutality of the Vancouver Police Department, and so I and others fight to make this possible.

Karen Lahey is proud to be a survivor. She has been living in the Downtown Eastside for the past 11 years. Because of the DTES Power of Women Group, she can now publicly speak in front of a crowd and in front of cameras. She likes to help other women find their voice.

This story was originally published on the Vancouver Media Co-op as part of the Downtown Eastside Power of Women “In Our Own Voices” writing project. For more information and to read more stories, please visit http://vancouver.mediacoop.ca/author/dtes-power-women-group

Karen Lahey

Run on the Banks in Vancouver

dawn — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 14:19:28 +0000

VANCOUVER-On Saturday, October 24, the people at Occupy Vancouver moved from the eternal process of the general assembly to the exciting world of direct action.

The "Run on the Banks" action marks an escalation on an occupation that's been busy building infrastructure. This was not an official Occupy Vancouver action but an offshoot, as stated on occupy Vancouver's twitter account.

About a thousand trouble makers made their way through the streets of Downtown Vancouver with the intention to occupy corporate banks and encourage folks to close their accounts.

And that they did. This Royal Bank of Canada was the first target, with about 50 people jamming the lobby while some withdraw their cash.

At the Bank of Montreal people shut down their account and moved to other options.

But the cherry on top was the Occupation of TD, or Toronto Dominion Bank, right next to the Occupy Vancouver camp at the Art Gallery. A home stereo was cranked to the max and the people rocked out on top of teller desks and furniture.

An idea was floated around to continue occupying through the night, but the group could not reach consensus, and the process ultimately disrupted the party.

The police quietly moved in and occupied the spots where tellers once stood to protect their corporate masters. Finally the group decided to move out en-masse and avoid arrest.

This piece was originally produced for the Vancouver Media Co-op. Franklin López is a Vancouver based filmmaker and creator of Submedia.tv.

The Intergenerational Impact of Child Apprehension

mccabe.melissa — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 12:45:36 +0000

A dispatch from the In our Own Voices writing project

VANCOUVER—At the age of 12 years old is when the abuse in my parents’ home started. My siblings and I were subjected to physical and emotional abuse and violence by my parents. We had many visits from the Ministry of Child and Family Development (MCFD) but my siblings and I were forced to lie about the abuse because we were afraid that telling the truth would result in even more abuse.

In 1994, at the age of 15, I was pregnant and gave birth to my first child. The abuse from my parents continued, until I could not take it anymore and I ran away from home. The following day I was taken into MCFD’s foster care and from then onwards, I was moved from home to home. I lost custody of my son, who was also placed into the foster system, thus perpetuating an intergenerational cycle of child apprehension and misery in the foster system.

I have read a report that in BC, young women who have been permanently apprehended by MCFD are four times more likely to become pregnant than young women who have never been in the foster care system. I, too, became pregnant with my second child while in foster care. During my pregnancy, the foster mother slept all day, and I was responsible for our meals and all the cleaning. I was constantly kicked, my hair was pulled, and I was kicked in my stomach. I made phone calls to MCFD, the police, and youth advocates for more support for my unborn baby and I, but to no avail. Instead, when I gave birth, MCFD apprehended my second child as well. Since they were both apprehended, I have not seen my two sons, nor do I know anything about their well-being.

Finally, at the age of 18, I moved into an independent living situation where I had my own living quarters with my own facilities for cooking and cleaning. At the age of 19, I landed my first job as a home supporter worker and was able to financially support myself. That is when I started drinking heavily, almost every night.

At the age of 19, I was pregnant again with my daughter, who is now eight years old. A few years later, I gave birth to my second daughter, who is now four years old. I was the primary parent for both of my daughters until MCFD got re-involved in my life. I did everything MCFD asked of me as a young, single, low-income parent. I did the best that I could to support my daughters. I quit drinking and I never did drugs.

Then in 2009, MCFD made several visits to my home alleging that I was constantly yelling at the girls and that on one occasion I had hit them. On Sep 14, 2009, a MCFD social worker advised me that the ministry was apprehending the girls and that the matter was now before the courts.

Since then, I have been going to every court date and every visit with my daughters, even though the ministry was making it very difficult for me to have visits. I went to a parenting program that they wanted me to attend. While MCFD is falsely pointing fingers at me, I find that the foster parents are completely negligent in caring for my children. In 2010, my youngest daughter had an infected hang-nail and a 101 degree fever. The foster parents refused to take her to the doctor, so during a court date I had to show the social worker a photograph of my girl. The ministry then granted me permission to take my daughter to the emergency room, where she was placed on an IV and antibiotics for a week.

This year, my lawyer and I attended a “mediation” with the ministry. I attempted to get answers as to how they were able to apprehend my children without any proof to back up their allegations of me abusing my girls. The ministry did not provide any answers. They simply said that their intention was to seek a continuing custody order to keep my children in the foster system and will be going to court to seek an extension. I then advised my lawyer and the ministry that it was my intention to have my girls come home with me. We are waiting to set trials for next year.

In the meantime, I start weekly 1-hour supervised visits with my daughters this month. If all goes well, MCFD will increase my visits after one month. I will also be able to attend all the girls’ doctors’ appointments and extracurricular activities. I recently attended a meeting with MCFD and the foster parents to arrange visits and access to my daughters. The foster mother said that if she had to supervise the visits then she would consider sending the girls to another home! I am so frustrated by her attitude and MCFD allowing my daughter’s to be shuffled around like this.

Over the past two years, I have been left feeling hopeless and alone. I feel like I am being ganged up on by MCFD. I have resorted to smoking cigarettes to keep my stress levels down. I wonder, how can I ever be happy without my girls at home with me? Since coming to the Downtown Eastside Women’s Centre I have gotten a lot of support and I have learned that I am not the only one whose children have been apprehended by MCFD. Other women have advised me that it is possible to win against MCFD, which brings me hope.

But my question remains unanswered: why are so many single mothers, especially Aboriginal, being targeted by the MCFD? I found out that as of September 2009, only eight per cent of children in BC are Aboriginal, but approximately 53 per cent of the children being apprehended are Aboriginal. We are stereotyped as abusive, but physical abuse and sexual abuse are not the primary reasons that children are apprehended. In fact, physical harm by a parent was only cited as a ground for removal in ten per cent of child protection cases in the Lower Mainland. Apprehensions are generally the result of a parent’s struggle with poverty; 65 per cent of all child apprehensions are from single parents on welfare.

Serious harm is being done by keeping families apart and by tearing children away from their mothers without just cause. More times that not, siblings are separated from each other and placed in different foster homes. It is not only the children who are harmed, but also the mothers, who then suffer from severe depression and sometimes spiral further into addictions. We should do more to unite against MCFD abuses. It is time that these injustices end.

Courtney is a volunteer at the Downtown Eastside Womens' Centre as well as a member of the DTES Power of Women Group.

Courtney, DTES Power of Women group

My Story of Domestic Violence and Child Apprehension

mccabe.melissa — Sun, 04 Sep 2011 12:34:42 +0000

A dispatch from the In our Own Voices writing project

VANCOUVER—I was abused by my ex-partner, who is also my children’s father, for ten and a half years. I had four children with him—Angela, Rosalie, Mike and Jackson. I was beat all throughout my first pregnancy, and as a result my girl Angela was born a month early. She did not develop properly and was born with her heart on the right side of her body. She was a Mother’s Day baby, born on May 13, 1973, at 5 lbs 11 oz. I named her Angela Michelle because she looked just like an angel. She only lived to the age of 16 and died on January 17, 1990, in Prince George.

It is for her and in her memory that I tell this story.

You might be wondering why I stayed in a violent relationship for that long? I grew up without a dad and was often called a "bastard." I was always taunted with sayings such as, "Do you even know who your dad is?" It hurt a lot to be bullied and I did not want my own children to go through the same experience. So I silently suffered the abuse. At the time I did not realize that it was equally bad, if not worse, for my children to witness the violence of their father beating up their own mother.

I tell this story for the women who are still in abusive relationships so that they will have the courage to get out. Anyone who controls you and physically and emotionally hurts you does not love you. We have to understand that violence against women is always unacceptable, and as Native women we are five-times more likely than other women to die as the result of violence.

I became an alcoholic while I was in the relationship. The alcohol would numb the pain of being beaten; it would numb me for when he got home in the evenings so I could tolerate all the kicks and punches; it would numb me against his false accusations of me cheating on him when he was the one cheating on me with other women.

As a result of my drinking, the Ministry of Child and Family Development (MCFD) became involved in my children’s lives. I had several visits from MCFD over the years and they told me to stop drinking and to get counseling, but I could not stop drinking. They also told me to leave my ex-partner, but I had nowhere to go. For years, MCFD kept apprehending my children. Sometimes they would take my children away for a few weeks; sometimes it was for a few months.

Then in December 1981, in a surprise visit, MCFD workers came to my home. I was not home, but my children’s father was supposed to be home. However he had left them alone in the house and the upstairs neighbour called MCFD. MCFD apprehended my children, this time seeking a permanent order. That meant that my young children, ages one to five, were going to essentially be kidnapped from me forever.

I broke down and started drinking even more heavily. I felt that if I did not have my children, then I had nothing to live for and would rather drink myself to death. One night in March 1982 I drank so much that I felt my heart was going to stop. That night I decided that I did not actually want to die an alcoholic and that I had to fight for my children.

I quit drinking cold-turkey. I went for alcohol counseling at the Native Courtworkers Society and also enrolled at Native Education Society to get my GED. I finally left my partner. After a few months I was able to get two-hour supervised visits with my children every six to eight weeks, but only after I appealed the decision by MCFD to deny me visits entirely.

After I won my right to supervised visits, I decided to appeal MCFD’s decision to apprehend my children permanently. I did not even know that I could appeal this decision until I was informed by an advocate at Native Courtworkers that I could. I realized that MCFD had not informed me of my basic legal rights as a parent and did not actually care to fulfill their responsibility and mandate to keep families together. I felt that as a survivor of violence and as a Native woman, I was being re-victimized by being labeled as a bad mother who was unable to protect her children.

After four years of fighting in the Court system, I finally won my case and my children were given back to me in 1986. Throughout the four years I often felt like giving up but I knew I had to fight for my family. The MCFD social worker reported to the Court that I was ‘not showing love and affection’ to my children. But the Court-ordered psychologist determined that there was lots of affection between us and said that it was clear that my children wanted to come back home. I thank Dr. Diane Mitchell for helping me win my case by recommending that my children be returned. It is frustrating though that we have to rely on these professionals to validate us.

The whole system of child apprehension is grossly unfair and unjust. From my experience and those of other women I know, it seems that the Ministry is interested in keeping children in the foster system rather than returning them to their parents. Most of the children in MCFD’s custody are Native children. In BC, Native children are 6.3 times more likely to be removed from their homes than non-Native children. I believe this is both a continuation of the residential school experience—where children are torn away from their families and communities are destroyed—as well as a consequence of residential schools, which has forced Native families into social dysfunction with rampant alcohol and drug use and abuse in the home. I feel like the odds are stacked against us, but still we continue on.

I am now 29 years sober and my three beautiful children—Rosalie and Michael and Jackson—are parents themselves. Once I had my children back, I told my boys to never hit a woman because it is like hitting your mother. I still live with the guilt about what happened to my deceased daughter Angela. I also felt responsible when my other daughter Rosalie was in an abusive relationship worse than mine. I felt that she thought it was okay to be abused because she watched me take it. But now my daughter Rosalie is happy and has a beautiful eight-year-old daughter named Kayla. My son Michael is 31 years old and has been clean from heroin for several years now. He is working and has a two-year-old daughter named Tayla. My youngest son Jackson is 30 years old and recently graduated from the Academy of Learning. He has a wonderful ten-month-old baby girl named Gianna. I am so proud of my children and thank the Creator for every new day. Love to all my family and friends.

B. has lived in Vancouver for 35 years. She is from Bella Bella. She is currently 29 years sober and volunteers at the Downtown Eastside Womens’ Centre. She loves being part of the DTES Power of Women Group because the group fights for everything she has been through—from violence and abuse to child apprehension—and gives her a voice! She also marches in the February 14th Womens’ Memorial March Committee for her murdered sister and niece.

Recently, B. was in the hospital for two months due to double pneumonia. She went through surgery for her right lung on December 28, 2010. She feels lucky to be alive and would like to thank all her family and friends for their prayers and visits, which meant a lot to her.

This story is part of the Downtown Eastside Power of Women “In Our Own Voices” writing project. For more information and to read more stories, please visit http://vancouver.mediacoop.ca/author/dtes-power-women-group

B. Photo by Joe Philipson

Brakes On

dawn — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 10:52:58 +0000

Speed limits in Vancouver's Downtown East Side hailed as victory by residents

VANCOUVER—People in Vancouver's Downtown East Side will step a little more lightly this fall, as the speed limit on East Hastings Street drops to 30 kilometres an hour, and more pedestrian controlled crossings are introduced into the bustling neighborhood.

Passed on July 26, the measures are part of a set of demands made by the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU) to make the Downtown East Side safer for the community.

The Downtown East Side has been identified as the most dangerous place in Vancouver for pedestrians, according to University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser University researchers. More than a quarter of the city's identified “hot spots” for pedestrian injuries—locations where more than five people were hit by cars over a five year time period—are in the 10 block stretch of Hastings street where the changes will be implemented.

VANDU's recommendations represent the findings of the We Are All Pedestrians report, a community-based research and advocacy project undertaken by VANDU. Focusing on data collection, education, and community outreach, the project hired people from the Downtown East Side to research both driver and pedestrian volumes and behaviors, including a pedestrian survey and observation of the effects of street and sidewalk design.

“It snowed and it rained, but we stayed out there for hours,” said researcher Lorna Bird, an organizer with VANDU and the Western Aboriginal Harm Reduction Society. “What we saw was that the police were handing out tickets for jaywalking in the Downtown East Side, but not on Davie and Robson.” Only 15 per cent of people in the Downtown East Side own vehicles, notes Bird. “People from other places are speeding through our neighborhood as a shortcut to get home,” she said.

The pedestrian safety project has set a precedent of cooperation between City Hall and the city's most marginalized community. “It was a really successful collaboration,” said VANDU organizer Aiyanas Ormond. The initiative emerged out of a "much less collaborative" process, however, surrounding what VANDU calls a “ticketing blitz” initiated by the Vancouver Police Department in 2008.

Under the guise of improving public safety, officers handed out over 1,100 tickets in the Downtown East Side for infractions like jaywalking, public urination and unlicensed vending.

“We challenged them on a number of occasions to prove that handing out jaywalking tickets improves public safety, and unsurprisingly they couldn't produce any evidence to support that,” said Ormond. VANDU members attended police board meetings, and even stormed a council meeting to demand that the city take a more proactive approach to public safety in the Downtown East Side. “Over 50 people stood up and said 'This is a crisis in our community,'" said Ormond. "People were afraid and felt targeted, being handed these tickets that they would never be able to pay.”

With funding to hire community members as grassroots researchers, the We Are All Pedestrians research took place in 2009 and 2010. While the report was well received by council, it took some pushing on the part of VANDU to get the changes that were won on July 26.

In the spring of 2011, VANDU sent a letter to Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson asking why no action had yet been taken on the report, even though the city had sent representatives of the City of Vancouver and VANDU to the International Urban Health Conference in New York to present the research. “Eventually, [city councilor] Kerry Jang came down to our Tuesday [VANDU Action Group] meeting with some city staff, and offered to implement the 30km per hr zone,” Ormond told The Dominion.

While the pedestrian safety measures approved by council are a step in the right direction, organizers at VANDU are still pushing for action on other parts of the community's demands that came out of the ticketing blitz in 2008.

The need for more public toilets in the neighborhood has been identified as an urgent concern, as many of the tickets that were handed out in the blitz were for public urination and defecation.

Following the success of the We Are All Pedestrians project, the city asked VANDU to do research on the public toilets issue. “This was really frustrating,” says Ormond. “[VANDU's research] basically just confirmed a decade of research that's already been done saying the same thing: we need more accessible public toilets in the Downtown East Side.”

Although hours for two existing public toilets in the neighbourhood have been extended for a trial period, the research project is currently stalled as VANDU and other participants have not been able to come to consensus about how to move forward.

Even though there is much more that needs to be done, the victory for pedestrian safety in late July sets a good precedent of the Downtown East Side community gaining ground on fighting for their rights at city hall. “We don't have a sense that the campaign is complete, but we're happy with the concrete improvements so far,” said Ormond.

Erin Innes is a freelance writer and Permaculture activist working for food and environmental justice in Vancouver/Coast Salish Territory.

Main and Hastings