25925 replies to this topic

[LJ]

So today Cool Aid marked their 50th year of "ending homelessness."

 

After 5 decades and nothing has changed they should hanging their heads not celebrating.

 

You would think they would have been out of jobs and money long before this had ending homelessness been their true goal, instead of just providing employment for a bunch of SJW's.

[Casual Kev]

I've been biking along Pandora and geez, between Quadra and Cook it's like the transition area between Gastown and Downtown Eastside in Vancouver. A buildup of homeless people surrounded by cranes. Eerie. 

 

As for the social housing ruling, the writing was on the wall when they had the residents sign tenancy agreements so it was a matter of time until someone brought it up to the courts, and it seem like Portland might've been unreasonable with some of their restrictions.  With that said, if you can't exercise some degree of paternalism over people you're looking after, and who have dubious capacity to look after their own affairs (whether due to drugs, illness, crime or long-term vagrancy), then it might as well not be supportive housing... it's just heavily subsidized rents with limited capacity to protect vulnerable people from themselves. There's certainly a middle ground between locking up homeless people for existing, and acting all shocked when a bunch of them OD to death because a "compassionate housing tenant" was a drug pusher.

[A Girl is No one]

^^^or some of them go and kill someone, randomly attack several people with a field hockey stick, shoot pellet guns at moving cars and at people INSIDE their 8th floor condo, etc....

[spanky123]

Should there not be some level of protection for the tenants against visitors who are violent or who come bearing gifts that cause ODs?

I think it's fair to afford the tenants some dignity but there surely must be some safeguards in place too.

 

Currently the drug dealers are forced to sit on a picnic table outside of the front doors of the facility. I guess that now they will be allowed inside.

 

What is crazy is that the 3rd floor of the PHS building on Douglas is supposed to be for people trying to clean themselves up. How you can possible do that when the rest of the building is a zoo and you are forced to walk the gauntlet of temptation all day every day is beyond me.

[Cassidy]

The B.C. Supreme Court has done more to propagate the bizarre concept of "taxpayer supported homelessness" than any single person, or august body in B.C. could ever hope to duplicate.

All these folks really want is more drugs, or more money to get more drugs, or to steal somebody else's drugs, or to assault somebody for their drugs.

 

Camping in parks, and complete freedom in their taxpayer supplied "apartment building" just makes finding and consuming drugs easier, and less stressful.

 

It's a great life if you can swing it ... something the B.C. Supreme Court and COV Mayor and Council have definitely made sure is dead easy to swing.

[Nparker]

And regardless of the taxpayer implications, have the BCSC decisions really done much to improve the lives of many of the chronically homeless? A great number still lead lives stuck on the addiction treadmill.

[David Bratzer]

Rock  Bay Landing is looking for donations of yoga mats:

 

Rock Bay Landing shelter is starting a Yoga program. We have connected with  amazing volunteer  instructors, but we need supplies to make this program a reality. We are looking for yoga mats, foam chip blocks and towels.

[David Bratzer]

Victoria Cool Aid Society held its 50th anniversary gala a few days ago. Tickets were $125 each.

[sdwright.vic]

^But did attendance decline again?

[RFS]

The new tent city by Uptown says they are protesting "a lack of resources in the captial region" WE HAVE MORE RESOURCES THAN ANY WHERE ELSE IN CANADA for ***** sake. Go to prince george or kelowna see how they welcome you. Police need to do their jobs

Edited by RFS, 30 May 2018 - 08:47 PM.

[Mike K.]

Tonight at about 10PM road crews were fast at work building the new TCH bus lane right along the Uptown frontage. Have they been doing night work like this for a while or is this something new?

[sdwright.vic]

Maybe to keep the new tent city awake?

[Cassidy]

Isn't the general consensus that Crissy's roving "tent circus" is largely empty at night, save a few hard core and legitimately homeless folks?

 

That the entire undertaking is designed to push taxpayers buttons and generate an agenda driven optics-fest ... rather than to actually offer a place of safe shelter overnight?

Edited by Cassidy, 31 May 2018 - 08:36 AM.

[Mike K.]

View and Blanshard streets’ “pencil man” has passed away. David was a familiar sight to those who lived and worked in downtown Victoria with his little shop of trinkets. David made the news last year when VicPD officers forced him to stop selling his items and told him to leave the corner. The community outpouring following that move soon saw David return.

I last saw him only days ago. Last year I believe he had lost his mum and I know hat had affected him greatly.

RIP David.

[Mike K.]

Crews are installing fencing along the Saanich tent city’s TCH frontage. I guess there are/were concerns of people darting onto the roadway.

[gstc84]

Very sad to hear about David.   Had many great chats with him over the last couple of years. He had just started cancer treatments a few weeks ago but I'd still see him at his corner a couple times a week, just in a wheelchair now rather than standing. 

 

Thanks for sharing the news.

 

He wasn't homeless though, so perhaps this would be better in the "Deaths of Notable Victorians" thread than here...

Edited by gstc84, 31 May 2018 - 01:56 PM.

[shoeflack]

View and Blanshard streets’ “pencil man” has passed away. David was a familiar sight to those who lived and worked in downtown Victoria with his little shop of trinkets. David made the news last year when VicPD officers forced him to stop selling his items and told him to leave the corner. The community outpouring following that move soon saw David return.

I last saw him only days ago. Last year I believe he had lost his mum and I know hat had affected him greatly.

RIP David.

 

And such a romantic as well. Anytime my partner and I would walk by him while holding hands, he'd always have a nice comment about true love that'd give us a good smile. He was a truly nice man, always something kind to say. Would never let you walk by with a hello or a good morning/afternoon.

[Mike K.]

Oh my, gst. I wasn’t thinking. Yes this should go in our long lost friends thread.

[mbjj]

Chrissy Brett was on the news at the news tent city. She wants more.

[Nparker]

Chrissy Brett was on the news at the news tent city. She wants more.

Someone gave her an inch once, and now she needs a mile.