With police support, workers remove tents and structures from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside

Efforts to dismantle an encampment on Vancouver's Downtown Eastside were met with resistance Wednesday, and at least one person has been arrested.

In a social media post, the Vancouver Police Department said that people within a "protest group have begun throwing projectiles at VPD officers and spraying them with fire extinguishers."

Neighborhood residents, supporters of the displaced campers, and members of activist and advocacy groups have gathered in response to the deployment of dozens of officers, marching along East Hastings Street.

City officials, including the mayor, the fire chief, and the chief of the VPD held a news conference earlier Wednesday, at which they said they were moving forward with plans to bring the encampment to an end, citing public safety concerns.

The move has been anticipated since Monday, when the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU) released leaked city documents outlining a new plan to end the encampment with a “two stage approach”—including a police-led operation.

Transit buses were detoured and the road was completely closed to traffic as police set up barricades.

“To ensure the safety and privacy for people within the encampment, we have limited public access,” the VPD said in a tweet Wednesday morning

Traffic cameras at the Main and Hastings intersection were out of service for about 30 minutes, shortly after the VPD was deployed, which city officials addressed at a news conference Wednesday morning.

“That was a mistake,” said City Manager Paul Mochrie. “We are working to provide as much transparency as possible, including a pool camera in the area.”

Asked about limits placed on access for media and legal observers, VPD Chief Const. Adam Palmer said they were necessary to prevent a "free for all."

SAFETY AND FIRE CONCERNS

Officials said the longer the street camp continues, the greater the odds that people living there will be harmed.

“Every day, we are hearing new and sometimes horrific stories: theft, vandalism, senseless acts of violence, violence against women, and more specifically, violence against Indigenous women,” Mayor Ken Sim said.

The city said in a statement that it has been working on the street daily to address fire, life and safety concerns identified in an order issued by fire Chief Karen Fry in July last year.

“More than 400 outdoor fires on East Hastings have occurred over the last eight months. Four people have already been injured this year,” reads the city’s statement.

According to Fry, Vancouver Fire and Rescue Services has seized 1,600 propane tanks from the encampment, where there have been 16 tent fires so far this year.

“More tents go down and more tents go up. It's not getting any better,” Fry said. “It's a matter of time before more lives are lost.”

Palmer said it is becoming increasingly challenging to keep people safe in the area.

“The Downtown Eastside encampment is fraught with serious crime, violence and dangerous weapons, which have proliferated in this neighbourhood. Street-level assaults within the encampment have increased 27 per cent and nearly half of those are being committed by strangers.”

THE REMOVAL PROCESS SO FAR

People currently living in the encampment are being encouraged to accept shelter offers.

“While shelters are far from ideal, they provide a safer option than sheltering in an entrenched encampment,” reads the statement.

However, at the news conference, no public official could say for certain where exactly the people living on the street would end up, nor could they say whether there are enough shelter spaces available to accommodate everyone who is being displaced.

Last week, the city said there were 117 people living in 74 tents and other structures along East Hastings Street—down from 180 at the encampment’s peak in August.

In total, the city says 600 tents and makeshift buildings have been removed from the area.

According to the province, a total of 90 people have been moved from the encampment into housing since July.

VANCOUVER’S PAST ENCAMPMENTS

Tent communities in Vancouver have been common.

In April two years ago, Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth told campers at the city's Oppenheimer Park that they could leave or choose to accept the housing they were offered. More than 200 campers had been living in the park for months.

Many of those campers then moved on to nearby Strathcona Park, which was also shut down months later after complaints of escalating crime.

Pivot Legal Society, which advocates for those on the Downtown Eastside, called the dismantling of the Hastings Street site a “gross human rights violation.”

“There is nowhere for people to go,” it says in a tweet. “(This is) a massive waste of public resources and a dangerous ploy to pretend to be doing something.”

The decision to remove the Hastings Street camp comes despite a B.C. Supreme Court order from Justice F. Matthew Kirchner, who said Vancouver's park board wasn't justified in issuing two eviction orders for those living in CRAB Park.

Kirchner found the orders unreasonably assumed there were enough indoor shelter spaces to accommodate campers who had been forced out.

Similar court orders have since been made allowing camps to remain in Victoria and Prince George. 

With files from The Canadian Press.