Western Expresso

[rrskylar]

Originally Posted by buzzg

It's almost like the cutbacks to health and social services by Pallister have had repercussions. Wild.

So you’re blaming Pallister for the meth epidemic which started under the speNDP regime.

[LilZebra]

Originally Posted by blueandgoldguy

Less money and resources need to be set aside for cops and more money and resources need to be set up for programs and services that deal with the underlying issues that cause these problems in the first place.

I'm tired of all the public moaning I hear from the Winnipeg Police. They sure sound entitled ie. worried about walking to their vehicles at night from their building...like any other office worker downtown.

Listening to Geoff Courier right now on CJOB, and you know, its the same old same old. I remember Adler and Cloutier talking about the same topic "Do you feel safe in downtown Winnipeg?" ... has been going on since 1997.


Well, it's just been getting worse since the 90s.

[EdwardTH]

Originally Posted by LilZebra

Listening to Geoff Courier right now on CJOB, and you know, its the same old same old. I remember Adler and Cloutier talking about the same topic "Do you feel safe in downtown Winnipeg?" ... has been going on since 1997.


Well, it's just been getting worse since the 90s.

It objectively hasn't though, crime rates steadily went down for two decades...

[esquire]

Originally Posted by LilZebra

Listening to Geoff Courier right now on CJOB, and you know, its the same old same old. I remember Adler and Cloutier talking about the same topic "Do you feel safe in downtown Winnipeg?" ... has been going on since 1997.

Well, it's just been getting worse since the 90s.

Purely anecdotally:

-it felt like things got worse in the mid/late 90s...it was around this time that large scale downtown retail sort of petered out with the decline and closure of Eaton's and a bunch of storefronts, and Portage Place went downhill too as a retail destination. So the armies of old lady downtown shopping diehards mostly disappeared during that era, making the rougher element more prominent.

-it felt like things were improving a bit later in the 2000s as downtown residential very slowly started to take root... there were more people around and more programs designed to tackle some of the social problems.

-it feels like there has been another pronounced decline in safety and order on the streets over the last few years. I'm not sure if it's meth driven or what, but things feel more menacing than they were 5-10 years ago. Not dramatically so, but the trendline is moving in what I'd consider to be the wrong direction. Some things have been positive like TNS and the continued improvement of Old Market Square, but other areas have not been improving in a similar way and it's hard to imagine that this is not holding back downtown development as many people don't consider it an ideal place to live.

Anyway, that's a totally anecdotal assessment but I wonder if anyone else's experience meshes with mine?

[dmacc]

I completely agree with your first two points but disagree with your final one. I still believe as a whole downtown has seen social improvement through out even the last few years. I feel better downtown today then I did 5 and 10 years ago.

[Authentic_City]

My experience meshes with Esquire's anecdotal timeline. For sure, the decline of retail downtown in the 1990s was pivotal moment, but downtown had long been seen as somewhat seedy and unseemly even in the 1980s when I was a young person coming downtown for the first time. The old Portage Village Inn across from Eatons (now Centrepoint) and the Hamburger House restaurant (MEC now) were hubs for drug dealing and a lot of rough characters were on the street back then.

The most recent concerns about downtown safety conflate disorder and fear of crime with actual crime. I find it interesting that the new report by Asper singles out panhandling, even though it's not a safety issue per se, but rather an issue of social disorder and a perception issue. We have to be clear that fear of crime is not the same thing as actual crime, but fear can certainly drive behavior and can negatively impact perceptions of downtown. Magically getting rid of the homeless and panhandlers is a way to try to address the perception problem, but doesn't change the actual crime problem or the causes of crime which are probably driven by substance abuse and other factors.

The fairly large population of flood evacuees who moved into downtown Winnipeg hotels several years ago and became essentially a permanent idle population downtown had shifted the perception of downtown too. After dark, there are a lot of idle folks just hanging around on the streets, and this can make folks uneasy, even if they aren't in any real danger. Downtown in the 1990s was a very different place than today. There isn't much reason to be on Portage Ave after dark now, so it feels pretty menacing. In the 90s at least there was shopping and even movies downtown.

I'm not really sure what can be done, but it feel like we don't have much upward momentum right now.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Authentic_City

I'm not really sure what can be done, but it feel like we don't have much upward momentum right now.

I agree. I think part of my assessment is rooted in the fact that Winnipeg is standing outside the party looking in when it comes to improvements downtown across Canada. Yes things have improved since, say, 1998, but really only marginally.

There was a good decade-long run of momentum from around the time that MTS Centre opened and work began on Hydro, until a few years ago when CMHR opened and TNS/300 Main were announced. It felt like things were moving in the right direction. But since then things have kind of flatlined, and we haven't seen a ton of improvement with existing buildings... really other than a few new restaurants and cafes here and there, there have been almost no new storefront businesses that have opened their doors over the last decade.

As I said, I think this is all exacerbated by the impressive growth and improvement in other Canadian downtowns. When you travel elsewhere, even to smaller cities, it's hard to shake the feeling that we've been left out. there have been some marginal improvements but things really don't feel like they've changed in a major way over the last 15 years, unlike what we've seen in so many other cities where condo towers are rising and shops are opening.

And as for panhandling, I'm not sure why that keeps getting trotted out in reports as it barely rates mentioning IMO. Of all the problems there are, this one is minor.

[wardlow]

Originally Posted by esquire

Purely anecdotally:

-it felt like things got worse in the mid/late 90s...it was around this time that large scale downtown retail sort of petered out with the decline and closure of Eaton's and a bunch of storefronts, and Portage Place went downhill too as a retail destination. So the armies of old lady downtown shopping diehards mostly disappeared during that era, making the rougher element more prominent.

-it felt like things were improving a bit later in the 2000s as downtown residential very slowly started to take root... there were more people around and more programs designed to tackle some of the social problems.

-it feels like there has been another pronounced decline in safety and order on the streets over the last few years. I'm not sure if it's meth driven or what, but things feel more menacing than they were 5-10 years ago. Not dramatically so, but the trendline is moving in what I'd consider to be the wrong direction. Some things have been positive like TNS and the continued improvement of Old Market Square, but other areas have not been improving in a similar way and it's hard to imagine that this is not holding back downtown development as many people don't consider it an ideal place to live.

Anyway, that's a totally anecdotal assessment but I wonder if anyone else's experience meshes with mine?

I think this is about right.

I would add to this, however, that while downtown in the late '90s had a high level of criminal activity (hello, Times Nightclub at Portage and Hargrave) and a lot of abandonment in areas where there's more activity now (the Exchange, obviously), there was not nearly the same amount of unsettling social disorder there is now. Lots of that kind of stuff was up on the North Main skid row, but you just didn't see it on and around Portage Avenue. Development activity obviously picked up in the late 2000s, but on the street level, Portage Avenue was worse in 2009 than it was in 1999. And it's vastly worse in 2019 than it was in 2009.

My wife (whose perception of safety is a little more meaningful than mine, given I'm a young-ish man) has worked around Portage Avenue for ~eight years. She says it's never been this bad. This is a woman who has lived and worked in and around downtown her entire adult life. I've been walking around all areas of downtown since the mid-1990s. We aren't paranoid suburbanites who can't handle seeing a homeless man.

I really wish Winnipeg could have an honest conversation about this kind of thing. It's possible to meet somewhere in the middle, between the only three positions there seems to be:
1) the unreasonably paranoid suburbanite who will never like downtown until it resembles a Scottsdale lifestyle centre anyway;
2) the woke Marxist pedant who thinks you're perpetuating genocide and colonialism for even talking about this;
3) the downtown booster who doesn't want to talk about anything other than building projects.

[esquire]

^ Agreed on all points. Even my wife's experience and perspective are similar to that of your wife's.

[EspionNoir]

It's really is a wicked problem: lots of confusion and misunderstanding on this kind of issues; lack of a definitive solution; a lot of stakeholders and so on. Conversations on this kind of issues are always tough.

I think people here are always being faily honest when talking about it - being honest about their feelings and opinion. It's just that arguments are likely inevitable. When there are many stakeholders around it's hard to have an agreement.

On the issues Winnipeg have, it's helpful in my opinion to have a look around and see that we are not the only ones dealing with problems. Other major cities have problems too. For example, Calgary also has ghettos (not to be picky about Calgary, just providing an example that I know).

That being said, it doesn't make it ok to have issues. It's always the best to solve them as much as possible. What are the solutions? Well...always ever changing and uncertain.

In terms of downtown growth, my opinion is that it will likely continues, even at a faster pace in the future. Population is a big factor I think, and as Winnipeg is approaching 1m, more things will come. For me, safety issues won't stop me from enjoying what downtown can offer. There are things downtown have that other areas don't really have much. There are also both good areas and bad areas in downtown, too.

[Riverman]

What a great read. Love the honesty and lack of hyperbole.

[headhorse]

Originally Posted by wardlow

I think this is about right.

I would add to this, however, that while downtown in the late '90s had a high level of criminal activity (hello, Times Nightclub at Portage and Hargrave) and a lot of abandonment in areas where there's more activity now (the Exchange, obviously), there was not nearly the same amount of unsettling social disorder there is now. Lots of that kind of stuff was up on the North Main skid row, but you just didn't see it on and around Portage Avenue. Development activity obviously picked up in the late 2000s, but on the street level, Portage Avenue was worse in 2009 than it was in 1999. And it's vastly worse in 2019 than it was in 2009.

My wife (whose perception of safety is a little more meaningful than mine, given I'm a young-ish man) has worked around Portage Avenue for ~eight years. She says it's never been this bad. This is a woman who has lived and worked in and around downtown her entire adult life. I've been walking around all areas of downtown since the mid-1990s. We aren't paranoid suburbanites who can't handle seeing a homeless man.

I really wish Winnipeg could have an honest conversation about this kind of thing. It's possible to meet somewhere in the middle, between the only three positions there seems to be:
1) the unreasonably paranoid suburbanite who will never like downtown until it resembles a Scottsdale lifestyle centre anyway;
2) the woke Marxist pedant who thinks you're perpetuating genocide and colonialism for even talking about this;
3) the downtown booster who doesn't want to talk about anything other than building projects.

alright, let's hear your "middle" position then? if you don't think colonialism and racism aren't a huge cause of poverty than you're the one who is not being honest.

also, buzzg is right. crime is related to a lack of services, something that the Pallister government is defunding.

[blacktrojan3921]

https://leaderpost.com/news/saskatch...WcYRH-mZXxg9Sc

Moe exploring Quebec-style control over immigration, taxes

Moe told reporters on Wednesday that he wants the province to have more “autonomy” over how many people are admitted through different immigration classes, as well as over the skills selection process. He said Saskatchewan needs new tools to help achieve his goal of growing the population to 1.4 million over the next decade.

“That’s unprecedented growth in this province, over the history of this province, and if we’re going to do that, we need to think outside the box,” he said.

The economic and family classes are the immigration areas Moe says he’s most interested in. He said few people will choose to move to Saskatchewan if they can’t bring their families with them, though he did not commit to exactly how the proportions between the two classes should change.

“The goal is not to say what the percentages would be. The goal is to have the flexibility to make the percentages work for the people and the industries in this province,” he said.

[dmacc]

I think a lot of the issues surrounding this conversation is there is no concrete definition of the problem. Most often we take such a high level view of things and say crime downtown. Well that's an overly vague statement that is so open to different streams. This leads us to think we are having a conversation when we are really talking about different things.

If it's crime are we talking preventative or punitive? I feel a lot of times when we talk about what is going on with Liquor Store thefts we talk about what needs to be done and in the same conversation you hear we need to change how the store operates and on the other side we need more social supports. Well that's all well and good but that's not a conversation, it's just two people talking.

One is talking about what MLCC should be doing and the other about what the government and MHSAL should be doing. Our conversation scope has to be narrowed and kept on track when trying to solve issues.

[wardlow]

Originally Posted by headhorse

alright, let's hear your "middle" position then? if you don't think colonialism and racism aren't a huge cause of poverty than you're the one who is not being honest.

Where did I say that those things are not a huge cause of poverty? I did not.

I said that it should be possible to discuss how there are high levels of social disorder downtown, and how this is not a good thing because it makes many people unsafe... without instantly being called out for ignorance or racism right off the bat. You proved that point, and I'm not going to engage with you further on this matter.

[davequanbury]

Originally Posted by Riverman

What a great read. Love the honesty and lack of hyperbole.

I agree.

I would just add that the obsession with panhandling appears to be related to "reputation" more so than "safety". I clicked on the link to the actual safety report from the cbc article. I did a search of the document for the word panhandling, and was surprised to find the number of times the issue was framed as "bad for tourism".

I know perception is important, and a tough ship to turn around once it sets sail, so what if we looked at the panhandlers as part of the downtown culture?

I think it's safe to say that panhandlers are not the perpetrators of much crime, they do how ever intimidate people and that's normal. So why not embrace them? Sounds a little whacky, I know, but maybe there is a way to announce to the world "we have panhandlers, they don't bite"

[esquire]

In the 90s there was always talk about panhandlers. It was a staple of the Peter Warren Action Line and the like. But nowadays the idea of getting worked up by a guy holding out a cup asking for change seems almost quaint. Particularly when it's all over town now... even the outer suburbs have guys sitting at traffic lights asking for change.

[OTA in Winnipeg]

The problem with panhandlers is it's all about addiction. If you think they're doing that to feed themselves, you are mistaken. There's a multitude of soup kitchens in this city. That's where they eat. Giving them money is just prolonging their addiction.
Not confronting this issue also creates an odd kind of entitlement with some that they can do whatever the hell they want, whenever they want. A hallmark of meth users behaviour which we all witnessed big time this past summer. Especially if you live along the rivers.

[EdwardTH]

Originally Posted by esquire

In the 90s there was always talk about panhandlers. It was a staple of the Peter Warren Action Line and the like. But nowadays the idea of getting worked up by a guy holding out a cup asking for change seems almost quaint. Particularly when it's all over town now... even the outer suburbs have guys sitting at traffic lights asking for change.

If not panhandling then what kinds of issues is your wife mentioning when she says it's gotten so bad then? Like is she being assaulted walking down the street?

[esquire]

Originally Posted by EdwardTH

If not panhandling then what kinds of issues is your wife mentioning when she says it's gotten so bad then? Like is she being assaulted walking down the street?

She has thankfully not been assaulted, but there have been a couple of dicey situations - I'm not talking about seeing some weirdo on the street a block away, but unwanted, uncomfortable face-to-face interactions.

But that said, a young female colleague of mine was punched in the face - completely unprovoked - on the street just outside our workplace.

Talk to any woman who spends time downtown and you'll hear the stories.