Downtown Eastside - DTES Issues

[rofina]

Originally Posted by SeymourDrake

sarcasm, but i wouldn't expect you to get it, nor was it directed at you. But you seem to want to speak for him. You seem to enjoy attempting to verbally attack me. Not going to happen.

It's all a bit awkward to be honest.

Very reasonable approach.

I mean, why would someone reply to your post on a message board, right?

There is a PM function on the board if you would like to communicate directly.

[rofina]

Originally Posted by kaitoe

The conclusion isn't as neat and tidy if you draw it out a little further, though. While it's easy to say "there must be a line drawn where you forfeit your ability to make decisions for self," what happens after that? With respect to those with substance use disorders, the evidence is murky as to whether involuntary treatment actually works.

Do we jail them? If so, what is the justification that we do so for a long period of time? And what happens when they get out, especially since they could have a criminal record on top of a substance use disorder?

Justification is the same as any other person - broken laws. It doesn't seem unreasonable to expunge criminal offences committed under mental health issues to allow people a chance at change and reintegration into society.

Do you send them away? And if so, to where and under what is the legal justification? And what if they return?

Send them away into medically supervised rehab and recovery housing. Albeit with limit ability to leave until progress is achieved. For many users who are significantly mentally damaged from use, strokes, OD's permanent housing and care needs to be built. Off the streets.

We are reckoning with a system that has been able to push homeless people out of sight and mind one way (mental instituions) or another (DTES), and I do agree that the status quo is not working, but the perspective we use to examine the issue should change. For example, the "rules that all of us follow as a simple means of living in a society" eliminates any form of compassion and empathy afforded towards those who are homeless and those who have substance-use disorders.

This is really the only point on which we disagree with. I think that's precisely compassion - you're extending a helping hand to someone without the ability to objectively see reality clearly or the ability to make decisions that increase their chance of survival.

If someone does not have the mental capacity to make healthy life sustaining decisions for self, while endangering the community and affecting remainder of society negatively, the compassionate thing is to aid that person. Its not to cast them aside and give them freedom to use and OD at will.

[whatnext]

From today's Sun:

Crime significantly up in several Vancouver neighbourhoods: VPD
During the first six months of this year, the number of break-ins to businesses and commercial properties was up 47.9 per cent compared with the same period last year.

Author of the article:Tiffany Crawford
Publishing date:Sep 17, 2020

Property crime was significantly up in several Vancouver neighbourhoods between January and June, the Vancouver police reported Thursday.

Deputy Police Chief Const. Howard Chow says that during the pandemic the number of commercial break-and-enters spiked, especially in Chinatown, the West End, Yaletown and Strathcona. During the first six months of this year, the number of break-ins to businesses and commercial properties was up 47.9 per cent in Vancouver compared with the same period last year...

...Violent crime increased by 5.2 per cent driven by an increase in the number of serious assaults, said Chow.

“I’m so concerned about the increase in violence and serious crimes and street disorder in some of the neighbourhoods like Strathcona, Yaletown, Chinatown and the West End,” he said.

In the downtown area to the end of July, thefts had gone up 36 per cent, calls for weapons were up 11 per cent and, in Yaletown, commercial break-and-enters spiked 58 per cent.

Assaults were up 16 per cent and, in Strathcona, where a tent city has grown to hundreds of tents in the park, weapons calls were up 50 per cent.

In Chinatown, violent crime was up 17 per cent and commercial break-ins were up 60 per cent compared with this period last year....

...in Yaletown, police have been called out 450 times to the areas of the hotels where homeless people were given shelter because of the pandemic. Chow said that compares with 45 calls in Yaletown during the same period...


https://vancouversun.com/news/crime-sign...cm/d1f32793-4046-4673-b264-10e1ef47b651/

[SeymourDrake]

Originally Posted by rofina

Very reasonable approach.

I mean, why would someone reply to your post on a message board, right?

There is a PM function on the board if you would like to communicate directly.

why would i PM you when you can act like you do in public.

[Vin]

Originally Posted by Sheba

I'm sure some here are content with just venting about the DTES - but if you want actual change send an e-mail to the premier's office and the mayor's office. Both of them are the main e-mail 'drop zone' and then will be forwarded to whoever is most appropriate.

Remember "the squeaky wheel gets the grease". They're not going to know about people venting on here, but going to the effort of e-mailing them will get their attention (esp if enough people e-mail them about the same things). You'll have to include your first and last name plus address if you want them to take you seriously.

Venting is a start. There was a time when few would discuss about this here. Awareness and realization can start a revolution. Everyone plays a part, big or small.

[Vin]

Vancouver police arrest man accused of breaking into 2 women’s homes with a knife
https://www.google.com/amp/s/globalnews.ca/news/7345217/vancouver-police-arrest-man-break-ins/amp/

I'm pretty sure this young man, known to police, was arrested by the cops before and released "on conditions". The judicial system is a problem in this province.

Good thing those women were not murdered, or their blood would be in the hands of those who keep giving excuses for these criminals.

[Vin]

Can you guys believe that the Westminster Pier Park fire arsonist was also arrested but released pending a court appearance? He is now free to walk over to your house and burn it down if he so wishes.


https://www.google.com/amp/s/beta.ctvnews.ca/local/british-columbia/2020/9/17/1_5109633.html

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by Vin

Can you guys believe that the Westminster Pier Park fire arsonist was also arrested but released pending a court appearance? He is now free to walk over to your house and burn it down if he so wishes.


https://www.google.com/amp/s/beta.ctvnews.ca/local/british-columbia/2020/9/17/1_5109633.html

Another knee-jerk reaction. I read a more nuanced report (which of course I can't find now to link to it) that said 'arson related charges'. Also homeless people camp at that end of the pier park - for all we know one of them could have accidentally started it with a cooking fire.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by Vin

Can you guys believe that the Westminster Pier Park fire arsonist was also arrested but released pending a court appearance? He is now free to walk over to your house and burn it down if he so wishes.


https://www.google.com/amp/s/beta.ctvnews.ca/local/british-columbia/2020/9/17/1_5109633.html

In the Downtown Eastside thread? No I can't. Maybe you could ask the mods to change the title to something that covers arson in New Westminster.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by Changing City

In the Downtown Eastside thread? No I can't. Maybe you could ask the mods to change the title to something that covers arson in New Westminster.

Ah but those terrible homeless people are travelling all over the region to commit all the crimes that happen and then coming back to sleep in the DTES!

[dreambrother808]

Originally Posted by Sheba

Ah but those terrible homeless people are travelling all over the region to commit all the crimes that happen and then coming back to sleep in the DTES!

I just wish we lived in one of those countries or cities where bad things didn’t happen! The City of Vancouver ruins everything!

[MIPS]

Originally Posted by Sheba

Ah but those terrible homeless people are travelling all over the region to commit all the crimes that happen and then coming back to sleep in the DTES!

They don't call it the Crime Train for nothing!

To adhere to this off-topic tangent about repeat offenders who CLEARLY shouldn't be walking the streets, I think it's more the system is unable to cope with a lot of these low to medium risk offenders (there is a LOT of them and space to confine them in until they are actually charged is very limited), so the brilliant idea is to slap them on the wrist, tell them not to do that and then let them walk after they promise to appear later. But of course these are so mentally unhinged and we've put so much faith in them NOT doing the same thing again that guess what? They don't care. What even says they're going to even appear again? I've mentioned it before that you really gotta commit these people and taxpayers are going to have to be onboard with this because there's no way to otherwise fund it.

Anyways WE should stick to DTES related crime and incidents. Grater Vancouver and the rest of BC is a whole different thing.

[rofina]

Originally Posted by SeymourDrake

why would i PM you when you can act like you do in public.

Dig, dig, dig that hole. What are you even arguing fella and more importantly why?

My suggestion was to PM the poster you had apparently only intended to be talking to on an open message board.

[Vin]

Originally Posted by Sheba

Ah but those terrible homeless people are travelling all over the region to commit all the crimes that happen and then coming back to sleep in the DTES!

Just bringing to attention why DTES is a mess, and as mentioned before, is a growing problem. If we keep letting people off so easily, we will always talk about DTES for generations to come.

Originally Posted by Sheba

Another knee-jerk reaction. I read a more nuanced report (which of course I can't find now to link to it) that said 'arson related charges'. Also homeless people camp at that end of the pier park - for all we know one of them could have accidentally started it with a cooking fire.

https://vancouversun.com/news/man-arrested-for-arson-in-connection-with-new-westminster-pier-fire
Which part of the article about the arrest of an arsonist do you not comprehend? Show us the sugarcoated link about a "homeless accident" and then we can discuss further. And even if that were true, which I highly doubt, it is the lack of enforcement that enables a homeless person to set fire whenever he wants.

Originally Posted by Changing City

In the Downtown Eastside thread? No I can't. Maybe you could ask the mods to change the title to something that covers arson in New Westminster.

No more sugarcoating OK? You very well know what I was trying to convey here, but got emboldened to comment only because someone else lashed out at my posting? Bah!

[Vin]

Originally Posted by MIPS

They don't call it the Crime Train for nothing!

To adhere to this off-topic tangent about repeat offenders who CLEARLY shouldn't be walking the streets, I think it's more the system is unable to cope with a lot of these low to medium risk offenders (there is a LOT of them and space to confine them in until they are actually charged is very limited), so the brilliant idea is to slap them on the wrist, tell them not to do that and then let them walk after they promise to appear later. But of course these are so mentally unhinged and we've put so much faith in them NOT doing the same thing again that guess what? They don't care. What even says they're going to even appear again? I've mentioned it before that you really gotta commit these people and taxpayers are going to have to be onboard with this because there's no way to otherwise fund it.

Anyways WE should stick to DTES related crime and incidents. Grater Vancouver and the rest of BC is a whole different thing.

Exactly. Some people only choose to cherry-pick what they see. I also notice a fair number of those living in Vancouver and Burnaby to constantly attack Surrey back in the days, but have always been blind to what is actually happening to their own backyard, especially DTES, and forever brushing the problem there off as something no one has control over.

The result of how we treat and deal the homeless, addicts and criminals in this province will always be reflected in the downtown Eastside ten-fold, as this is the centre where everything culminates. If we can eradicate problems elesewhere, then focusing on the DTES will only get easier.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by Vin

Just bringing to attention why DTES is a mess, and as mentioned before, is a growing problem. If we keep letting people off so easily, we will always talk about DTES for generations to come.

Which part of the article about the arrest of an arsonist do you not comprehend? Show us the sugarcoated link about a "homeless accident" and then we can discuss further. And even if that were true, which I highly doubt, it is the lack of enforcement that enables a homeless person to set fire whenever he wants.

No more sugarcoating OK? You very well know what I was trying to convey here, but got emboldened to comment only because someone else lashed out at my posting? Bah!

Nothing about someone setting fire to the Pier in New Westmister has anything to do with the DTES, unless you can prove it does. The man arrested hasn't been charged. There's nothing published that I've seen that links him to Vancouver, or the DTES.

You accuse both Sheba and me of 'sugarcoating' the situation. That's rubbish. I've never failed to acknowledge the problems of the DTES - I live in it. I just don't think locking up everybody I see on the street until they're ready to be pizza delivery drivers is likely to be a solution to the problems here.

Maybe you should read a bit more about the area - like Dr. Gabor Maté for example. "'I've never met a single person who ever chose to be a drug addict".

Actually, sugarcoating might not be a bad approach to your increasingly bitter comments.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by Changing City

You accuse both Sheba and me of 'sugarcoating' the situation. That's rubbish. I've never failed to acknowledge the problems of the DTES - I live in it. I just don't think locking up everybody I see on the street until they're ready to be pizza delivery drivers is likely to be a solution to the problems here.

I find it rather funny that he completely misses the humour in a few people's posts and views it as some kind of attack, along with the usual 'how dare we be blind to what's happening'. Then again we've had over two dozen pages of him complaining about how bad the DTES is without offering any useful suggestions (I agree - lock them all up and force them to detox isn't a solution).

[SeymourDrake]

Originally Posted by rofina

Dig, dig, dig that hole. What are you even arguing fella and more importantly why?

My suggestion was to PM the poster you had apparently only intended to be talking to on an open message board.

shouldn't you be out picking up empty cans up to pay for your starbucks addiction?

[MIPS]

This might not really come as a shock to a lot of people here but this does seem to support my theory that the DTES is a COVID hotspot, even if the statistics imply it hasn't been. It's hard to gather valid data when nobody wants to report their symptoms, either because they don't know what they got or because if they go to the doctor they'll just get microchipped again by Monsanto and the Freemasons.

COVID-19 antibody testing finds 'significant' number of cases in Downtown Eastside

Since the earliest days of the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a heightened level of concern for what might happen to residents of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside if the neighbourhood was exposed to an outbreak of the disease.

Many of the members of the community live with limited resources, and poverty, drug use and other issues have left a trail of underlying health conditions.

Yet, while more than 8,200 British Columbians — nearly 3,000 of them within the Vancouver Coastal Health region — have tested positive for the virus, the Downtown Eastside appears to have avoided a major outbreak.

But now, according to the Vancouver Infectious Disease Centre (VIDC) — an independent nonprofit that provides clinical services, research and outreach on infectious diseases in the Downtown Eastside — it's clear that the neighbourhood hasn't been spared.

...

"Our preliminary results suggest that a significant number of residents of the Downtown Eastside carry antibodies to COVID-19, indicating that they were infected at some point," Conway said.

Conway launched a series of free community "pop-up clinics" to test blood for telltale coronavirus antibodies among Downtown Eastside DTES residents over the summer. The clinics were approved by Health Canada and staffed and funded by the VIDC, he said.

Of the few hundred residents Conway's team tested, a couple of dozen have the antibodies, he said. There appears to be high levels of infection, at least in shelter environments where there is limited ability to maintain physical distancing, he added.

- https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/downtown-eastside-viru-antibody-testing-1.5733501

The sample size is small, mind you.

[Vin]

I have a feeling that people were concerned at the beginning of the pandemic only because they feared that DTES would become the Covid epicentre that would spread the disease rapidly to other places. Overtime, when it seems that there have been no mass death there, nobody cares anymore. Authorities don't even enforce social separation rules there, and it seems like DTES residents are just left to do whatever they want.

What's the big deal when one more resident drops dead there? And who cares if it is from drug overdose, Covid or a combination of death caused by both drug use and Covid. Sad, really.