First United Church Now a 21-Hour Shelter but "not doing a very good job getting the word out"

(Photo of First United Church taken late Dec. 2008)

Geez it was cold last night.

First United Church at Hastings & Gore on the Downtown Eastside is now operating as a 21 hour shelter, according to Audrey Laferriere who ran for Council on the homeless issue.

Photo: Audrey Laferriere holds microphone at All Candidates meeting at Carnegie Center on Downtown Eastside in 2008, as she talks about homeless issue.

Laferriere wrote to the DTES Enquirer today,

"There still is a lot of homeless that do not know that the First United Church Mission is now a 21 hour shelter. The shelter providers are not doing a very good job getting the word out. I emailed HEAT (Mayor Gregor Robertson) on December 23rd that each lamp standard in the City should have a poster advising of this needed shelter but never heard anything from him. I was at the First United Shelter yesterday and was told that they had very little problems considering the 200 plus they look after each night."

The shelter accepts pets, carts, couples, singles, children, and teenagers. "Nobody turned away,"announces a poster put up this afternoon on the bulletin board at Carnegie Center.

The shelter opens at 8 p.m. in the evening and stays open until 5 p.m. the next day.

First United Church stopped functioning as a church with regular services and was turned into a mission some time ago. First United's former minister, Ruth Wright -- nicknamed 'Ruthless Wrong' by homeless William Simpson when an employee at the DugOut Drop-In, funded by the United Church, allegedly whacked two people across the head with a two by four -- once told the media that she should qualify for campground funding considering the number of homeless sleeping there.

A Thousand Israel Supporters Turn Out to "Battle for Truth" Rally in Vancouver

Roughly a thousand people turned up at the sprawling Schara Tzedeck Synagogue on Oak St. in Vancouver on Thursday evening to a high security – no purse or back pack got through the door unexamined -- “Community Solidarity Gathering for Israel”. Some in the overflow crowd at the rally organized by the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver were turned away. There was simply no more room. Even the balcony was jam-packed.


“There is a battle for truth,” speaker Dr. James Lunney, Member of Parliament and Chair of the Canada-Israel Interparliamentary Committee, told the crowd.

Loud applause.

“Hamas fired more than 450 rockets into Israel in the week leading up to Israel’s response”, Lunney said. The Canadian government sees the conflict this way: “Hamas is responsible for the current crisis.”

You won’t find the current Conservative Canadian government in the middle of the road on the Israeli-Gaza conflict, Lunney explained. Being the MP for Nanaimo-Alberni on Vancouver Island, he used a forestry industry analogy: If you’re driving along the road and you turn a corner and see a logging truck coming toward you, the last place you want to be is in the middle of the road. Laughter. On the Israeli-Hamas conflict, Lunney said, “The middle of the road is neither a right place or a safe place.”

Yet the middle of the road is exactly where past Canadian governments have been, Lunney said. They have taken a “moral equivalence” approach to the two sides in Israeli-Palestinian tensions, “condemning neither, supporting neither”. That’s over. “The Canadian government sees no moral equivalence between Israel, a vibrant if imperfect democracy, and Hamas…”, Lunney said. He described Hamas as “terrorists who use military aggression…using their neighbors, including women and children as shields.”


Like Lunney, grade 12 student Igal Raich sees the Israel-Hamas conflict as a battle for truth. There was one lie Raich was particularly eager to set the record straight on when he took the podium: “Israel does not intentionally kill women and children but attacks rocket launchers. But they [Hamas] are using women and children as human shields.”

Raich, who announced that he will be joining the Israel Defense Forces when he graduates this year, is a product of the David Project at King David school in Vancouver. “The David project empowers us to confront and respond to anti-Israel bias”, he said. In the Project, students are taught “historical accuracy, moral decision-making, and activism.”

Raich went to the anti-Israel demonstration in downtown Vancouver on Dec. 29th. “I didn’t go to cheer them on”, he said. “I went to protest against the continual bombardment of Southern Israel by Hamas.”

A giant video screen at the front of the room allowed the crowd to see speakers, including Anglican Reverend Dr. Richard Leggett who said they had been told to "keep it short".

Setting the record straight was also a goal of Dr. Michael Elterman, Chair of the Pacific Region Canada Israel Committee. Claims made about Israel in the media, he said, are too often “ill-informed and intellectually lazy”. He saw the claim that Israel is contributing to a “cycle of violence” as a prime example. “It confuses the pyromaniac with the firefighter.”

Another on the long list of claims Elterman challenged was that Israel is using “disproportionate force”. “Israel under reacted for 8 years,” he said, “which only acted to encourage Hamas.”

The dearth of balanced reporting on the Israel-Hamas conflict was a problem that Elterman saw as extending to anti-Israel protesters – including the fifteen or so standing on the sidewalk outside. As Israel supporters entered the rally, protesters had stood on the sidewalk loudly chanting, “Hey, hey, Israel! How many people have you killed today!” Elterman asked the crowd, “Where were the protesters outside tonight when Israeli civilians were being terrorized and rocketed for eight years?” When you leave tonight, he urged, “Ask them.”


The Vancouver rally was one of several held in major cities across Canada on Thursday evening. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud spoke to the rally via a pre-taped video. He explained that in response to Hamas “firing rockets, missiles, and mortar shells directly into population centers”, Israel was pressed to act to ensure the “security and safety” of it’s citizens. “This is what Canada would have done for the people living in Toronto”.


After the rally, which ended with a “Song of Peace”, the anti-Israel protesters were nowhere to be seen outside. But uniformed police were everywhere.

Program

To read the speakers list from the rally, enlarge the photo below by clicking on it.

Speeding Driver Loses Lottery

High speed appears to have been a factor in a two car accident beside the Shell station at Main & 2nd Ave. at about 11:00 p.m. Thursday night.

“They were definitely going fast, very fast”, said Gafar, the cashier inside the Shell station who was serving a customer when he heard the crash. It is unclear whether both vehicles were traveling at high speed though.

“They had to cut him out,” Gafar said, pointing to the open flap on the hood of the red car which lay on its side.

Gafar said he overheard one of the cops say, “We were looking for him.”

Gafar said there wasn't just one noise upon impact but a long sequence of loud noises. “I heard ‘Pow!, Pow!, Pow!, Pow!, Pow! Pow! Pow! Pow!” Gafar estimated that these noises had continued “for one or two minutes”. He asked his customer what had happened. The customer’s first response was, “Maybe the bus crashed.” But Gafar said they soon realized that the cars were right outside the window of the store.

“They were both unconscious,” said Gafar, who saw one victim removed from the red car on it’s side and another removed from a black car sitting right side up a few meters up the street.

Gafar asked one of the cops about the victim in the red car. “Is he dead?” The cop responded, “We’re working on him.”

Gafar said the accident could have been much worse. He pointed to the gas tanks outside the convenience store where there is a constant flow of people driving or walking through.

Gafar, an immigrant who speaks competent English, emphasized that it was his impression that there had been a "chase" going on when the accident occurred.





A male bystander said, "I think one of the wheels on the car is missing."

Neon Sign Turned on Today at Opening of Pennsylvania Hotel for the Poor and Screwed Up

This morning was the "Grand Re-opening" of Vancouver's historic Pennsylvania Hotel at the corner of Carroll & Hastings on the Downtown Eastside. About a century ago, it was a swank hotel advertised as having a telephone in every room, but it has recently been turned into supportive housing for the poor and screwed up.


The Pennsylvania Hotel, which many Downtown Eastsiders call "The Portland" as that's what it's been called for years, has been empty since 2000. A hand-out published by the Portland Hotel Society which will be operating the Pennsylvania didn't conceal their disdain for gentrification in the neighborhood. "We didn't want it to become condos or turned into a Backpacker or Tourist Hotel."

So they worked to turn it into supportive housing. "Eventually, we cobbled together the money to renovate the building so that each room has its own bathroom and small kitchen. The Hotel will also receive a subsidy allowing for rents of $375/month and 24-hour staffing."

Photo above: Portland Society Co-Director Liz Evans on the stage in the basement of the Pennsylvania Hotel.

Photo above: Liz Evans behind microphone during second part of the opening which took place outside the Pennsylvania on the corner of Hastings & Carroll St. Mayor Robertson is on the right of the photo.

Liz Evans who co-directs the Portland Hotel Society with her spouse Mark Townsend -- the PHS also operates Insite, the supervised drug injection site on the same block -- was MC at the Opening. Evans is a psych nurse and about 15 years ago was listed in the Globe & Mail as one of Canada's young up and comers to be watched. But a few Downtown Eastsiders believe there are other reasons she should be watched.


Psych nurses have gained a reputation for unchecked abuses of power on the Downtown Eastside. A few years ago, when evidence surfaced to support serious allegations against nurse Don Getz of making fraudulent entries in a psychiatric report arranged for political ends against a normal Downtown Eastside resident, a few Downtown Eastside men came forward and said, 'While we're on the topic of psych nurse abuse, why not look at Liz Evans?"

There are allegations that early in her career in Vancouver, Evans abused her influence as a psych nurse to contact a psychiatrist and falsely portray a woman, Christa, as needing mental health intervention. This tactic was allegedly used during a struggle by Evans and her spouse to get lease-holder Christa, to move out of a house they shared in the Strathcona neighborhood. Terrified of being committed, Christa, moved out of the house. According to a friend, Christa gets 'chills up her spine' to this day when she comes across Liz Evans. [Jim Green, who helped found the Portland Hotel Society and would later run for mayor, also lived in Strathcona; he met Evans in the neighborhood and recruited her to work on supportive housing. He gave her a kiss at the opening today.]

There is also an allegation that during the same period of Evans' career, she had a sexual relationship with a mentally ill man she had been hired to care for; he later had a breakdown.


Evans would no doubt deny these allegations. But if she is going to be operating "supportive" housing for the government, there should be an independent investigation into such allegations made by men who knew her at the time this alleged misconduct occurred.


That was then. This is now. But it remains important that an investigation take place as today's praise by Evans and her PHS associates of their 'partner' in the development of this supportive housing, the Carnegie Community Action Project -- the praise appeared in the introductory paragraph of the glossy handout at the opening -- suggests that not much progress has been made. The endorsement of Carnegie suggests that Evans is willing to overlook the very type of abuse that Downtown Eastsiders fear could occur at the Pennsylvania: people who can't afford lawyers will be easy targets for fraudulent claims entered into reports should they criticize staff [CUPE members].

Carnegie is notorious for this type of abuse of the poor and the homeless. One of many cases is that of homeless William Simpson who was barred from entering Carnegie after he managed to get himself elected to the Carnegie Board. When the barring was exposed, the damage control strategy involved concocting entirely unsupported claims about Simpson posing a "WorkSafe risk".


When I saw the throng of reporters packed around the stage where Liz Evans stood in the basement of the Pennsylvania, and heard a panicky CKNW reporter pleading with people on the jammed staircase to let her get down there, I wondered why such a big deal was being made of this opening. But when Evans introduced Mayor Gregor Robertson and Housing Minister Rich Coleman, I understood. Homelessness is a big deal. Politicians are eager to show local voters and the world that action is being taken on homelessness. (This morning Vancouver radio host Nicki Renshaw said that when she was in London, England for Christmas, the tv news was reporting that homeless people were dying on the snowy streets of Vancouver.)


Robertson reminded the crowd that homelessness was a priority of his government. But first he doused the crowd with political correctness by stating that this event was taking place on "Coast Salish traditional territory". Robertson also said that organizers of the Pennsylvania had spent many years of their lives bringing this supportive housing project to completion. He didn't mention that many were well paid for their time; we have no idea how much PHS executives were paid because they wouldn't release those figures when the Courier newspaper asked them to. And Robertson thanked the ultimate supporter of this supportive housing, "the taxpayer".

Photo above: Rich Coleman, BC Minister of Housing

BC Housing Minister Rich Coleman also spoke to the packed crowd in the basement of the Pennsylvania. Coleman said of this supported housing, "It's not about bricks and mortar; it's about people."

Photo above: Pennsylvania resident Earle Crowe stands behind the microphone on the left of the photo as Housing Minister Rich Coleman (seated) looks on.

The crowd also heard from Earle Crowe, a resident of the Pennsylvania Hotel. Crowe said he'd moved in after being homeless for 3 years. What he didn't say is that he had the right connections and the right politics to get in. It pays to be on the political left or to at least be non-threateningly apolitical if you want to get into social housing on the Downtown Eastside. A few years ago, Crowe worked for the Carnegie Street workers; I remember seeing him slumped over in Pigeon Park on drugs during that period. That was the period when street workers were involved in an illegal scam to silence a victim of alleged (but well supported by documentation) political psychiatry by psych nurse Don Getz. The person's medical confidentiality was breached, a description of this person was passed around amongst street workers and street nurses for no apparent reason than to expedite harassment of them on the street. The victim reports no harassment by Earle Crowe though. He appears to have been otherwise occupied.


Before spectators and speakers left the basement, drummer Gail Bowen -- Burton Cummings learned to play harmonica on her veranda in Winnipeg -- performed a "peace prayer". But first she reminded the crowd that she agreed with Robertson, that this is "unceded Coast Salish territory".

Above photo: Judy Graves, a publicly-funded advocate who walks the streets and approaches the homeless to help them get welfare and a place to stay.
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Although much of the opening ceremony took place in the basement of the Pennsylvania, the final leg took place outside on the corner of Hastings & Carroll St. A switch was flicked in front of the crowd, turning on the neon "Pennsylvania Hotel" sign. Actually, this sign has been turned on for over a month now but it was turned off earlier today so that it could be ceremonially turned on again at the opening. A low income guy watching commented loudly that the sign had cost a fortune. "For the cost of that sign," he said, "they could have built more social housing."

I like the sign. I like seeing it shining at night in the neighborhood. But with povertarians claiming to be improving the lives of Downtown Eastsiders while ignoring the epidemic of human rights abuses that they or their allies are inflicting, it will take more than a neon sign to light up the darkness.



[Thanks to the Downtown Eastsider who took photos and emailed them to us.]

Is this your son? I Told You to Come and Get Him.

He came back. Late Christmas night, turkey-stuffed Downtown Eastsiders meeting for hot chocolate at McDonalds at Terminal & Main St. spotted him. I had written about him previously in a Nov. 1 post, "Is this your son? Come and Get Him", when he dropped a needle on the floor in McDonalds.

When this addict-customer left on Christmas night, he dropped a five dollar bill which another male customer later picked up, saying, "There is a Santa Claus afterall."

Then the addict-customer returned to McDonalds a few minutes later on Christmas night and stood by the ketchup dispenser rummaging through his pockets. He asked the staff if they had found two CDs, but they hadn't.

Maybe that was his Christmas present.

Your Tax Dollars at Rest

Unmarked police car parked across from the Vancouver Police station on Main St. near Hastings.

Christmas night, Dec. 25

Boxing Day as it snowed.

Boxing Day night as it rained.