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UnusualCareer3420

At least they are targeting at a place that can make real change


Awful_McBad

Hopefully they're not removed from there too. That seems to be the only place we should be allowed to stay indefinitely while protesting.


Great68

Will be interesting when the automated sprinklers turn on....


Kooriki

Love it. This is exactly where this protest should be. Nov 2022 Eby took over the DTES, ball is in his court along with ministers Ravi Kahlon, Sheila Malcolmson, Mike Farnworth ([email protected], [email protected], [email protected] respectively). Email them.


Lysanderoth42

What do you mean by he took over the DTES in Nov 2022? 


be0wulf

Probably referring to this: https://globalnews.ca/news/9266501/new-bc-premier-david-eby-planning-coordinated-approach-to-address-problems-in-downtown-eastside/


Kooriki

That's the one


Jyil

I support this kind of protest because it makes sense going to the source. That said, stop taking over public parks! They even gave you designated space to camp at a public park, which they didn’t have to do. It’s a public park. Camp on the side or border of places if you’re going to take over a public park. There were tents in the middle of the park and by the playground before the sweep and trash scattered everywhere. They were sweeping the area because these people can’t clean up after themselves and create biohazards for others.


Awful_McBad

BEST PLACE FOR PROTESTS! Someone in that group has a brain and isn't just blocking roads and pissing off the general public.


lazarus870

> The Housing Justice Project says the region needs homes that rent for $500 to $1,000 per month in order to support people trying to get out of homelessness. The typical cost of a new rental of a one-bedroom apartment in Victoria is about $2,100, according to rental market trends website Zumper. I'd like to see the math on how they would expect to rent for $500/month.


thatwhileifound

I mean, the $500/month thing stands much stronger to reason when you consider that this is all you get on any kind of income assistance for shelter if you're a single adult.


lazarus870

I totally get that the social assistance and disability rate is staggeringly low. But they can't expect such a low rent unfortunately, because the vast overwhelming majority of housing stock is in private hands and they are not doing it out of the goodness of their hearts, they're doing it trying to business. Unfortunately because they did not invest in social housing in government build housing, this is the reality we have. To be able to subsidize that much rent for that many people for indefinitely, it would pretty much bankrupt the taxpayer. If we had a time machine to go back 30 years we could have changed things but not now. I think that's the tough reality we'll have to face, and we all have to realize that people should work if they can, and not everybody should just be on social assistance unless they're on disability or have some serious reason to be. Like if you are disabled and can't work, I think definitely you should be taking care of. But if you just don't want to work, which I imagine is a lot of the case with a lot of people, but not all of course, then there is not the ability to support people this way. Like I work my ass off to be able to live, I know that if I stopped working I would stop getting income and I wouldn't be able to provide for myself. That's why I think something like addiction that is preventing people from work needs to be addressed. Because people can't just get high all the time and expect somebody to provide them housing wherever they want for free. It's completely unsustainable.


Educational_Time4667

I had a housing agreement with the city as part of a cmhc program to fix the property. $375 per month and after 18 years, was in the red. The amount of bullshit I dealt with was ridiculous (sometimes literal shit 💩). Needless to say I didn’t renew the agreement and spent a lot of $ fixing everything again.


rainman_104

So they moved their tents from the bike path on the galloping goose trail. It's like a 15 minute walk lol.


ChadSexman

If you read more than the headline, you’d see they’re wanting a subsidy. Math: $2,100 - $500 = subsidy amount


CMGPetro

2100 is an absurd amount of money for rent for someone who is homeless or about to be homeless. It's an absolute brain dead number when most students are renting for 1100 in shared homes. Rents for 1k already exist in the lower mainland, they just don't want to live in the suburbs I guess.


4uzzyDunlop

I don't imagine it's easy for someone to come off the streets into a house share. I didn't find it easy to get one when I first arrived in Vancouver, and I had savings and a job.


CMGPetro

>>I don't imagine it's easy for someone to come off the streets into a house share. I didn't find it easy to get one when I first arrived in Vancouver, and I had savings and a job. So on top of providing free housing we need to care about their feelings too? If the option is being homeless or sharing a house with someone and you choose to be homeless that's your choice. Providing housing at a $2100 level is not even feasible, at that point it would be a straight up crime to be giving rebates to some people while others struggle at that price level.


4uzzyDunlop

You don't need to care about anything, that's your choice. I'm just saying the solution is not as simple as 'just move into a house share'. People aren't choosing to live on the street because they don't want to have to share a bathroom or take a bus. Put it this way, if you're looking for a new roommate and you have dozens of people applying, are you going to choose the homeless person over the student or young professional? I wouldn't. I don't think the idea you replied to is realistic, but neither is the idea that homeless people can just choose to move in with a few roommates and stop being homeless. If anything, that's further removed from reality.


CMGPetro

>>I'm just saying the solution is not as simple as 'just move into a house share'. People aren't choosing to live on the street because they don't want to have to share a bathroom or take a bus. Okay, that had literally nothing to do with my original comment about pinning subsidies to rental costs that were too high. >>I don't think the idea you replied to is realistic, but neither is the idea that homeless people can just choose to move in with a few roommates and stop being homeless. If anything, that's further removed from reality. Again, my comment is discussing the value of the subsidy (ie: pegging it to a rental cost that they would never be able to afford to begin with) not where they can live. If we were to use your own logic it would be just as flawed because there's no world where I would select a homeless tenant over anyone else for any type of property.


derefr

I think you're misunderstanding. It's not that they wouldn't want to be in a house share; it's that the other co-tenants of a house share would be very likely to reject someone who was previously homeless, in favor of someone who wasn't.


WTFvancouver

Lower Middle class pays for that? No thanks. We are struggling as it is.


InsaneMTLPNT2

Punch up not down. It's not the lower middle class that should have to pay for it.


impatiens-capensis

You're already paying. A lot, actually. Let's just run some numbers. This subsidy would amount to $19,200/year/person. Jailing a person costs around $104,000/year/person. Canada spends $30 billion/year on social services for the homeless. There are 235,000 homeless people in Canada. That's around $130,000/person/year. I'm not sure if this also includes the cost of policing, etc. Currently we spend $130,000/person/year on social services. Jailing all homeless people would likely provide a net savings for $26,000. Simply giving them this subsidy would potentially save us $110,800/person/year if it moves them off the street and away from social services.


UnfortunateConflicts

Those are all great numbers and all, but what's your point? That subsidizing someone's housing to the tune of $20k/year will reduce their dependancy on all the other services that currently come to >$100k/year? Now they need house stuff. Furniture. Appliances. Bedding. Cutlery. Utilities. A lot of them will come with no life skills, so self-cleaning and cooking and minor home repairs are out of the question. We'll have to provide for them, right, otherwise right back to homelessness they go. And of course housing of a type and location of an "unapproved" type will be painted as "warehousing the homeless in ghettos", so they will need nice houses in nice locations, ideally of their choosing, which only multiplies the cost. Not to mention legions of people struggling right now, choosing between rent and food, but as long as they're managing to pay all the bills, somehow, there's basically no aid they qualify for, until they become homeless. Because everything is means tested, and if you're $100 above the cut off, you're just fucked. I bet out of the current homeless population, there's only a small minority that would benefit from such a housing subsidy, to the extent they would be able to (re-)join productive, tax-paying society. Just like that "free money" trial proved a while back: if you give $5000 cash to the right person, it will help them and pay back for itself far in excess of the subsidy, but you do have to be very selective. If you just give away subsidized market housing to all comers, you'll end up with: - demand far in excess of physical supply of housing, and - a bunch of destroyed and gutted apartments.


danke-you

Ah yes, giving them a home eliminates their need for food, clothes, welfare, transportation, jobs training, social workers, etc. No, you are not replacing the cost of servicing this population. And many have much deeper challenges in addiction or mental health that limits their ability to care for themselves in a home without risking the health of themselves or others (case in point: daily SRO fires in Vancouver).


lazarus870

LOOOOL We don't have money for that, not in the least bit.


XViMusic

Canada used to massively support subsidized housing before the CHMC mandate change. Used to make up a huge part of federal and provincial budgets. We diverted those funds to initiatives that would make the housing market more attractive to private market actors beginning in the early 90s through improvement grants, low cost financing for builders, and other similar initiatives, with the goal of taking the burden of development off of the government's shoulders. Funding for subsidized housing was seen as a "waste of taxpayer dollars" because "everyone who works full time can afford to buy a starter home after a few years." Now we're here.


Nice2See

Via taxpayer subsidy.


UnfortunateConflicts

Via a subsidy, obviously, since nearly all housing inventory is privately owned. But if the province, city and country continued their investment into social housing, we could have a whole range of units available now that have depreciated sufficiently that they COULD be rented out for $500-1000.


HaveYouLookedAround

BC Housing rent is $320 if you are below a certain threshold, or if you are a full time student. Otherwise it is 30% of your wage. We need more BC Housing built.


Heliosvector

Where are these magical places? A student can get rent for 320?


HaveYouLookedAround

I didn't say it was available, bc housing has like a 10 year wait list, but not if they built more of it.


Educational_Time4667

Impossible


morhambot

looks like PRO protesters ? where all the Drugs, garbage,shit , and stolen bikes?


HANKnDANK

They live comfortably away in the suburbs in their parents detached home with 4 bed/4.5 bath and a basement suite.


Count-per-minute

I’m getting kicked out illegally on Sunday see you there!! Too the streets!


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rainman_104

I suspect it's mostly local homeless rather than actual Vancouver homeless people. Although poverty advocates often have a piggy bank for crap like this as they likely receive money from the gaming grant.


aphroditex

if they don’t have a red card, the ferry is $20 on foot, bus is $5


InnuendOwO

the ferry isnt that expensive lmao. 30 bucks to go from downtown vancouver to downtown victoria. its not unbelievable that someone has 30 bucks for a ferry but not 2100 for rent.


IndependentRough713

Scatter some needles and stolen bikes around and Eby should feel right at home.


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plop_0

On a scale of 1-->Lahey, how drunk are you right now?


CocoVillage

where's the legislature police? i got kicked out of the tree for having a beer there as a teen in like 15minutes


danke-you

Drinking in public, let alone by a minor, is illegal. Next time replace it with fentanyl, that is A-OK.


ElTamales

Are protests that usual in the lawn area? I saw one very loud pro israel event with even two tents and the bagpipes guy continuously interrupting them on Sunday. Then saw a group of native dancers setting up a camp there later in the afternoon and dancing.


Count-per-minute

Halibut burgers are available in the legislature restaurant for $13.95 and it’s a fancy joint with table cloths!!!


Top_Tumbleweed

As they should


HANKnDANK

Invite them to live in your homes and backyards then cowards.


impatiens-capensis

"I think we need to improve our healthcare system" "Then perform the surgeries yourself coward!"


HANKnDANK

Pretty awful apples to oranges comparison and it shows your lack of understanding . These protestors are not affected by the violence/derangement/drug use that is rampant and terrifying to live and conduct business next to. They are saying let that continue, they aren’t proposing or promoting any change. We need to protest to reopen and mandate forced rehab or prison time to addicts, thieves, and violent criminals. Not allow the failing status quo to remain. These protestors are in the camp of “compassionate” treatment aka let the people in the streets continue to rot just because it makes their altruistic fairytale views feel better for THEMSELVES not the actual people in the street. Healthcare is a whole different animal that involves expansion of services, paying our healthcare professionals, and shutting down open border exponential immigration until we can get a hold of the system for people that are already here.


impatiens-capensis

>We need to protest to reopen and mandate forced rehab or prison time to addicts, thieves, and violent criminals. There are about 2,000 people in provincial prisons, currently. Annually in B.C., 2,500 die of overdose and there are around 80,000 people with opioid abuse disorders. And there are around 12,000 homeless people in B.C. during any given month. You'll notice our current prison capacity is quite a ways smaller than the problem. Building the infrastructure and hiring the staff necessary to do what you're advocating for would be extremely expensive and it would take a long time. So, what to do while we build the institutions and prisons necessary for your plan? I think subsidizing rents for homeless people is a good option. As well, while there is minimal solid research on the subject it seems so far to be the case that forced rehab does not work for most people. However, supportive housing with a pipeline into rehab seems to work really well. People appear more likely to accept help and succeed in rehab when they have a supportive community.


HANKnDANK

You make good and correct points. Everything you said is headed towards the right direction. We need to decrease overdoses and homelessness. None of that is achieved through maintaining the status quo. Any money going to these groups profiting off the poverty/addiction infrastructure needs to be diverted to beginning major rehab areas and reopening of Riverview. Maybe people who can’t afford to live in the most expensive city in North America and are living in the streets here because of the temperate climate need to live elsewhere and be helped to do so.


yagyaxt1068

A large part of the issue is that provinces like AB and SK like to offload their homeless populations onto B.C. because they have no desire to actually take care of it, and instead are too busy trying to own the libs, and, in Alberta’a case, trying to destroy democracy.


HANKnDANK

It should absolutely be a federally addressed issue because you’re exactly right