Saturday, May 03, 2008

Vancouver's Olympic Secrets

Olympic Secretariat stops keeping minutes
David Eby
25 Apr 2008

Secretaries at British Columbia's Olympic Secretariat are celebrating the $40m provincial government department's decision to stop keeping minutes at meetings. NDP critic Harry Bains suggests the reason the minutes are no longer being kept is not out of concern for admin assistant workloads at the BCOS, but actually due to concerns that Freedom of Information requests would reveal embarrassing information to ranting gripers about the upcoming 2010 Olympics.


For those not in the Olympic loop, which included me, the Olympic Secretariat is apparently "the provincial agency responsible for overseeing British Columbia's Olympic financial commitments and ensuring British Columbia's Olympic vision is achieved." Which is a pretty cool job, especially if you don't have to write anything down about it.


As to why the department is no longer keeping minutes, Secretariat rep Don McDonald (no relation to official Olympic sponsor Ronald) told the Vancouver Sun that keeping minutes was a big waste of time: "The secretariat was keeping minutes but found they were not an effective management tool."


He also suggested that their approach was "consistent with cross-government practices and legislation." Really? Wow. A whole provincial government of non-minute taking departments. What was it we were talking about last time? Was it something about transportation?


Interestingly, in the same article, NDP Olympic critic Harry Bains alleges that VANOC has stopped sending copies of its minutes to the Secretariat as well, not to save money on postage as one might expect, but also because of Freedom of Information request concerns. Whatever you say HB...
Visit pivotlegal.org for more information about Vancouver's low-income housing crisis.

Pictures of the DTES and homelessness


Posted: 25 Apr 2008 06:26 PM CDT


For those of you reading this blog from out of town, it may be difficult to imagine the situation in a neighbourhood whose AIDS rate is equivalent to that of Botswana, in buildings where people are being displaced into street homelessness by gentrification, and in a city where homelessness doubles in a two year span. Fortunately, some interested photographers have taken the time to document some of the remarkable people and places that personify this crisis.


First, the Pivot Legal Society [Disclosure: I work there] hands out disposable cameras every year to community members to document the bonds and humanity in the DTES. The best pictures end up in their annual calendar. They've just launched a book, available for $20, that tells the stories behind the pictures. You can find out more about it and buy it online here, or from a street vender or a local bookstore.


Second, the Vancouver Sun did a great photo essay on homelessness you can check out online here.


Finally, The Blackbird, as he likes to be known, has done a photo essay on gentrification in the DTES filled with remarkable images available on Flickr here.
Visit pivotlegal.org for more information about Vancouver's low-income housing crisis.

Olympic traffic lanes


Posted: 25 Apr 2008 11:48 AM CDT


For a city that apparently waged an entire election on the issue of converting two of six traffic lanes to bike lanes on the Burrard Street bridge, coverage of Olympic designated traffic lanes for 2010 has seemed, well, somewhat less controversial.


Although this is a touch out of date, last week the Province tabled legislation that would permit the City to close traffic lanes to all but Olympic traffic. The Miscellaneous Statutes Amendment Act isn't about traffic interruption on just one bridge; we're talking about closing a lane all the way from Richmond to Southeast False Creek, says Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon: "We're talking about taking existing roadways and reserving lanes for special use. It could be, say, to get to the Richmond Oval from the athletes' village for example."


Don't worry though, because access to the specialized lanes is going to be totally transparent and accountable. The Sun has guaranteed as much: "Access to the specialized lanes would likely be overseen by staff working for Vanoc." Perfect.
Visit pivotlegal.org for more information about Vancouver's low-income housing crisis.

City drops ball on social housing opportunities


Posted: 24 Apr 2008 05:36 PM CDT


Seems like every time I turn around these days, someone is telling me about how Vancouver could have built more housing for the homeless, but dropped the ball. Check out this throw away paragraph from the Vancouver Sun about how there could have been social housing in the new Concord Pacific development at Abbot and Hastings, but the City couldn't figure out their policy on the matter:


Concord had at one point considered asking the city for significant additional density, for which it had been willing to provide some low-income units in the project. But [Concord's Senior Vice President of Development Peter] Webb said the company abandoned that idea when it became clear that it was going to take city planners some time to decide on an overall policy about trading density for social housing.


Hmmmm....should we trade density for social housing? I don't know. Tough question. Doesn't seem to me that Vancouver is facing a density crisis, but it sure is facing a homelessness crisis.


Check out this info, from an anonymous source, about the Pantages Theatre renovation at the corner of Main and Hastings:


[The proponents are] still only mentioning something like approx 135 "affordable housing" units to be built on the 4 properties to the right of the theatre. [. . .] The 2 story Chinese association bldg next to Pantages was to become a part of the package, and were to have seniors housing within the development as payment for their property being assembled, but after a while they settled for cash in lieu of housing units. [. . .] At the beginning of this 2 years ago, it was touted as being social housing but fairly early on became "affordable housing."


If the City can't get its act together to jump on the opportunities people are presenting to them, let alone advocating to make sure they're even better than what is proposed, then who will?
Visit pivotlegal.org for more information about Vancouver's low-income housing crisis.

Sochi residents feel DTES pain


Posted: 24 Apr 2008 01:11 PM CDT


According to the Internet, which is usally pretty accurate, residents of the Nizhneimeretinsky (Lower Imeretinsky) Bukhta, the low-lands area where most of the Olympic village will be built for the 2014 Sochi olympics, have written an open letter to plead against the forced eviction of locals.


Highlights of the letter are as follows, and the similarities to the displacement going on in the DTES is eerie. From swampland to highly valuable real estate:


We, the residents of the Nizhneimeretinsky Bukhta, address this to you personally with belief and hope. Help us to protect and save our "SMALL HOMELAND"!


It is clear, that in our modest lives, we don't fit in with the grandiose plans of the "powers that be." When the prices for land in Sochi grew beyond belief, our land, right on the sea, sparked many people's interest. Now it holds tremendous worth, and not for the Olympics, but for business. At one time, this land did not exist. There was impassable malarial marshland and swamp, which our grandfathers and great-grandfathers drained and cultivated, dying from malaria and fever. This land was obtained not only with an exchange of life, but also with gold paid to the Russian government.


[. . .]


According to the talk, the Olympics serve people, bringing them health, happiness and joy, but in fact they are remaking the destinies of hundreds of Sochi families, and as it looks to us, not for sport, and not for the prospect of developing our city of SOCHI. The Olympics will pass through in two weeks, while we will lose our "SMALL HOMELAND" forever!


By law, properties of equal worth must be provided. But where can they be found for Everyone, if [those providing them] need [the land] themselves? The relocation of people from private homes into apartments. Presenting people who live on the sea with lands remote and distanced from it. Compensation with a fair price? Such a thing is completely unequal!! And it is not at all clear why land immediately on the coast of the Black Sea is needed to conduct the winter Olympics in Sochi.


[. . .]


We would even understand the necessity of tearing down one house, as with the building of the airport, if it stood at the center of the state's interests in relation to solving Olympic problems. But we cannot understand how a whole village could interfere (with more than 100 houses, with several families living in each house).


Whose interests are the Olympics, which must bring peace to the whole world, pursuing, if they are denigrating their own people in this way!!!
Visit pivotlegal.org for more information about Vancouver's low-income housing crisis.

Let the accurate reporting begin


Posted: 24 Apr 2008 12:38 PM CDT


Jeff Lee, the Sun's Olympic reporter, appears to be feeling a bit tender about the recent decision by the Sun's parent company, Canwest, to buy into the Olympics.


In a recent blog entry, Lee seems to recognize the clear conflict of interest he has been placed in by his employer: "What an interesting situation I find myself in," he writes. He describes how, on hearing the announcement, he "specifically braced Skulsky [President of Canwest] and Bent [President of the Pacific Newspaper Group] on how they will assure readers that the newsrooms will be free from interference on Olympic coverage."


From a clear recognition of the conflict, Lee then descends into name calling for others who dared to ask the same questions he did. In analyzing my post about Canwest's sponsorship of the Games (Lee is hopefully a regular reader), he suggests that this blog used to be called "David Eby's Rant Blog," which is totally untrue (although it may contain the odd rant). He also suggested that the questions asked in the post on the Canwest sponsorship are mere "griping." Fortunately, he appears to believe that I am entitled to my rants and griping.


Swell.


In any event (no pun intended), I hope that Jeff, as the official Olympic reporter for the Official Newspaper of the 2010 Olympic Games, is going to ask hard questions about the Olympics of more people than just his employers. It's going to take more than a couple of low blows in a blog entry, and a feel good story about a drunk driving editor, to convince me and other skeptics that the millions paid out by Canwest aren't going to affect his coverage of the Olympics, whether intentionally or otherwise. Good luck Jeff.


Personal message to Jeff: If things go sideways because you write too honestly, you can always write with us. No hard feelings; you're a talented writer. So long as you don't mind being the number two reporter on the actual Official Vancouver 2010 Olympics Newswire.
Visit pivotlegal.org for more information about Vancouver's low-income housing crisis.

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