Home Sweet Home… but for how long?

Downtown East art poster, November 2013

Displacement: Past, Present, Future

By Dave Diewert and Mercedes Eng

The forces that drive people out of their homes and communities and off their land have a long history in the Downtown Eastside. (…)

7th Annual Women’s Housing march

Photograph collection

After the Olympics homelessness in Vancouver is back on the rise

By the Editors

Homelessness is increasing. In October, City Hall released a report that says the number of homeless people in the city is 1,600 and there are only enough shelter beds for 1,327. (…)

The Stanza Project

By Phoenix

The Stanza Project (Vancouver: Otter Press, 2013) is a DTES book of poems and writings, drawings and sketches. It is a collaboration of architecture and words. Edited by Elee Kraljii Gardiner, the book combines the work of the Thursdays Writing Collective at the Carnegie Community Centre and MLPProosten/Architecture of the Netherlands. (…)

Hungry for a Welfare Raise: The 2nd Annual Welfare Food Challenge

By Bill Hopwood

A group of dieticians and nutritionists were among the people who took Raise the Rates’ 2^nd Annual Welfare Food Challenge. In spite of all their training and skills, none of them could work out a healthy and filling diet for a week with only $26 to spend. (…)

Mayor’s Meeting on Mental Health and Addictions

By Phoenix

On October 2nd, Vancouver’s Mayor Gregor Robertson held a roundtable on mental health and addictions. This was done on short notice. The mayor announced a “public health crisis” saying that far too many people were walking around the city with “untreated” mental health and addiction issues and doing harm to themselves or others. (…)

Mental Health Crisis!

By Karen Ward

The Downtown Eastside is the only place I have found where you’re treated with decency and respect when you’re upfront about your illness. Politicians and doctors will never understand this. They have a lot of privilege and think they know the best way to live a life, and anything else is just wrong. (…)

My Thoughts on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission

By Robert Bonner

In my lifetime, I have heard or read about historic events that have occurred in this world. The death of a British Prime Minister, assassination of two brothers, man on the moon, death of a man with a dream; an inept apology from a man who continues with his government’s policies to suppress and deprive this country’s First Nations’ people (Indians) of their share in the abundance of natural resources that he offers so freely to the world. (…)

Park-a-palooza and artists at Oppenheimer Park

By Diane Wood

The Oppenheimer Park show, named “Park-a-Palooza! – Fun & Play” is running at the Gallery Gachet, 88 East Cordova, until December 1. My first reaction to the theme of this year’s show was a defensive reaction to calling art “fun”. Many local artists have chosen this as our career, and it’s our livelihood. (…)

Pushed out – Pressure is building against low-income residents in the DTES

By DJ Larkin

When it comes to housing, members of the Downtown Eastside community are being squeezed on all sides, leaving many with few or no reasonable options. (…)

Homeless in the DTES

By Wendy Pedersen

What happens to your tent and belongings when the cops take it away?  It took a lawyer and a long-time advocate to figure it out and get the possessions back for Donny Miller, a local homeless man. (…)

Homelessness and the Drug War in Abbotsford: Interview with Barry Shantz

By Dave Diewert

Recently the Downtown East caught up with Barry Shantz, an organizer with the BC/Yukon Association of Drug War Survivors in Abbotsford. (…)

Storm Brewing: Local Area Plan and the Future of the DTES

By Jean Swanson and Harold Lavender

The fight over the future of the DTES is heating up. A DTES Local Area Plan that could last up to thirty years will be presented to City Council for a vote, probably in March. (…)

Condos flood into Oppenheimer area while City stalls on planning process

By Jean Swanson

While the City stalls on the Local Area Planning Process (LAPP), the heart of the DTES community is being taken over by condo and market housing developments. The latest is a proposal for 24 condos and only 5 social housing units (probably only 2 or 3 at rents people on welfare can afford) at 626 Alexander. (…)

City Hall gives developers $71 Million, they cry for more

By Ivan Drury

City Hall is making and proposing pro-development policy changes and neighbourhood plans. The first effect is a great leap in land values. How does this work? (…)

“My activism goes beyond the personal”: an Interview with Japanese Canadian activist Lily Shinde

By Mercedes Eng

In this era of official government apologies and ongoing systemic racism, we look to successful struggles for social justice such as the Japanese Canadian Redress movement and ask their leaders for advice in current struggles. (…)

Japanese Canadian elder Grace Eiko Thomson speaks to Mayor and Council

By Grace Eiko Thomson

On September 25^th, the City of Vancouver passed a motion to formally apologize for its role in the internment and forced removal of Japanese Canadians during and after the war. The Human Rights Committee of the Greater Vancouver Japanese Canadian Citizens’ Association invited Grace Eiko Thomson, an independent curator, cultural historian, and Redress activist, to speak to the historic context of the City’s motion. (…)