- This event has passed.
Rally to block Gregor’s injunction against the 58 tent city
November 24, 2016- 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Housing rights not property rights! Displacement is not safety!
Rally to block Gregor’s injunction against the 58 tent city
Thursday, November 24th
4pm
58 W Hastings tent city
By 6pm on Thursday, November 24th, all tent city residents of 58 W Hastings have been ordered to evacuate the site. Almost 20 people are currently staying at the site and they have nowhere to go when the tent city is dismantled. Only one person has been offered housing and all the shelters are full, including the winter shelters which opened last week.
The City is using safety concerns to justify the injunction, but in reality the injunction is designed to break up and destroy the little stability, safety and security that the remaining homeless residents of 58 W Hastings have built up over the past months. Displacement does not mean safety for women or anyone. Displacement will thrust the residents of 58 back into the alleys and dark spaces of the city where they will face increased danger from police and anti-homeless and misogynist bigots who act under cover of isolation.
The court injunction against 58 W Hastings was granted even though in similar cases last year the BC Supreme Court found that pushing homeless people out of public spaces without offering adequate shelter alternatives is a violation of their Charter rights. In this case, although 58 W. Hastings is owned by the City of Vancouver, it is the City’s private property and designated for the City’s private development not public use.
The fight against Gregor’s injunction at 58 challenges the rule of private property rights over peoples’ lives. The court ruling that empowers the police displacement of 58 means the homeless-free appearance of Vancouver’s downtown core and the power of private property (even a fenced-in empty lot) overrules homeless people’s lives.
Join 58 W Hastings tent city residents on Thursday as they protest the City of Vancouver’s homeless hate laws. In the midst of an unprecedented housing crisis, we want the City to accommodate tent cities not displace them! We want homes not shelters! And we want an end to all homeless hate laws!
Read more about the injunction in the Volcano’s special newsletter about 58 W Hastings:
https://www.thevolcano.org/
The rally is taking place on the unceded coast salish territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Wauthuth) and Skwxwú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish) peoples.