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$1.4-billion spent on Downtown Eastside since 2000, More than $1.4-billion later, the

Quote:

THE MONEY PIT
A Globe and Mail investigation shows for the first time how much public and private money has been spent on Vancouver's Downtown Eastside since 2000: $1.4-billion. What has all that money accomplished? Limited progress at best. As Robert Matas reports, many people believe the area is worse than ever.

ROBERT MATAS
Globe & Mail

February 14, 2009

VANCOUVER -- It has been nearly a decade since three levels of government signed a landmark agreement designed to transform Vancouver's notorious Downtown Eastside, but the neighbourhood remains a vortex that sucks in junkies, the mentally ill and other desperate souls from across the country.

With a year remaining in the agreement - and the 2010 Olympics about to put Vancouver in the world's spotlight - a Globe and Mail investigation has for the first time tallied how much public and private money has been poured into Canada's worst slum.

The result: More than $1.4-billion later, the Downtown Eastside is hardly better off.

An open-air drug market still thrives five minutes from a police station. The bathrooms of decrepit hotels still serve as shooting galleries for addicts. Prostitutes still offer their bodies from the curbside. Drug pushers still prey on the mentally diminished, multiplying the misery.

If there has been progress, it has been scant. The rash of drug overdoses that killed more than 1,000 people in the 1990s has dissipated, but the legion of addicts remains. HIV/AIDS is no longer epidemic, but residents' health remains abysmal.

Even the politicians who were behind the Vancouver Agreement concede defeat.

"I've worked in the Downtown Eastside for a long time, since before I got into politics, and I have never seen our community this bad," says Jenny Kwan, the NDP cabinet minister who led the province's involvement in the agreement, signed in 2000.

"I can say that honestly, politics aside, I have never seen such desperation on the streets. I walk down there in the early hours, I go down to the community, and I am literally stepping over bodies."

Spending on the Downtown Eastside is "mind-boggling," says former Vancouver mayor Philip Owen, another signatory to the agreement.

Mr. Owen says that until now he has had no firm idea of just how much money has gone into the Downtown Eastside.

That is because nobody has been keeping track.

The federal, provincial and municipal governments, the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority and more than 100 organizations working in the neighbourhood record their own spending, but none keeps a global tally. The Vancouver police department, meanwhile, won't release its budget for patrolling the Downtown Eastside.

"No one seems to have a handle on it," says Bernie Magnan, the Vancouver Board of Trade's chief economist. "We've tried several times to get it, but we cannot seem to nail down what actually goes in there."

By conducting interviews, reviewing public documents and asking groups to summarize their spending, The Globe reached a conservative estimate for health, social services, housing, law enforcement and other public services.

The grand total: At least $1,468,154,865 since the Vancouver Agreement was signed, with roughly $717.5-million spent on health and social services, $348.6-million on housing, $154.5-million on safety and justice, $230-million on economic development and $16.8-million on services that bridged those classifications.

Reaching the total was more art than science. Wherever possible, The Globe used actual spending figures, but in some cases relied on promises of spending or estimates where precise figures weren't available. The calculations include some projects and services outside the Downtown Eastside because the boundaries of the neighbourhood are fluid and some of the projects aimed at the neighbourhood's residents are located outside it.

The flood of spending has been concentrated mostly in a few squalid blocks home to about 6,000 men and women; a huge chunk has gone to about 2,100 people in crisis, health authorities say.

So why has $1.4-billion made so little difference to this relatively small population? Where did the money go?

ONE ROOM FOR THE HOMELESS: $326,484

To help solve the puzzle of how so much money has been spent on housing in the Downtown Eastside, consider the case of the Pennsylvania Hotel.

The historic five-storey structure, built in 1906 and designed by renowned local architect William Tuff Whiteway, is located on the edge of the most desolate stretch of Hastings Street, the main drag. By 2000, the once-stylish, turret-topped building was a flophouse, its 165-seat pub a drug den.

The city, provincial and federal governments worked together to restore the heritage landmark, replacing the pub with a restaurant and reconfiguring the living space into 44 units for the homeless. The antiquated structure had to be brought up to current seismic and building codes.

The province contributed $4.6-million from its housing budget and agreed to pay $341,710 annually for health workers and counsellors who work there. Ottawa contributed $4-million. The regional and city government paid an additional $2.15-million.

Developer Concord Pacific contributed $3.6-million in exchange for transfer of density to another property.

In total, it cost $14.4-million to reopen the hotel recently. That works out to $326,484 per suite, for about 250 square feet of living space, including a bathroom and kitchenette.

In the past two years, the B.C. government has bought 13 run-down residential hotels in the Downtown Eastside with the intention of fixing them up for the homeless. The final bill for the real-estate buying spree is not yet known.

The spending on housing in the neighbourhood goes well beyond buying and reviving skid-road hotels.

In 2000, the federal and provincial governments announced at least $72-million in expenditures on housing and temporary shelters in the area. Since then, an additional $104-million has gone into subsidized housing, outreach programs to homeless people and rent supplements, according to The Globe's estimate.

In the same period, city hall spent $155-million on affordable and subsidized housing throughout Vancouver. Although the city does not separate its spending by neighbourhood, a municipal official said much of the housing was for people who may have ended up in the Downtown Eastside without alternatives.

It is also difficult to calculate the total cost of government concessions granted to private developers that build in the Downtown Eastside. The $183-million Woodward's redevelopment - a four-tower project that promises to remake the western portion of the Downtown Eastside - will have 500 units priced at whatever the market dictates and 200 units of subsidized housing. The city compensated the developer with concessions worth millions of dollars for the public housing, heritage restoration and public amenities such as a daycare.

As well, the city has permits on its books for new projects worth $70-million in the Downtown Eastside. The list includes subsidized housing, market housing and renovations of an evening drop-in centre for prostitutes.

AN EXPENSIVE DRUG COURT THAT DOESN'T WORK

Like housing, law enforcement and courts for the Downtown Eastside have swallowed hundreds of millions of dollars.

Some costly judicial programs have not made a difference. One example: Vancouver's special court for drug cases, which has cost about $17-million to build and operate.

The city opened the court in 2001, embracing an idea pioneered in Toronto three years earlier. Judicial authorities hoped that the novel approach would help to combat substance abuse in the Downtown Eastside. The concept is simple: Judges offer less-severe penalties to addicts charged with narcotics crimes, provided they participate in a court-supervised, 265-hour treatment program. Also, as a condition of bail, the addicts must stay away from the neighbourhood.

The courtroom is located on the third floor of the Provincial Court building, in the heart of the Downtown Eastside, and the atmosphere is anything but typical.

On a recent day, dozens of offenders who had already pleaded guilty filled the public gallery, listening as the names of the accused were read out. Each time somebody answered and approached the bench, the gallery broke into applause.

The judge was casual. "Hi, John," she would say. "How are you? What would like to talk about today." But this kinder, gentler approach hasn't kept the Downtown Eastside's addicts from reoffending. The court accepted 322 offenders from December, 2001, to March, 2005, according to an evaluation of the project done by Ottawa's ORBIS Partners Inc., and funded by the National Crime Prevention Strategy. Only 43 people - or 14 per cent - completed the treatment program.

The analysts compared the group with 166 offenders with addiction problems who did not go to drug court. Their evaluation found the new approach produced no statistically significant reductions in new charges and convictions.

Nevertheless, the drug court continues to run in Vancouver (with some changes to the treatment program) and the concept has been expanded to include a downtown community court for mentally ill people, which opened last fall in the Downtown Eastside. The new court process was expected to integrate health and social services into the justice system.

The construction budget for the new court was $5.6-million, and the cost of operating it in its first year is expected to be about $4.4-million.

LIVING FREE IN THE DOWNTOWN EASTSIDE

Any calculation of money spent in the Downtown Eastside must include the incredible efforts of non-profit organizations and community groups that have stepped in to fill holes in the public safety net.

A directory of free services in the Downtown Eastside prepared for street people lists five shelters, seven locations for free clothing and six places for free meals. Free phones, free hair cuts, free dental work, laundry and showers are available.

At one such place, the three-storey Union Gospel Mission shelter, 76 people came for a free lunch one day last week. The menu featured smoky sausage soup, meat sandwiches, cupcakes and orange juice, and the line of mostly men in worn jackets and jeans wound down the street and around the corner.

At the door, a scruffy man who looked to be in his 20s mumbled to himself as he stood next to the front of the line. "His mind is gone," a mission worker said. "He just stands in the doorway."

The Union Gospel Mission offers more than meals. The facility sleeps 40, and offers free clothes, toothbrushes, soap, razors, counselling and courses to complete high school.

"Everything is for free," said Keela Keeping, a spokeswoman for the mission. "But it is not really attractive. It would only appeal to people who really need it."

The Union Gospel Mission, which run two additional sites in the Downtown Eastside, receives no government funds. Corporate sponsors such as Telus Corp. provide volunteers and cash.

Other groups depend heavily on government support. Some groups, such as the Downtown Eastside Youth Activities Society (DEYAS), receive almost 100 per cent of their funding from the government. No one calculates how much has been spent over the decade on those services.

And yet, after all that investment in health, safety and housing, more is required to turn the Downtown Eastside into a community just like any other in Vancouver. Considerable effort has gone into trying to re-establish businesses, provide job training for residents and brighten up the neighbourhood.

The city has kicked in $400,000 to match some of the projects financed under a $10-million provincial government grant for neighbourhood improvements, such as new awnings on buildings, new neon signs and cleaning up graffiti.

The city also made an effort to provide job training with a program of temporary work for eight people in recovery from drug use. Four went on to full-time employment. The budget for the program was $163,000.

Projects under the Vancouver Agreement are among the more aggressive attempts to change the social and economic realities in the community. The governments put $6.9-million into creating an organization to develop business in the area and help find work opportunities for residents. Building Opportunities with Business Inner City Society, better known as BOB, has achieved small victories for several people, but it has not succeeded in remaking the neighbourhood.

The agency had played a role in the purchase of $25-million worth of goods and services from suppliers in the Downtown Eastside and adjacent neighbourhoods. BOB was also involved in arrangements leading to jobs for 102 residents. But it was set up with ambitions of helping find work for many more people.

Meanwhile, government spending on social assistance rivals spending on health and housing. About 73 per cent of the 7,100 people on welfare who live in what the province considers to be the Downtown Eastside receive payment at the highest level possible. The province is paying out $70-million in this year alone. An additional $9.7-million was spent this year on help for families and children in the neighbourhood. The cash injected over the decade amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars.

LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL?

Although some believe that the Downtown Eastside is worse off now than it was a decade ago, others see progress.

Donald MacPherson, Vancouver's drug policy co-ordinator, recalls the tragic rash of overdose deaths in the 1990s. "Around 200 people died in 1993, another 200 in 1998," he said. "People were also dying of HIV at an incredible rate. There was a sense of despair on the street."

While the debate raged over the appropriate response to the urban crisis, money began to flow. At least $300-million has been spent since 2000 by the health authorities in the Downtown Eastside. More than half of the funds have gone to services and housing supports for addicts and the mentally ill. A supervised injection site, an experiment with heroin distribution and support for abstinence-based treatment brought in $31-million more.

The government also has committed funds for services for the mentally ill and addicted that are located outside the neighbourhood. In the past few years, new drug-treatment centres and institutional care for the mentally ill worth $41-million have been unveiled.

Working together under the Vancouver Agreement, the three levels of government contributed $300,000 toward a $6.5-million drug-treatment centre called The Crossing at Keremeos, which has opened in the B.C. interior and is expected to cost $2.4-million to operate in its first year.

The facility is located 350 kilometres to the east, but the Downtown Eastside is more than just a local problem, says Christine Lattey, executive director of the Vancouver Agreement's co-ordination unit. "It's a B.C. and a Canada problem."

"If you look at the Downtown Eastside, you can provide services for people who are there," she explains. "But you also have to look at how you prevent people from getting there in the first place."

According to Ms. Lattey, the Crossing at Keremeos can do just that - and is an example of how spending under the Vancouver Agreement and other programs has helped to improve situation. But it clearly hasn't helped enough.

"You just need to walk down there to see there is a lot that has not been done."

Robert Matas is a member of The Globe and Mail's Vancouver bureau.

*****

Ground zero

Vancouver's Downtown Eastside, a venerable neighbourhood plagued by drug addiction, mental illness and prostitution, is composed mostly of low-income housing and social-service agencies. About 27 per cent of the commercial frontage along Hastings Street, the main thoroughfare, is boarded up. Since there's disagreement on where the Downtown Eastside begins and ends, The Globe and Mail selected these boundaries when compiling its Statistics Canada data on the neighbourhood.

Map by Tonia Cowan

*****

Poor and uneducated

82

Percentage of Downtown Eastside

residents who live alone.

38

Percentage of residents without

a high-school diploma

$14,024

Average annual income of residents

who live alone.

$6,282

The average annual income, minus

government subsidies.

With a per capita income that's less than half the national average, the neighbourhood is among the poorest of the poor. The percentage of residents who failed to finish high school is double the average for the rest of British Columbia.

"We've basically got a Third World country stuck in the middle of downtown Vancouver," says Krishna Pendakur, a professor of economics at Simon Fraser University.

These figures have been compiled by Patrick Brethour, the Globe and Mail's British Columbia editor, drawing from the 2006 census with the help of special software from Tetrad Computer Applications Inc.

See globeandmail.com for an explanation of the methodology and how Statistics Canada deals with the homeless in the census.

*****

How it added up

Where did the $1.4-billion figure come from?

To find out how much money has gone into the Downtown Eastside since the city, provincial and federal governments signed the Vancouver Agreement in 2000, The Globe and Mail began by reviewing public documents and asking the various groups and agencies that operate in the area for a summary of their spending.

Where possible, hard numbers were used, but precise figures were not always available. So the tally also includes some estimates and promises of spending. (In some cases, it was impossible to avoid including projects and services that are outside the neighbourhood because the Downtown Eastside's boundaries are often interpreted differently, and some of the services provided to its residents originate elsewhere.)

In the end, a conservative assessment of the health, social services, housing, law enforcement and other public services came to at least $1,468,154,865, consisting of roughly $717.5-million for health and social services, $348.6-million for housing, $154.5-million for safety and justice, $230-million for economic development and $16.8-million on services that span categories.

For the most part, this money was spent on an area that is home to 6,000 people, the vast majority of it going to 2,100 of them who are considered to be in dire need.

Reserve judgment

14

Percentage of area residents of aboriginal descent.

The Downtown Eastside's aboriginal population is, proportionately, seven times that of Vancouver as a whole. "In some people's minds, it's the largest reserve in Canada," says John O'Neil, dean of health sciences at Simon Fraser University and a specialist in aboriginal health care.

Why so many natives? Housing costs are certainly much lower, but Mr. O'Neil says many newcomers from reserves come looking for a familiar face, despite the grim surroundings.

*****

Out of work

60

Percentage of residents not considered participants in the labour force.

Officially, the unemployment rate for the Downtown Eastside is only 5 per cent - but that's because more than six people in every 10 aren't even counted among those who have a job or are looking for one. Of those who able to work, only one in three does. That is less than half the average for B.C. and for the entire country.

"This is worse than the Great Depression," Simon Fraser University economist Krishna Pendakur says.

The official figures, of course, don't include anyone who breaks the law to earn a living.

*****

Alone and childless

7

Percentage of residents yet to reach the age of majority.

The average Downtown Eastside household consists of just 1.3 people, making it half as big as an average family elsewhere in the city, the province or the country as a whole. As well, the percentage of one-person homes (among residents 15 and older) is triple that found elsewhere, while the 7 per cent for children and teens compares with 25 for the country as a whole.

*****

Research in motion

59

Percentage of residents who have moved in the past five years.

39

Percentage of Canadian residents who have moved in the past five years.

The way residents move around suggests a huge turnover in population, but a large number of those who move don't leave the city - and may not even venture beyond the Downtown Eastside.

I drove down Hastings tonight to a friend's apartment and I saw 3 ambulances on my way down there because people were either passed out, beaten up or dead.

My best friend from grades 5-10 became a crack addict, and is now homeless there. Our high school friends had largely forgotten about him until he showed up on the news. Its a hopeless situation and complex on so many levels I don't know where to begin.
I volunteered down there years ago with other UBC students in a clean needle exchange clinic that also provided free health checkups etc., and as much as I hate and have no right to say it, I often feel that the most mentally disturbed of them would be better off euthanized.

The only initiative that they actually put effort into (the needle exchange) has been a success. Well, what does that tell you?

The situation is pretty much hopeless unless there is going to be a mass round-up and mandatory, life altering detox. Social services can help people get off the streets when they finally hit that rock bottom stage, but for every person that gets to that stage, another new person comes on the scene, so it never looks like anything has changed.

One thing is for sure, the people with unfixable mental problems really, really should not fucking be there. That's what makes me think of 3rd world conditions, that we send our mentally handicapped to go live in the filthiest conditions possible at great risk to their own lives.

good read.

once again it proves you can't just throw money at the problem -- it makes no difference at all.

build a wall around the area just like the Warsaw ghetto. A few armed guards with attack dogs, problem solved.

i'm afraid there is no dollar amount that will ever repair this epidemic. clearly, you can offer more help then is necessary but ultimately it is up to the inhabitants of the DTES. unfortunately, the addictions are so powerful that living anything that resembles a "normal" life to most of these people isn't even a faint thought in the back of their minds. please forgive the phrase, but i'm afraid we are just pissing in the wind with these expenditures. the money needs to be spent on prevention. it is at least more of a possibility to prevent some of the problems then it is to attempt to "fix" them

Ship them to a remote island. Supply food and shelter to them. Until they have lost their drug addition do not allow them to leave the island. This will cost less than 1.4 billion dollar for sure and it makes the street look so much better.

The DTES if ever cleaned up, is a prime real estate section of Vancouver. Next year when the Olympics are here its going to taint some of Vancouver's reputation to the international media. I wonder what the city is going to do by that time.

like i've said in other posts, throwing money and building low income housing does absolutely nothing but attract more homeless to Vancouver, you could build 30,000 units and in 2 years they'd all be full with more homless on the street then ever

really there are a few drastic aproaches to take, or we live with the problem as it is, i dont see many other ways around it as has been said above, that area is absolutely prime real estate in Vancouver and if they all were shipped out and developers moved in, that would be a much more prime area then yale town even, it would be coal harbor #2

Im so sick and tired of hearing about all these protesters who are opposed to the olympics and criticize the gov't on spending too much money for hosting the games when they feel that money could be better spent pissing it away to this bottomless pit we call the DTES. As a taxpayer I support the olympics. I see it as a chance for vancouver to show the world that its world class city written all over it. Unfortunately, chances are visitors to our city will in fact be able to view the problem as they drive through crackville. Perhaps with millions of viewers, and thousands of strangers to our city, Vancouver will be put on the spot and will undoubtedly have to face the music. Its really too bad that the city/province couldn't take the initiative to begin fixing the problem much earlier so that the ungodly site of hundreds of heroin/meth addicts littering the dtes might not be as prevalent.

Its quite clear that several things need to happen in order to begin rectifying the problem that has plagued vancouver for all these years.

A) Re-open riverview along with other institutions that used to house the mentally ill. These folk represent a significant percentage of the crowds you see gathered around the streets of the DTES.

B) Open up more locations like insite. While were at it, open up a monitored brothel. The sex trade will never disappear. Its been existing for centuries upon centuries..Instead of going against it, go with it but direct it onto a path that is more socially acceptable and safer for those involved.

C) Deport all those honduran( I use hondurans because thats what ethnicity the media usually reports) drug dealers who pretty much have no business in this country. You come into our country to pour gas over a fire that is already raging outta control - GTFO! Infact, get rid of the dealers period! Three strikes and you're out - on a side note: If any of you ever go by the main&hastings area as often as I do, your eyes will be trained to pick out amongst the crowds the USERS vs DEALERS. Users are the ones scrounging around for change/begging people for money so that homeboy/girl around the corner can sell em their next hit. Dealers are slightly better dressed than the users. They are clearly wearing clothes that are newer, are clearly unaffordable to the average DTES'er and have this obvious shadyness to them. Beware, to the untrained eye they blend in pretty good!

D) The continued gentrification of the dtes/gastown will not cure the problem but will slowly erode the stronghold that these crowds have over the area. Sure, the problem will only move east but on a technicality the grim scenes that one is used to seeing at Main&hastings will perhaps be seen more towards hastings and franklin.

With the proper measures in place, this problem can be solved. The bottom line is that the average person doesn't give a rats ass about that area of town as it doesn't affect their pristine little neighborhoods. Guaranteed if there was a problem similar to that of the DTES in and around the kerrisdale area, it'd be cleaned up in no time! Granted, a problem to that extent is next to impossible anywhere near the dale.

end rant

Or do what china did when they host the olympics China pretty ban all beggers/homeless away 10miles away from the city. If the homeless even come near the city they are beaten and put to jail. We should dot hat during olympics as well.

As I said ship them all to a remote island somewhere far far fr away. Send them food every few months. Why spend billions when the money will get wasted anyways.

1. License people for reproduction, educate children on the consequences to early reproduction

This will help reduce the number of "oops" babies, hopefully. If people know that early reproduction without money is financial suicide, perhaps they will make an effort to not get knocked up. Also, free and easily available birth control. The pill, IUD shots available same day through health clinics.

2. Forced rehabilitation

If you are caught high in public on certain drugs, you will be hauled off to a sobriety facility!

Seriously, I have done drugs before and enjoyed them, but guess what, you do them in private. If you're out on the street super fucked up, that should be enough for the cops to pick you up. I'm not talking stoned and petting a flower, or drunk and pissing yourself, I'm talking full out cocaine psychosis and sleeping on the street.

We need to stop tolerating the downtown east side.

3. Indians can fuck off

Seriously, the government can't and shouldn't be responsible for every native that is fucked up. Time to take some responsibility for your own community and fix your shit. I have no education and no family to help me, but I do well through my own desire to. I don't sit around and look for a handout, and nobody else should, either.

4. Politicians are useless

More proof that sitting around and comissioning studies doesn't work, that people wil pander for votes and ignore problems long enough that they can pass it on to someone else. We need real action and we need it now. People that are on the downtown eastside obviously have problems, but at what point do you make people FACE those problems and not continue to escape from life by using drugs?

5. Apathetic people

As long as I am getting hot poontang and driving a BMW, why should I care?

You should care because your tax money is going to pay for these people to sit around, get high, break into cars, and generally be a cancer on society. They aren't horrible people, they are a product of a shitty set of parents and a society that needs them to be on the bottom. I don't understand why we put up with it, but we do.

6. DTES money provides jobs

Think of how many people and businesses are kept employed and profitable by those DTES people?

The cops get money
Judges and lawyers
Government administration jobs
Social workers
Needle exchange
Pawn shops
Drug dealers
Drug suppliers
Hotel owners
Church groups
Etc etc

^
Do any of the above people want to be out of work?

NO.

Why fix something that makes you money and keeps you employed?

This whole system and world is so corrupt, I want it to burn in a nuclear fire!

...but after I have made my adult video game and driven a Ferrari with a hot hooker who has boobs made of cocaine and liquor

Quote:

Originally Posted by Infiniti (Post 6281917)

A) Re-open riverview along with other institutions that used to house the mentally ill. These folk represent a significant percentage of the crowds you see gathered around the streets of the DTES.

B) Open up more locations like insite. While were at it, open up a monitored brothel. The sex trade will never disappear. Its been existing for centuries upon centuries..Instead of going against it, go with it but direct it onto a path that is more socially acceptable and safer for those involved.

:werd: :thumbsup:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Infiniti (Post 6281917)

C) Deport all those honduran( I use hondurans because thats what ethnicity the media usually reports) drug dealers who pretty much have no business in this country. You come into our country to pour gas over a fire that is already raging outta control - GTFO! Infact, get rid of the dealers period! Three strikes and you're out - on a side note: If any of you ever go by the main&hastings area as often as I do, your eyes will be trained to pick out amongst the crowds the USERS vs DEALERS. Users are the ones scrounging around for change/begging people for money so that homeboy/girl around the corner can sell em their next hit. Dealers are slightly better dressed than the users. They are clearly wearing clothes that are newer, are clearly unaffordable to the average DTES'er and have this obvious shadyness to them. Beware, to the untrained eye they blend in pretty good!

While I have no problem with deporting people that are breaking the law, it wouldn't actually solve much of the problem.

The war on drugs in America has proven that spending trillions of dollars and locking up millions of people for dealing drugs just doesn't work.

All it really does is jack up the price of drugs. People will pay whatever they have to to get their fix. So the prices go up enough that the risk of life in jail is less than the lure of $$$$$ for people who are either dumb or desperately poor.

So the net result would be more stolen car stereos and home invasions as desperate crack addicts steal enough to pay $300 a hit.

I love you guys. It sounds like most of us have the same ideas.

Not sure why riverview isn't re-opened.

Not sure why prostitution is still illegal. I would legalize prostitution before I legalized marijuana.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hondaracer (Post 6281888)

I've been saying this for a long time. I have to live in Burnaby/Coquitlam because I can't afford to pay $500,000 for a downtown condo, but some low income person get's a subsidized condo. Worse yet would be I could afford the $500,000 condo but would have to live next door to someone who is living in a subsidized low income condo. =(

I too, do not understand why Riverview was shut down.
Does anyone know where the monitored long term psychiatric patients were shipped to?
Drug compliance is clearly one key aspect here, as many of the homeless have no supervision on taking their drugs and keeping them in a cleaner state of mind.

Continued gentrification of DTES real estate would only serve to push the cess pool further east and into the dock areas.

I was reading this week's Economist, and they had an interesting article about New York State welfare/social workers examining a welfare system that worked really well in Mexico. There, the recipients are given aid only if they meet certain requirements signed in a contract e.g. proof of drug regimen compliance, work, etc.

Perhaps the City should look into this rather than giving money out blindly to both the disadvantaged and studies which justifiy their own existence.

Quote:

Originally Posted by iwantaskyline (Post 6281881)

My prediction:

They'll be out of money, so they'll come up with some sort of new tax
to help clean up the streets before the olympics

However this article clearly shows that throwing money at the problem makes no difference at all.

Our government is retarded

Quote:

Originally Posted by Draft (Post 6283247)

We do need a revolution. I think our policies do not advance humankind, merely allow it to stagnate and regress. No survival of the fittest, everyone gets a free ride.

I think it's high time I picked up Atlas Shrugged, as I have heard people talking about it coming true today...

Downtown Eastside costs $1 million a day

Quote:

Philip Owen stands at 65 East Hastings Street in front of a soon-to-open, nine-storey social housing complex.

The former Vancouver mayor looks west to the intersection of Carrall Street and points to a just- opened social housing project.

There’s a charity-owned art gallery a few buildings down, more social housing across the road as well as two pharmacies and a church-run drop in centre.

A similar potpourri of housing and services is replicated in the blocks around him.

“Someone has to try and find the sort of money being spent here,” pleads Owen. “Nobody really knows the numbers. The services are funded from different groups and organizations, non-profits, churches and they go down and rent some space and open up and they’re looking after this or that or they respond to this or they’re part of some other organization down there. We need an audit.”

The Province took on the task of finding out what is being spent in the Downtown Eastside.

A Province investigation has found that in 2007 alone the three levels of government and others spent about $360 million providing housing and support for residents.

That’s nearly $1 million a day, with most of that for the roughly 5,000 disabled people in the community.

The spending continues unabated with no one in control of the purse-strings as conditions continue to deteriorate at street level.

“It’s just unknown how much has been spent,” says Dr. Julian Somers, director of Simon Fraser University’s Centre for Applied Research in Mental Health and Addictions.

“Even if we knew the value, the effectiveness of distributing the money is less than optimal due to administrative inefficiency. We know no one is co-ordinating it all.”

The 34-year-old psychologist’s primary focus is how to deal with mental illness and addiction on a large scale, leading him to research on the DTES.

That research includes a July 2008 report for the City of Vancouver titled Collaboration and Change: Evidence Related to Reforming Housing, Mental Health and Addiction Care in Vancouver.

Two key statements to come out of the B.C. report are that there is “no mechanism for co-ordinating the efforts and priorities of different funding sources” and that “the roles of different services are not clear and collaboration does not take place consistently. Each agency has its own linkages and some agencies compete with each other.”

Somers also unearthed a disturbing lack of co-ordinated financial information on the Downtown Eastside.

He says that on top of the direct costs of caring for the marginalized population, there are a number of costs borne by society that are “really costs of neglect.”

“We may be able to tally the cost of hospitalizations and corrections but we will always be unable to quantify things like the impact on tourism and trade. Our system is biased toward responding to crisis.”

Somers has been able to come up with general service figures — that there are “over 90 agencies in Vancouver providing mental health or addictions services, plus others providing broader health care and housing for high-risk people.”

Those services are provided by several provincial and federal ministries, Providence Health Care, Vancouver Coastal Health and numerous not-for-profit societies and foundations.

According to DTES.ca, there are 174 groups providing services of some sort in the community.

In Somers report for the city, he said there are more resources becoming available but “no enhancements to the processes that serve to integrate them.”

His theory is backed by a recent City of Vancouver report stating “existing service delivery models are not reaching this population” and supported by the Vancouver Police Department’s recent call for the creation of a Downtown Eastside director for the most vulnerable people.

There’s no shortage of community groups wanting to address the problem.

The Network of Inner City Community Services was established three years ago and is still going, at a cost of $690,000 a year.

More recently, a group called the Downtown Eastside Community Land Use Principles was formed — backed by groups such as the $720,000-a-year Pivot Legal Society and the $190,000-a-year Carnegie Community Centre Association — which aims to get groups working together.

There’s the recently-formed Streetohome Foundation channelling donor and government money into DTES housing projects.

In February 2008, the City of Vancouver launched its Collaboration for Change program also aimed at co-ordinating services.

Owen says none of these groups has attempted to determine costs of the Downtown Eastside and that an immediate audit is needed. Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson said the $360-million annual bill for the neighbourhood simply isn’t good value for money.

“There’s nowhere near enough money targeted at solutions,” he said. “It’s far more cost-effective to be investing in housing and health care versus expensive emergency services. The situation won’t change much until we deal with the causes rather than crisis management of the symptoms.”

However, an audit of services by either the provincial or federal auditor-general isn’t necessary, said Robertson, because the majority of services receiving money are using it effectively.

“An audit is misleading,” he said. “The bigger question is value for money. Could $10 million spent on security in the Downtown Eastside be better spent on drug treatment? These are the types of questions we should be asking.”

Maureen Bader, B.C. president of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, said a review of the programs in the Downtown Eastside is in order.

“If that’s how much they’re spending there, then they’re wasting an awful lot of money,” she said.

“Someone should review what’s going on, put in place effective programs, and just quit throwing good money after bad.”

Without co-ordination, she said, it’s impossible to know whether the money is being spent effectively.

“A lot of times, government in all levels will just be overlapping a program into another without knowing how much is being spent and where,” she said.

“That’s a big cause of waste and it’s doing no good for the taxpayer and no good for the people who live down there.”

The Vancouver Agreement, a landmark alliance signed in 2000 that attempted to co-ordinate federal, provincial, and municipal efforts in the Downtown Eastside, has largely “fallen by the wayside” because of a lack of political will, said NDP MLA Jenny Kwan, one of the architects of the agreement, along with Owen and Liberal MP Hedy Fry.

“For lasting solutions, we need to co-ordinate our efforts to ensure we get the best value for our dollars,” said Kwan.

“Unfortunately, there is no follow-through.”

Current spending in the Downtown Eastside is being used inefficiently, she said, because it doesn’t address the root problems or offer long-term solutions.

“So many of the dollars invested in the Downtown Eastside are put in there to cope with the emergency, but are not targeted to deal with initiatives that will build our way out of the crisis.”

Prof. Dan Simunic, of UBC’s Sauder School of Business, said it’s up to the federal and provincial auditors-general to determine whether the government is getting value for money in the DTES.

Morris Sydor, B.C. assistant auditor-general, said his office has never audited spending in the Downtown Eastside. “There are a number of ministries involved,” he said. “It would be quite a chore to pull it all together.”