oh Boy!

It would seem that our government plans to invoke these measures and when challenged just drag it out till the Olympics are over!
Anyone asking questions will get the stock reply: "We cannot comment because this is before the courts:!

A government that can break a legal contract with its workers is liable to think they can get away with anything.
I can see where some people get driven to do suicide bombings, when up against such an unwielding force.

Any assistance short of actual help

"If after seeing the shelter, the person refuses, well, I don't think there's any more we could do," he said.

Of course there isn't Richie. Nothing at all. You just go on back to your nice little tax reduced life and forget all about it.

They chose their poverty, you know. Probably did it just to annoy you and your clearly superiour type friends. You know, the ones whose taxes you've been reducing annually for the past eight years, by billions and billions of dollars.

While what once was a decent society has become a place where our elders can be arrested and forced to go to a shelter where the most dangerous addicts and mental patients will be piled on top of one another. In the dark.

Why should you care. You can afford a half a million bucks for a house, after all. If they worked as hard as you, they could too.

Besides, the police need something to do. They sure aren't prosecuting crimes like misappropriation, bribery and obstruction, so this should help fill up their days.

In regards to the photo caption

You may as well euthanize both the homeless person and the dog. If I were homeless, you'd have to separate my dog and I over my dead body. I imagine for a homeless person especially their pet is the ONLY thing in the world that keeps them going at all.
F'N disgusting!!! Our society is sick.

Grimm Tales from the Ministry of Straw Housing

"Can we at least give a power to take the person to the shelter, connect them with an outreach worker, show them that it is warm and there is a meal there for them, and let them make a choice," Coleman asked."

"But oh, grandmother, what big eyes you have!"

"All the the better to see you with, my dear".

"If the person refuses, the police officer contacts an official (to be determined) by telephone who issues an administrative order which the officer would then enforce. The administrative order would name the person and order that they accompany the officer to an emergency shelter. This process enables the police officer to use force."

"But oh, grandmother, what big hands you have!"

"All the better to grab and taser....errr, I mean hug you with, my dear.".

Of course........

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"Tra-la-la-la, what a merry world we live in"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"Tra-la-la-la, all of it is yours and mine"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"So wear a smile, sing a little while it's raining"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"And through the clouds, ev'ry little star will shine"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"Tra-la-la-la, what's a little bit of trouble?"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"You live and learn things are gonna turn out fine"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"Just feel that way"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"And ev'ry little day"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"Will seem like spring"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"If you'll just sing"

("The appropriate use of force options will have to be determined.")

"Tra-la, tra-la-la-la-la"

Reserve Judgement?

"Coleman said the bill is not yet ready, and suggested the public reserve judgment until an actual draft is tabled"

Based on what I have seen so far from the BC Liberals..... it is like watching a skunk walk into the room... you don't have to reserve judgment, you know the place is going to stink.

The biggest irony over the article photo...

Chances are, the guy in the photo does not have a criminal record.

And Gordo does.

or you could keep them warm where they are

http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/2004/12/parasite-shelte.php

we can have freedom AND survival

The real question isn't whether we (the community at large) have the right to force some of our members to sleep in shelters against their will. The question is whether we (the community at large) share an obligation to make sure that none of our members are forced to choose between their dignity and freedom, and their physical survival.

Finally

A solution to homelessness and the whining still persists.

Leave them alone. Quit pitying them as they are where they're at by choice. Put the severe mental cases back in hospital and pension off all the addicts into care facilities where they can get treatment if they wish.

???

Can anyone tell me when this government started giving a crap about these people or anyone but the elite, for that matter?

winter weather conditions

I linked to this story elsewhere, but if we think ignoring Charter rights due to winter weather conditions is a good idea, a lot of people outside of the DTES could also conceivably be affected

http://tinyurl.com/dxaq33

Someone else for the cops to electrocute

Yes...they need more criminals to give all those extra cops they hire for the Olympics something to do. To get more criminals they need more laws: laws to make talking on your cell phone while you drive a crime and laws to make homelessness a crime.

You see it’s all about keeping the real criminals in power by making the general public criminals including the general public who have no place to sleep because they refuse the shelters for various reasons like not being able to secure their meager belongings.

You know when they say "force" they mean electrocution. They'll be electrocuting homeless people. That should warm them up real nice on a cold winters night.

Gee, I wonder why?

Both the law makers, and apparently the author of this paper failed to deal with question that should be completely obvious: why don't these people (many of them women) want to go to shelters, even in extreme weather? Because these shelters are often places where they suffer abuse. This problem isn't going to be fixed by giving the police more power to slap on a band-aid that will only cause more problems and acrimonious relationships between homeless and police. Instead, they ought to get to the route of the problem which is the shelter system.

You bet this is for the Olympics

Nurses contracts, BC rail, Cambie merchants.... the Liberals LOVE to go up against court cases they can't win and stall them out until it's too late. They don't care cause the taxpayer pays the cost. It's a great way to get what you want done. And they know that a ton of foreign media is on the way looking for the homeless story. Now they're hoping that no homeless equals no homeless stories.
A scathing piece and Vancouver's image being hammered on an international scale would be a disaster for a city that loves to strut around smugly declaring itself the best place on earth. It would be embarrassing and cause people here to do a better job holding their leaders accountable.... and the powers that be just can't have that.

This is also a danger for some homeless people. Some don't go to shelters because they don't feel safe in them. So, now you're going to force someone to a place they don't feel safe?

If a person is stabbed in a shelter or harm comes to them, can they sue the VPD?

Face it, this is just legal kidnapping.

To most Tyee readers:

If homeless people set up camp in our back yard or living room we'd have the cops over in a heartbeat. But, since they are in someone else' space, we feel they deserve to live there. ‘There’ being somewhere else, away, not near us. Now we can pretend to champion their rights! Yeah us.But...
If the smell of urine was part of your patio experience (maybe it is but I doubt it) change would occur. Maybe I’m cynical. Maybe we Tyee readers would have them in for tea, a discussion on Marxism over a reading of Sartre with Peek Freans, but I doubt it. Forced removal would be my bet 9 times out of 10.
The warmer the weather, the worse the psych-care infrastructure, the more accepting the populace and the more accessible the dealer the more homeless there are. In a few months go to Portage and Main and see how many homeless there are. DTES is the end goal. End of the road anyway. How could an effort to change their situation not have some potential for good? These aren’t death camps or rat infested alleys where they are completely vulnerable.
Oh, have to cut it short, I see a homeless person setting up camp under my Azaleas…better put the water on.

Out of Sight - Out of Mind

Of course this sudden compassion for homeless people is just an excuse to rid them for the Olympics, as Vancouver's homeless problem would be a world-wide embarassment for Campbell.

But what else did we expect from a "Liberal" (in name only) Fascist Government?

Not at all suprised

First, I think is is kinda strange that the picture in this article is of Bill and his dog Chopper. This person is not at all homeless and has not been for the years that I have known him. He used to live at the Stanley in Gastown and now lives at the main Portland residence on Hastings street. He was involved in the Woodwards squat years ago but he ended up being housed along with all the rest of the people who were in the squat. Secondly I am not at all surprised with the way the premier is dealing with this problem. obviously he has no idea what it is like to live with an addiction or a mental health problem. These things seem to be something that he depends on advisors who get 50+k salaries a year. I would like to challenge the premier to come and see for himself what his shallow and narrow minded thinking has done to the lesser fortunate of his province. Unfortunately he will probably be too busy sipping his martinis in Hawaii...

After Thought

If all of this energy exerted by the premier was directed towards setting up places where those who have addictions could clean up such as detoxes and recovery houses, the homeless problem may just go away. BUT, that will not happen because all of his buddies are too busy profiting from this problem. Be it from social service societies or the importation of Cocaine and Heroin. Either way both of these industries would be severely harmed if the addicted were able to find a way out. So guess what, we all get a whitewash cool eh?

Law crafted for Olympics

No kidding!

At least the well dressed homneless will be left alone as Olympic cameras (no pun) will only distinguish the 'obvious' homeless!

In protest people should 'dress' and 'act' homeless and see if they get picked up!

Or offer free suit, briefcases, and ties to 'obvious' homeless so that they will not be 'helped' off the street!

Olympic sweeping up of the homeless of course!

Notice Coleman is only concerned about the 'obvious' homeless freezing to death (winter when Owelimpics are held).

What about concern for their welfare during the rest of the year Minister Coleman?

Campbell et al. are going to have another problem

Based on the satellite and ARGO observations, it looks like we might be in for an El Nino this coming winter, meaning rather mild temperatures and a reduced risk of freezing temperatures in Vancouver during the Olympics.

If that is the case, what Double-Speak do you imagine will happen to round up the street people?

Things could get convoluted and ugly.

for comparison

MLA housing allowance:

$1583 (per month)

Charter rights cut both ways, sorry

As DavidN has pointed out, there would be no issue if the people on this post who expressed outrage would open their own homes to the "homeless". I may be wrong, but I suspect resounding silence in this area.

I understand that there is a legal ruling in place in B.C. that the state cannot restrict the homeless from camping out and living in any public place (park or legislative grounds) because their "Charter rights" require that they need to camp out to be secure against bad weather. It seems a loquical sequitur from that ruling, that the state is obliged to take positive steps to take these people to shelters in defence of the Charter rights so recently successfully argued. ow from that the the wehbe ath

A few facts

In 1995 I met a homeless woman living in a doorway behind the grocery store at Arbutus and Broadway. She did not want to go back to the DTES because she had been raped in a shelter. 6 months later, with the help of BDBC who identified unused space, a former jail on SW Marine, and the help of shelter leaders, Lookout South opened. There were no complaints from self-absorbed neighbours or anyone else. Housing ran until 2002 when Gordo shut it down to developer friends and now a condo with teeny, tiny, psychologically unsound, cramped units are there. Currently there is no room at the inn: the shelters are full and it is summer! No one running a shelter will dare speak out about this utter abuse of power.
Will this law be province wide? Nelson has a shelter--been full for years. Several homeless persons built a shelter near the rail tracks, collected bottles, bothered no one. BUT the neocons complained so much that the RCMP had to move in and close it down. No one knows where the folks went.

Delta has no shelter and homeless are moving here out of fear of the use of batons near the HEAT shelters.
Some activist group needs to start a petition and, as Trooper says, RAISE A LITTLE HELL. Cheers.

This argument that the

This argument that the people complaining about the new bylaw should be willing to open their own homes to the homeless is rediculous and ignores the many concerns that have been raised on this thread.

It's like saying those in favour of uranium mining or the proliferation of nuclear energy should allow nuclear reactors to be built in their backyards.

Homeless people come with a variety of problems that the vast majority of us are unable to help them with, such as drug addictions and mental health issues.

If the government had used their previous 8years to build housing and established mental health and rehab clinics, we wouldn't have the sizable problem we currently have.

Forcing the homeless into overcrowed shelters may solve the governments image problem, but it isn't going to solve the long term issues that make people homeless in the first place.

The government has no credibility on the homeless issue and this bylaw isn't helping them any.

Apprehend the government

Before and during world war two enough of the German people were convinced by their government that rounding up the Jews was beneficial to their society. No rational human being would believe that the government would have such insidious intentions behind those actions but it became clear that a dictator had taken over their democratic government. So the rights and freedoms of the Jewish population were destroyed with catastrophic results. Campbell is headed down this same slippery slope to becoming a dictator by ramming through legislation that will take away the rights and freedoms from a certain segment of our society. Who will stop him? Why do we, as a population not recognize this man for the cruel, heartless, uncaring wanna be dictator that he is? Why isn't he labelled publically before we end up losing what's left of our democratic system?

2009/1939

rockbysea wrote:

"You see it’s all about keeping the real criminals in power by making the general public criminals ..."

Nail on head, rockbysea. Well said.

You have very succinctly revealed the present shameless and appalling state of so-called "governance" in BC.

What does this also reveal about the present state of our courts, our policing, and of course, our dear and deeply complicit mainstream media?

Twit274

The quickest way for any argument to become irrelevant is to use Nazi Germany as a comparison. Why not try Stalin or something, Pol Pot, change it up a bit.

The DTES is full of people whose families and communities have failed them, who have failed themselves. They are from all over the place. It is ludicrous to have an entire section of the city turned into a getto for Canada’s forgotten. Something must happen, and this is something. For the government it is a no-win situation. Let them freeze to death and you are a neocon, house them forcibly and you are a neocon, ignore them and you are a neocon. Or a fascist or whatever.
The DTES is a dumping ground. My 10-year-old daughter rode through the DTES this summer with my wife and I on our mountain bikes, through many of the streets and Pigeon Park and past the crazy white haired lady swinging her arms and past people shooting up and dealing and hooking. She was the only kid in the neighbourhood that I saw, and she was a bit freaked out. She couldn’t understand why we they don’t have some place to be that wasn’t so gross, why someone would be laying on a sidewalk passed out in a pool of piss.
What do you say to a 10 year old, that moving them to safe clean place would violate their charter of rights like the Nazis did? Kids are smarter than that. Lynn and C274 are not.

Something?

This isn't 'something'. It's just expecting the police to compel people to participate in a 'solution' that isn't working.

Something might be asking people what they want, not telling them what they need.

THE OLYMPICS TOOK MY HOME

Last year in early November I was walking around the downtown eastside as part of normal routine, and couldn't help but notice the poverty and hopelessness that seem to be rampant on every corner of this the poorest part of our lovely city. I myself have suffered in the past from addiction and temporary homeless conditions. After a few days of feeling inspired I decided to carry a camera with me and started to document what I saw for the next two week's I gathered together a archive of photo's and with the help of a friend we produced a video which we aptly named THE OLYMPICS' TOOK MY HOME This video is currently hosted on over fifty websites throughout the world. I also started a WEBSITE called 2010homelesschampions.ca '' WHO NEW'' Today I'm so looking forward to the coming event's surrounding the Olympics' and the plight of this neighborhood Here is the link to this video and as well to 20 other's we have taken

http://www.2010homelesschampions.ca/olympic_impact_on_homelessness_i.htm

What to do with the trash...

Gary, at the lead to this thread, has nailed it of course, and indeed been proven right in his early warnings of what was coming here.

Poverty is the bottom social order result of extreme riches at the top of the social order class system. As Fait is frequently fond of saying, wealth cannot be created out of nothing. And as I say, it is secured by the theft of a larger share for itself, at the expense of the impoverishment of the lower working and underclass, and theft of the share that would otherwise give all working people an actually liveable standard of living. (Which leads to the degradation, sense of unworthiness and humiliation of these lower class orders, and their surrender to drug and alcohol escapism.)

And then, like so much dirt they have created, when it inconveniences, angers or embarasses them, they seek to sweep this "human garbage", as they privately describe it, under the carpet as we see here.

They want to throw a money making party, which is what the Olympics is really about, and do not want the social trash they have themselves created to sully the atmosphere of spending and a good time.

to all the cynics who

to all the cynics who criticise *every* solution to the DTES: What have YOU done to help them?

Paranoid

Coyote: Eat the rich. Hey, why not eat the homeless as well? Equal opportunity consumption.

The fact that the homeless are largely a mental health problem is missed by those that subvert arguments about mental health issues for their own political aims.
Chris. I am compelled to pay taxes, why not compel someone to seek shelter? Especially if that someone was not capable of rational self preservation? It may be that this is the start of something good, the status quo doesn't seem good enough. Can always say "no". Doesn't seem like a huge imposition and it also doesn't seem to impose on the rights and freedoms when living outdoors is not safe. Is it all about the scary police state or Coyotes evil elite class or what?
My Q:
When do you suggest we as a community may intervene?
Would we intervene at all in your ideal world?

Duhhh, I forget....

"The fact that the homeless are largely a mental health problem is missed by those that subvert arguments about mental health issues..." wrote DavidN.

And, assuming you are correct, which you are not, do you remember as well as I do who closed the mental institutions and turfed these people out onto the streets, as part of the early the early wingnut programmes that kicked off the current socio-economic period.? (These Social Crediters later became part of the foundation stock for the current Neoconazi Liberal Alliance of the right.)

bad comparison

David:

Chris. I am compelled to pay taxes, why not compel someone to seek shelter? Especially if that someone was not capable of rational self preservation?

You can't compare an exchange of money for services to a question of freedom of movement and the right to liberty that are both part of our Constitution.

People incapable of 'rational self-preservation' are already addressed under current laws.

DavidN

I find it amusing that a person who suggested, with one assumes, a straight face, that Tyee readers should make his government look good by accepting the homeless into their own homes, and at their own expense, has a problem with someone pointing out an interesting historical parallel.

"What do you say to a 10 year old, that moving them to safe clean place would violate their charter of rights like the Nazis did?"

Why not just tell your daughter to pick her favourite and they can come and stay at your place? It was your suggestion after all. I think your daughter would appreciate your generous spirit to boot.

Coleman

It makes one shudder to think that the Liberal brains will be "solving" the problem of highest child poverty rates in Canada for 6 years running in the same manner.

Olympic Shame

The simple answer is to give them welfare so they can have a place to live, keep clean, do laundry and get employment training, etc etc. Oh my gad they may even get back some dignity. Gordo and cohorts have made being poor a criminal offence while they try to rob each of us with hst. gordo abuses our grandparents, our parents and our kids with cut backs. His ideas are akin to some of the worlds worst examples of subtle terroism.

How many of our parents or grandparents need a louge @ 1.63 million for a week of kids games. Where did he learn what was important? There is no excuse for the horrific crap that is being paraded as political belief I call it lunacy.

gordo should be arrested and have all his bank accounts removed and have his posssesions taken away.

Failures??

What has failed, and failed miserably, is the ideology behind this sort of proposal...that's the dead end ideology of 'free market capitalism' - the idea that someone's keeping track and toting up who's a failure on the basis of a money yardstick..

It's that ideology that created this ghetto - and every other ghetto of its kind throughout post-enlightenment history.

If you don't like the fascist comparisons, I suggest you try to understand why they're so apt.

When the government stops taking money from its close personal friends and giving the public's largesse back to people who espouse to be free-marketeers I might be willing to listen - until then, sorry, those arguments aren't worth the time it takes to refute them.

It's all been done before!

Two obvious

Two things stick out like a sore thumb. How little the Government cared for the last 8 yrs.(Olympics) And what they are talking about doing now.(Hiding the problem that they are responsible for in the first place)They gave these people money and put them on the street to be preyed upon by drug dealers. It's funny I haven't heard Coleman suggest anything that would infringe on the charter of rights of the drug dealers.

Height of Hypocrisy

It's hard to say this is the height of hypocrisy with this regime, but it's getting there. To watch Coleman and Campbell feign "concern" for homelessness is stomach turning. They didn't care before, they don't care now, and they won't care in the future.

If the next suggestion is

If the next suggestion is that the homeless will be transported by rail boxcar to their "new" destination, I think we need to start worrying.

An invitation in the true spirit of 2010

DavidN,

You write:

"What do you say to a 10 year old, that moving them to safe clean place would violate their charter of rights like the Nazis did?"

You are honest and tell the ten year old that this most cordial invitation for the homeless comes with a clause for appropriate use of force options.

Hopefully she is smarter than her Dad and she will see through the fine print.

Won't be surprised next if

Won't be surprised next if the prov. gov't gets an 'epiphany' of compassion and starts building 'shelters' in places like Maple Ridge or Abbotsford, so their charges are 'safe' and secure being housed far away from the eyes of tourists...err...I mean drug dealers and other predators.

Does anyone else every feel like walking into the Vancouver Stock Exchange and the Vancouver Board of Trade with baseball bats and smashing everything in sight? Or is that just me?

I think we should just have a "Protest Against Everything Day".

Didn't work for him either

Dear Crass; I feel sympathy for your desire to drive the moneymen out of business. I seem to recall a story about Jesus driving them out with a bat too.

As much as I appreciate the traditiional approaches, (I personally dream occasionally about Guillotines) I have to point out that it only made the moneymen more powerful, and brought in the taxman as well. Jesus, like Capone, was finally brought down on charges of tax evasion.

I had a friend who had a spot of bother with the law, and he mentioned that each time you can make the court laugh, you come closer to acquittal.

The way he put it: "Laughter is the enemy of the crown."

I think that might be the only thing that can actually bring about meaningful change. Certainly they can meet anger with greater malice, violence with greater violence. They can't be beaten that way. But point at their foolish inadequacies in a way that makes the people laugh, and they're halfway gone.

highhopes said: "What have YOU done to help them?”

highhopes said: “to all the cynics who criticise *every* solution to the DTES: What have YOU done to help them?”

The way to help them is to reveal the true cause of poverty and homelessness in Canada.

The following quote by Thomas Jefferson about the government allowing the private banks to control and issue the nations currency sums up the cause of poverty in a nutshell:

“I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the [Canadian] people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.”

Notice the that the national origin of the people collecting cans in our back alleys are Canadian and if you speak to many of these homeless you’ll find that their fathers or grandfathers fought in the 2nd war or served in the military.

The solution to all poverty is to restore the power to issue currency to the people. No Canadian understood this more than 2 time most popular Vancouver mayor Gerald Grattan McGeer 1935-36 and 1947. You can read all about this forgotten Canadian hero “the True Father of the Bank of Canada” at this web site: http://www.vivelecanada.ca/article/235930338-the-crime-of-the-canadian-banking-system

You can also watch 3 videos of Canadian Bill Graham explaining how our treasonous government has enslaved the Canadian people to the private international bankers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8Zl1Wax8MI&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yYEFuN2v08&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zB7GbM1OgzA&feature=related

Highhopes, If you research what I posted you will discover the solution.

Lynn

Hi. My daughter is smarter than me. If you think that girls are stupid and the comparison hurtful because of it, that’s your sad issue.
Anyway…
What about a case where you have someone living in a manner that endangers their lives and will not leave without force? You would sit and have a coherent and logical communication with that person? I don’t mean we should hire black shirts to taser the homeless into submission and haul them off to some dysfunctional hell.
Lets all agree that governments and police forces are fallible and have enduring and undesirable qualities, my point was that the rant is boring and empty. The point mocks us. Frank clearly missed that.
I have seen force save lives and later seen as beneficial by the person who received the force. I am haunted by an intervention ignored.
The murder of Dziekanski is an example of what we have to be wary of. I get that.
It is a fair and tough question. Would you step over that person and let them freeze to death or use force and get them into a shelter? Save a life or stick to a principle?
I think professionals need to deal with people with psychological issues. We can house people that cannot house themselves, try taxing some of the companies we are giving our resources to for a start. That is another rant for another day.
What is your call?
Death or principle?

DavidN

Would you force a homeless person into a situation where she could be raped or beaten or have her stuff taken when she's asleep?

You're automatically assuming that the reason many homeless people don't want to go to the shelters is because they're insane. The other possibility is they know better than you do what goes on there.

But rather than think something negative about your favourite government you prefer to think the shelters are mini-paradises and that anyone not wanting to be in one is crazy and therefore the government is right in using force on them.

A coy turn on the road to Damascus

I never said that girls were stupid. Quite the contrary...so don't put words in my mouth. My assumption was that your daughter would be smart enough to see through "the fine print".

We are talking about a government that is setting policy to address social issues by the use of force. A government that for many years now has failed miserably to address social issues, indeed has been the cause of the tragic devastation of our our most vital social-infrastructure.

Now they choose to "address" these issues by force because it is the only way they can quickly and effciently hide their failures before the sacred year of 2010 arrives.

Good social infra-structure doesn't happen overnight. Nor does good social housing. That is why it is so tragic when a government systematically and intentionally sets out to undermine, under-fund and destroy it as the present government has done.

A shelter is not a solution for social housing.

It is a temporary band-aid.

This is no solution.

It is just more of the same kind of subterfuge that has become standard practice for this government.

Now suddenly you and the government care about how the homeless are treated - now you suddenly care about "death and principle"....how the homeless may die on the streets.

The homeless have been dying on the streets and in back alleys for years and years of BC Liberal rule.

Their numbers ever increasing.

You obviously don't care enough or you would not be defending this government in any shape or form as you have done consistently on this thread.

Know the history of what this government represents.

Well said lynn

If shelters were the answer the homeless wouldn't need to be forced to go to them, they'd all go voluntarily.

Frank and Lynn

We do agree on a lot, but…
maybe you guys are right, fascists are lining up people for warehousing to improve optics during the Olympics only to be abused, tasered, raped, robbed, beaten for good measure then thrown back on the street when the last triple jump has leapt the building. Frank, I cannot imagine anything less safe than DTES street life or a government being that stupid. They are already doing their utmost to be unelectable and will lose access to the trough if they don’t get their act together. I agree, one eye has to be kept open for a slide into anarchy, totalitarianism, the Spanish inquisition etc. but we need to be vigilant, not paranoid.
Mental illness is a huge problem; I bet would-be patients make up the majority of the street people. Insane is not a word I used but if you mean I assume most of them are probably in need of psychological care then yes I believe that, until I am educated otherwise. Anybody got stats?
Lynn you have no clue what I do, you just dodged a valid question. Libs/NDP/Socreds have all ignored the challenge.
We still agree mostly.
I am anything but 100% supportive of the government, but see the opportunity our society has to do "something" despite it's inadequacies. I am willing to pay for it through donation and taxation. I could be the next schizophrenic, or junky, who knows. If optics spurs a political group to act then so be it, getting the action is key, change the world later.
It appears we also agree that governments in general are inadequate. They represent large voting blocks and financial donors first or only most times. But hating them is your choice. Not engaging in your rhetoric or sharing your hatred doesn’t make me one of “them” or one of “you”. Thank goodness.

Frank

You are talking about rational healthy people.
get real man.

DavidN

So why don't some of the homeless want to go to shelters? Do you have an argument besides that they must need psychological care? Because I don't care for that assumption.

Are you so certain that no one has ever been beaten, abused, raped or robbed at a shelter? Because I've never stayed the night in one and I assume you haven't either so when someone that refuses to go to one says that's what they're afraid of I think they should be listened to and not forced to go. The first thing to do with the homeless is not to increase their problems.

If the Liberals had been working for the last 8 years to reduce homelessness instead of increasing it and if they had been working to address the issues of the homeless instead of ignoring them I would give them the benefit of the doubt now. But neither of those are true and therefore I see the use of force on the homeless as being nothing more than Olympic optics.

Do You Really Believe What Coleman has to Say?

Like he cares about the Homeless when he is the same guy keeping the homeless on the street and now he is taking the homeless off the streets to never be seen again. There are no homes. There is no money for homes. There is no money for shelters. For crying out loud the loser just took away money for housing abused women and children.
I also thought the Olympic Committe asked for peace for the Olympics? Well what about the war on the poor as its been relentless since Campbell opened BC's doors to the USA and the Winter Games. Kinda Helter Skelter or better yet Helter Shelter as its difficult as many find themselves without a job. Liberals communication strategy, "Public deception" and funny enough its been working for Liberals just fine, up until now that is. And even if the public is aware its just a ploy by the Liberals to wipe the homeless off the face of the earth, RCMP style because officer's have all the compassion of a tazer gun.

50 Women Die, And Nothing?

While a homeless women refuses shelter and Coleman must save others from the same fate even if it takes unecessary force and even death because he is such a caring man? Is that what we are supposed to believe now that the election is over and its back to government as ususal as its let the lies begin as fall session opens. Living the lie, BC Liberal style, but unfortunately for British Columbians the Liberals have no class, especially when it comes to the middle and lower classes.

This is what we get

When most self centered superficial British Columbians along with the rest of North Americans sleep walk through the political process and let our corrupt propaganda apparatus convince them that they have no hope or power in this democracy. How often have you heard the mantra " there's no use in voting THEY ARE ALL THE SAME", no matter who you vote for the govt get's in..... how convenient but for whom? You never hear this gutless drivel from corporate lobbyists or the elite.

If we want this to change then we can change it by civil disobedience in contrast to just showing up and whining AKA protest. Gandhi did not just "protest" and then go for a coffee and complain about the governments injustice he flooded the jails with his protesters and they took beatings until the police grew exhausted beating them. Likewise look at the people who surrounded houses and stopped evictions in the 1930's Or people who risked their lives to organize unions. These are the people who fought and sacrificed for the benefits we used to enjoy until the sleeping public stood by while the neo conservative agenda in the 1980's started dismantling our gains and standards of living. Is it any wonder why corporate exec's wages have increased 300-400% since and working class people are making the same wages they did for the most part in the late 70's and early 80's?

And everywhere I hear people of modest means talking like "free market" buccaneers spouting crap that they have been told to believe by their TV's without thinking; things that are contrary to their own and their families well being. Anti union none voting TV addicted isolated fools with all the power in the world but who are too afraid to FIGHT for their rights like the French Italians and many other brave people around the world do. A citizenry too lazy to even consider the issues that shape their lives and vote in their own best interests. Campbell and his sh*tty so called Liberals AKA Socreds won a majority when it was blatantly obvious that they didn't deserve to govern a few months ago and how many times did the same scumbags under the "Social Credit" banner govern with the publics consent? We get what we deserve in this pseudo democracy mostly peopled by a lazy stupid and cowardly citizenry. What was that phrase? "If you stand for nothing you will fall for anything"

I HAVE spent the night in a

I HAVE spent the night in a homeless shelter, one night to see what it was like. Imagine a prison with no guards, stinking, noisy insane people walking around babbling all night and with no secure place to put your belongings. And they kick you out at dawn. If I was homeless I would rather sleep outside too. Actually I would rather be in a jail cell myself.

What if it was a summer owelimpics?

Would Minister Coleman force homeless to shelters to avoid dehydration and heat stroke during the summer?

Homelessness, drug and alcohol addiction, and mental illness are not seasonal problems Minister Coleman.

Limits to stuff....

Is there a limit to how many terms for a Premier? Is this Gordzzillas 2nd or 3rd?