BC Government Axes Controversial Downtown Eastside Adviser

As recently as Thursday Premier David Eby defended the government’s contract with Michael Bryant to provide strategic advice about the Downtown Eastside neighbourhood of Vancouver.

Then on Sunday the government ended Bryant’s contract months ahead of schedule.

“We have a shared dedication towards improving conditions in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside, and thank him for his work to this point,” said a statement from Eby’s office released Tuesday afternoon. “However, debate and discussion around this time-limited contract is distracting from the important work underway.”

Bryant’s work for the government through his consulting company Humilitas Group Ltd. concluded on Sunday, the statement said.

That was a little more than three months into a contract that was supposed to continue until mid-August, with the potential to be extended for a further six months. In total the government was to pay Bryant as much as $300,000.

For three days in a row last week B.C. Conservative MLAs had raised concerns about Bryant’s appointment to provide advice to Eby, Social Development and Poverty Reduction Minister Sheila Malcolmson and the Cabinet Committee on Community Safety.

A former attorney general in Ontario, Bryant followed a bumpy path to become the CEO of Legal Aid BC in 2022, only to part with the organization after just two years in the position for reasons that have never been publicly explained.

Conservative finance critic Peter Milobar alleged in the legislature that Bryant “got fired from Legal Aid under a cloud of suspicion around potential misogynistic behaviour.”

Legal Aid BC has said it cannot comment on personnel matters and Bryant has not responded to messages.

On Wednesday Eby said he didn’t know Bryant until Legal Aid BC hired him but saw what he did there.

“He worked with Indigenous people, he worked with poor people, with people who are struggling, to get them access to justice in a meaningful way,” he said. “I need him to use those skills in the Downtown Eastside to find ways that we can provide better supports for people.”

Bryant also has life experience that would help him understand conditions on the Downtown Eastside, said Eby. “He struggled with his own addiction and recovery. He’s got empathy.”

His background includes law degrees from Harvard and Osgoode Hall, clerking at the Supreme Court of Canada, a decade in provincial politics in Ontario and involvement in the tragic 2009 death of cyclist Darcy Allan Sheppard, an incident for which charges were laid against him and later dropped.

Bryant later released a memoir, 28 Seconds: A True Story of Addiction, Tragedy, and Hope, that intertwined the stories of Sheppard’s death and his own struggle with alcoholism.

Before moving to the job with Legal Aid BC at the start of 2022, Bryant worked for four years as executive director and general counsel for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association.

Eby said Bryant’s skills and experience were needed in the Downtown Eastside where, despite government spending on housing and other supports, there has been little improvement. Eby said conditions in the neighbourhood were a key inspiration for him to enter politics.

“There is a cohort of people in the neighbourhood that are served by non-profit organizations, the city, the federal government, by our government, by private charities,” he said. “The metrics, the outcomes, the improvements for that specific group — I just don’t think we’re seeing them.”

On Thursday, as opposition MLAs continued to question the appointment, Eby said there is a lot more work to do to co-ordinate the services offered in the neighbourhood.

“My goal is for Michael Bryant to assist us in co-ordinating to ensure that we’re delivering outcomes that we’re looking for in terms of improving the quality of life of the people who are struggling, as well as the safety, both perceived and actual, in the Downtown Eastside.”

Three days after Eby made those comments, the government cancelled the contract with Bryant’s company, while saying it “remains committed to making life better for people living in and around the Downtown Eastside community.”

Terms of the contract allow the government to cancel for any reason by giving 10 days’ written notice and paying for any work already completed.

Even as the contract was cancelled, B.C. Conservatives criticized the government for awarding it without competition, public disclosure or clearly defined deliverables.

“This wasn’t accountability, it was damage control,” said Surrey-White Rock MLA Trevor Halford in a statement. “The premier didn’t end this contract because it was wrong. He ended it because it became public.”

Halford called for the release of the total amount already paid under the contract, any payments triggered by cancelling it and an accounting of the work done to date.

“The contract may be gone, but the questions aren’t,” he said. “British Columbians are paying the price for this government’s backroom politics.”