Days after the Conservative Party of B.C. won the provincial election, business and advocacy groups in Vancouver called on the new government to act on street disorder and related harms.
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Business Improvement Areas of BC (BIABC) vice-chair Patricia Barnes said the biggest challenges facing small businesses in Vancouver right now are the cost of doing business and street disorder, including retail crime and drug addiction.
Barnes said addressing costs involves removing red tape, while dealing with street disorder requires a holistic approach from the province, adding, “Do I personally know what the solution is? No,” and continuing, “But I do know that we need law enforcement, we need harm reduction, we need everything all at once.”
Sarah Blyth of the Overdose Prevention Society said improving Vancouver’s streets should begin with addressing poverty rather than focusing first on getting drugs off the street, saying, “I think alleviating poverty is the thing that if we can do that, the issues won’t exist in the way they do today.”
Jess Ketchum, co-founder of the Save Our Streets Coalition, said the groups want the government to have a minister responsible for overall safety, rather than splitting responsibility across different portfolios, noting, “You don’t have competing forces within government,” and “You have the same people sitting around the table at all times.”
Both Barnes and Ketchum said they want the new government to listen more closely to those affected by current conditions, with Barnes saying, “We’re not listening to those voices enough to understand the repercussions of what’s happening in our economy on them.”
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