About 35 people gathered outside the locked Goldstream Provincial Park campground gate Saturday to protest what they called a war on the poor being waged by the provincial NDP.
With about a dozen RCMP and park rangers looking on, speakers denounced “police state” tactics and “subhuman” treatment they say they have received at the hands of authorities as their homeless camp has been pushed from one green space to another.
About 34 homeless people set up camp in Goldstream Sept. 18 after Saanich police, armed with a B.C. Supreme Court injunction, evicted 115 campers from Regina Park.
Rather than working effectively to find housing for the homeless campers during the time the tent city called Namegans was in Saanich, the province teamed with the district to collect evidence and build a case against the campers, Ashley Mollison, of the Alliance Against Displacement, told the gathering.
Within 24 hours of the campers setting up at Goldstream, the province had turned the campground into a containment site — evicting all of the campers who were already there when the homeless showed up, refusing access to anyone but approved professionals and setting a Tuesday deadline for them to leave, she said.
“This Goldstream isolation is a grim symbol of what a government-organized legalized tent city might look like. It’s an outdoor shelter, gate-kept by police and isolated from the social movement that demands an end to homelessness,” Mollison said.
“The message that homeless working class and Indigenous people are not welcome rings clear. This promotes anti-homeless hate from those that are forced out of the campground and neighbours who have fears of the unknown.”
While authorities including those from local government, fire departments, public health and police say tent cities are unclean, unsafe, pose fire risks and are breeding grounds for crime, the demonstrators said they provide the safety of community.
“In tent cities, people find the safety from the harms of homelessness. They have a community. They find belonging. It’s a place where people can look after each other and look after each other’s belongings and get healing,” Mollison said.
“We hear over and over again that these are the safest places for homeless people in the absence of appropriate and affordable housing.”
Camp organizer Chrissy Brett said there was one overdose death at the tent city that set up behind Victoria’s courthouse for almost a year.
In the government housing that was provided to house those campers, there have been 16 overdose or suicide deaths, she said.
“When government services are killing people, they are moving to tents outdoors because they feel that’s safer,” Brett said.
While Premier John Horgan promised shelter opportunities for all when he set the Tuesday deadline for the homeless campers to leave, the 34 campers at Goldstream have only been offered 19 shelter mats, Brett said.
Langford Mayor Stew Young has been vocal in his demand that the province find new shelter for the campers and get them out of the park.
Neighbours aren’t happy with the park being closed and are concerned about an increase in crime, Young says.
While the campers protested near the gates Saturday, about half a dozen neighbours watched from across the street and were reluctant to comment.
“I think the general feeling of the community is that if they go peacefully on Tuesday, then it’s a done deal. We’re fine,” said one woman who did not want to give her name.
“There’s been no problems, [but] there’s been some control on them and maybe that’s what they needed.”
