B.C. Hydro is putting the word out that its Rock Bay site at Government and Pembroke streets poses a safety hazard for any homeless tenters thinking of relocating.
The utility has heard rumours from several sources that campers facing eviction from the tent city on the Victoria courthouse lawn might consider moving to Rock Bay.
“We are aware that a couple of campers may be discussing coming to the Rock Bay site,” Hydro spokesman Ted Olynyk wrote in an email to the Times Colonist on Thursday. “We heard the rumour from a few places.
“We want to stress that this is still considered a construction and environmental remediation zone. B.C. Hydro takes safety very seriously. We don’t want to see anyone from the public needlessly put themselves in harm’s way.”
The Rock Bay site is fenced with high drop-offs on the inside and, like all Hydro properties, is patrolled by security staff, Olynyk said.
“I don’t understand why anyone would want to camp on what was one of the most contaminated sites in the province.”
Rev. Al Tysick of the Dandelion Society said last week he was seeking another provincially owned site for campers given the B.C. government’s application for an injunction to force them from the courthouse lawn. Tysick said Thursday he did not have Rock Bay in mind — “that’s for sure” — because it is too far for people to walk to supportive services.
Provincial grounds are key to campers because they are not covered by a city bylaw that requires people camping in parks to pack up their belongings at seven each morning.
The province recently posted “no camping” signs at several downtown properties it owns.
Tysick said he’s concentrating his efforts on supporting people refusing to leave the courthouse lawn. About 20 people spent several hours on Thursday cleaning up the tent city to counter the government’s view that the grounds constitute a health and safety risk.
A lot of garbage was picked up and pathways cleared in case emergency services personnel have to carry someone on a stretcher, Tysick said. The last of four stabbings reported in the tent city occurred on Feb. 18. There have been several drug overdoses, one fatal, since the encampment grew up in November.
Victoria’s Together Against Poverty Society expects to be in B.C. Supreme Court next Thursday to oppose an injunction application made by the province to evict the campers. Both sides will present “many, many” affidavits as opposed to verbal testimony, TAPS executive director Kelly Newhook said. TAPS does not want to disclose its legal strategy in advance, she added.
The province is prepared for a TAPS request for a further adjournment, a B.C. spokeswoman said.
The province maintains eviction is in order because it recently provided 88 one-year units, along with 40 temporary spaces at My Place on Yates Street, dispelling the argument that homeless people in tent city have nowhere to go.
But Newhook said as many as 500 people will need homes by the end of April, when My Place closes. Another 110 beds will close March 31 in two short-term shelters run by the Victoria Cool-Aid Society and downtown churches’ Out of the Rain program, she said.
There are 40 to 60 people still at tent city and 254 people “sleeping rough” identified by a federal government homelessness count on Feb. 10, although that included some people at tent city.
The federal numbers have yet to come in for homeless people not included in the count because they were incarcerated, not interested, asleep or in hospital.
“There’s still people out there who need help and there are no spaces,” Newhook said.
B.C. Housing’s 38 new spaces at Mount Edwards Court on Vancouver Street are full. Of the 50 spaces at Choices in View Royal, 20 camp sites are full and moves to 30 indoor spaces are expected to begin today, Our Place shelter manager Grant McKenzie said.
