Heightened tensions around Victoria’s tent city have led to claims of harassment by area residents and people living at the encampment.
“The situation is unsafe for everyone, housed and unhoused,” said Mayor Lisa Helps, adding that any incidents should be reported to police.
A Victoria man said he was injured in a confrontation on the sidewalk outside the YMCA, across the street from the encampment on Wednesday.
Aaron Locke, 22, said he was walking home to Fairfield along Courtney Street around 2 a.m. after having three beers at the Sticky Wicket Pub.
“There was a lady in front of tent city holding out some kind of a makeshift weapon,” said Locke, who described the item as a flail or mallet.
“I tried to walk past her, but she was blocking me, so I kind of pushed her, not in an aggressive way, just to get by.”
The woman yelled for help, he said, and “at least eight people” came out of the tent city encampment and “started to beat the s--- out of me.” Locke said he didn’t get a good look at the people, some of whom were wearing hoodies, and they took his phone.
“They were yelling at me, calling me a Nazi,” said Locke, who is bald because of a disorder called alopecia.
He was left with a split lip and facial bruising.
Locke said he ran to the nearest apartment building, kitty corner from the tent city, and started hitting buzzers to get help.
Someone eventually answered and called police and an ambulance. When police arrived, he said, they told him they would take his statement the next day, when he was sober.
“I wasn’t drunk. I was really angry,” said Locke, a care-home worker who wants police to find his attackers and pursue charges.
He said the incident confirmed his view that the situation at the tent city is getting worse.
Victoria police spokesman Const. Matt Rutherford said the allegation is being investigated.
Ana McBee, who lives in tent city directly across from where the alleged attack took place, said she didn’t hear anything.
Stephen Portman, a legal advocate with Together Against Poverty Society, questioned Locke’s story, saying he met with several residents Wednesday and asked about the alleged altercation. No one had heard about it or witnessed anything, he said.
He said some tent city residents have reported being harassed and confronted.
“I’ve heard several stories from tent-city residents about drunk people and passersby yelling hateful things, coming into the camp and even throwing fireworks in,” said Portman.
Helps said anecdotes about assault or harassment around the camp, proven or not, are an indication that something must change before things get worse.
“The province needs to get these people housed first, which they are working on, and then close the camp down.”
Violence has been centred within tent city, police said
Violence connected to the tent city on the Victoria courthouse lawn has been overwhelmingly centred within the encampment, rather than the surrounding community, said Victoria police Insp. Scott McGregor.
McGregor, whose responsibility includes tent city, said at the beginning of May that he was aware of only one assault involving a neighbour and a tent city resident. It did not result in charges as it was an argument that escalated to physical confrontation on both sides.
“Other than that, the violence that has occurred in tent city has really been contained to the people living on the site,” he said. Four stabbings, the most recent on Feb. 18, have been reported in tent city. Since November, there have been several drug overdoses, one of which was fatal.
— Katherine Dedyna
