Goldstream Provincial Park campground remained closed to all but about 34 homeless campers on Monday as their organizer threatened to stay in Langford if the city’s mayor doesn’t back off from his criticisms.
From behind a locked park gate, organizer Chrissy Brett said Langford Mayor Stew Young has declared war on the poor by inciting fear among park neighbours about increased crime and drug use related to the campers.
“Stew Young has definitely not seen the last of us,” said Brett. “Maybe he’ll see us for the next six to eight months.”
Young countered: “We don’t declare war on the poor, we’re trying to provide services for the poor.”
The mayor said Brett’s “confrontational rhetoric” is a disservice to vulnerable people — those addicted to drugs and alcohol, those with mental-heath challenges, those who pay for their habits through crime — who need help from the province.
On Monday night, Young met with B.C. Premier John Horgan, who is the area’s MLA. The mayor is scheduled to be part of a conference call with provincial ministers today to discuss how to co-ordinate their different approaches to help the homeless people at the park.
“My message is the province needs more boots on the ground and to get people out of their offices,” Young said. “These neighbours are mad and angry at John [Horgan] and at the housing minister [Selina Robinson],” said Young. “This was dropped literally in their backyard and there was no discussion with me. I can’t answer when they’ll be leaving.”
Brett said the original plan was for people with disabilities, who are allowed to camp for free, to stay at Goldstream for two weeks.
The intent was to return to Saanich — where the group had stayed for five months in Regina Park and a couple of days in a Ravine Way green space — in the hopes of finding housing solutions.
Under a B.C. Housing initiative to provide 2,000 modular homes to municipalities that provide free land, Saanich has offered land near its fire hall on Vernon Avenue for 40 to 60 homes. B.C. Housing is assessing the land. If approved, Brett said some of the people at the camp might be first in line for that housing, which Saanich Mayor Richard Atwell said could be ready in the spring.
The Langford mayor’s generalizations about the campers’ drug use and criminality and the Environment Ministry’s insistence on keeping the park campground gate locked, citing safety concerns, has taken its toll on campers, Brett said. The campers may be “looking at creating something way more permanent — probably not in Goldstream Park — but somewhere in Langford.”
B.C. Parks staff have been guarding the campground gates while others patrol. West Shore RCMP regularly patrol also, as do bylaw enforcement officers.
On Sunday night, a “heated debate” at Goldstream Inn’s Ma Miller’s pub was attended by Langford’s mayor, West Shore RCMP Staff Sgt. Raj Sandhu, neighbours, and a sole camper, Morgan van Humbeck.
From that meeting it was decided that two neighbourhood “stewards” will walk through the park every 48 hours with a representative from Horgan’s Langford-Juan De Fuca riding office and the RCMP to observe the encampment, said Young.
It’s a way that neighbours can hear from neighbours rather politicians and media and advocates, the mayor said.
Van Humbeck, who was staying at the park in his recreational vehicle, and joined the campers, spoke at the meeting.
He said he understands neighbour concerns about needles being left in the park and fears about the environment being harmed, but said that two troublesome campers were kicked out, the sensitive park environment is being respected, park rules are being followed, and that multiple police visits every day can confirm this.
Neighbours were in agreement that a campsite across the highway is a better location. It has a covered shelter with sinks and access to hot and cold running water, and picnic tables inside and out.
“It’s probably a better place than where it is now but I don’t want to interfere with what the government is doing,” said Young.
Young said any decision to move the campers has to be made by the province. “My suggestion is that you don’t make the decision to move them anywhere unless there are rules that there are no drugs or no crime, or you’re out.”
Neighbour Reece Hasanen said people who are homeless in the area are looked after by the community and that Langford isn’t rejecting the poor but rather only the “opportunists” coming to disrupt the community and the park.
Van Humbeck said far more Langford residents have come with food and offered to help and move the campers than those who have threatened to forcibly remove them. “There’s been an endless fount of support,” he said.
ceharnett@timescolonist.com
