Are stories of Vanouver Police officers running intimidation tactics on the homeless true? Hard to tell to what extent, if at all.
But details emerging from the mouths of tent dwellers about being pressured to leave the area don’t seem to be coming out of thin air (the part about being pushed up against vans and told to pick up their s–t and get out of town? Well that’s a different story).
I found this piece of the above-linked article very telling however:
Hope for those of us who were fearful that the VPD or VANOC influenced officials would try to hide certain aspects about Vancouver’s troubles during the Olympics.
The annual Women's Memorial March will thankfully not be displaced or postponed by the Olympics.
The protesters that show up from across the globe during the Games with their intent of disruption for the sake of anarchy could learn a thing or two from these women, whose display will have nothing to do with chaos for the cameras and everything to do with honouring the memory of the fallen with dignity and solidarity.
Here is an interesting update to a query posed by the Vancouver Police Board back in January regarding the usage of tasers within the VPD compared to other major police forces across Canada (there were 16 requests for data, 11 of which responded).
Vancouver taser use is 8th out of 12 Canadian policing agencies polled on taser use
It is interesting to see the surprisingly low numbers in contrast to cities like Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg (with acknowledgment that unlike the City of Vancouver, those cities seemingly have one force for the entire metro population). Whether or not the conduct of municipal police forces like Vancouver’s continue to get lumped in with incidents attributed to the RCMP, for example, will be interesting to keep an eye on once these statistics become more widely disseminated.
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“Perhaps it was my silk dress or the new perfume I’ve been wearing lately. When I asked Suzanne Anton what her New Year’s resolution was, she replied, “To kiss a pretty girl!” and pecked me on the cheek.” – Writer Emily Barca describing her encounter with the lone NPA City Councillor on New Year’s Eve.
