This bulletin just out from the mayor’s office. Mayor announces HEAT shelter numbers from December “No barrier” facilities provide shelter for almost 300 a night Almost 300 homeless people found shelter every night over the past three weeks in emergency facilities opened by the Homeless Emergency Action Team (HEAT), Mayor Gregor Robertson said today. More […]

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Just before Christmas, MLA David Chudnovsky sent a little missile in my direction, saying that I had been suckered by government propaganda (yet again, I think was the implication) when I put up a blog item about the provincial government delaying the bid process on some of its 12 social housing projects to try to […]

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In my end-of-year, end-of-election-season post for my CTV blog, I look at the challenges all these new councils face and my fondest hopes for what they will and won’t do as they tackle those challenges. Also, links to a couple of previous posts here and here that you may have missed.

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From: Graves, Judy Sent: Wednesday, December 17, 2008 11:44 AM To: [Removed] It looks like you have had unprecedented success with the expanded shelter openings. It has been well over a decade since there have been so few people sleeping rough in the DTES overnight during Extreme Weather. The whole area was quiet, very few […]

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The fast agreement between Premier Campbell and Mayor Robertson that led to yesterday’s announcement of 200 new shelter beds points to a willingness between the two to work around the clock to get things done, as I found out for my Globe story today.

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I really think there should have been a sports commentator at today’s first meeting of the new Vision-controlled council. Or several really, to handle the various rounds that ensued as council proceeded through the many motions put forward to kickstart the Vision agenda. We could have started with one of those hushed-voice golf types for […]

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My last CTV blog post looked at the debate over whether homelessness is worth trying to tackle (some people feel like it’s too big a job for the city) and also a warning about scrambling together homeless shelters too quickly. As people in the Downtown Eastside know too well, those who have been sleeping on […]

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I see from this story by my Vancouver Sun counterpart Catherine Rolfsen that NPA Councillor Suzanne Anton is objecting to the city (or, to be more precise, Vision Vancouver) putting $300,000 from its contingency reserve into funding shelters, which it hasn’t typically done in the past. She’s right on that. However, the city has been […]

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The first raft of motions from the new council just hit the decks. Enjoy your holidays, city hall staffers, because you’ll be scrambling when you get back to come up with answers and options for your new bosses. What the new council is asking for” – a staff report on options for the Burrard Street […]

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For those of you who don’t scrutinize the comments section on this blog, there’s an interesting discussion going on about homelessness and solutions under one of my posts (which, oddly, had nothing to do about homelessness — the one about the Olympic village and finding the perfect mayor from a couple of days ago). It’s […]

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