This British Columbia Tent City Is About to Get a Flushing Toilet as Calls to Shut it Down Grow

A tent city occupying the lawn of a British Columbia courthouse may have won an unprecedented legal victory when a judge rejected an order to dismantle the camp last month — and will soon get flushing toilets and portable showers — but it suffered a few critical losses in the court of public opinion this week.

Seven months in, the camp in Victoria once seen as a symbol of British Columbia's growing housing crisis and wealth divide has fewer supporters than ever.

On Wednesday, British Columbia's youth watchdog Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond called on the province to remove about a dozen teens known to hang around the camp. She warned the youth may be exposed to street drugs and sexual coercion.

Those concerns came one day after a cathedral across the street from the grounds pulled its support for the homeless campers, citing needles and feces found on church property. The head of the adjoined Catholic school also called for the tents to come down Tuesday.

And yet, while the tent city has angered neighbours and triggered an increase in police calls, the provincial government has in the meantime been forced to step up its efforts to make the campers more comfortable.

The province filed an injunction to remove the camp back in February, but a judge ruled alternative housing options were lacking, and the campers had "nowhere else to move to." The ruling allows the tents to stay until a full injunction case is heard September 7, unless the province seeks to file a renewed interim injunction.

To address mounting concerns about health and safety, the government has now brought in Portland Hotel Society, a veteran social housing non-profit from Vancouver, to liaise with the camp and provide basic necessities, including flushing toilets and portable showers slated to arrive next week.

The society is best known for running Vancouver's first safe injection site, as well as managing buildings for the city's poorest and hardest to house. The non-profit does not run any buildings or health services in Victoria, but has assisted with similar pop-up encampments in Vancouver and Abbotsford in the past.

So far the organization's housing director says they've brought in a tap for drinking water, fire extinguishers and gravel paths, and have so far acted as a "logistical support service" for the camp's own management and cleanup efforts.

"We've been on the site most days for a few weeks," Andy Bond told VICE News Wednesday. "We've provided food, water and some barbecues for cooking so people aren't having to use open flames … Today they were going to make oatmeal on the site."

Bond said reception has so far been "mixed." Campers VICE News spoke to said they feel abused by service providers like Portland, and remain resistant to outside influence. "We cannot — will not — deal with imposed rules that don't work for us," tent city resident Ana McBee (pictured above) told VICE News, "because we do better running ourselves."

Neighborhood critics, on the other hand, have reacted negatively to the government providing "free stuff" for people who refuse to play by rules. "What the hell is this," tweeted an anti-tent city group calling itself Mad as Hell Victoria, linking to a story about the recent running water hookup. "Spa day at tent city."

Despite the recent moves to provide some basic necessities, comments from the minister responsible for housing suggest the province's overall strategy remains to evict the camp as soon as possible. This week, Deputy Premier Rich Coleman said the government will file a renewed injunction before a September 7 court date if the level of safety at the camp takes a turn for the worse.

"At some point in time, given the other stresses that have been around the camp, we're going to have to make a decision," Coleman told media Tuesday, adding there would need to be a "compelling enough" reason to file the renewed injunction. "We have to be in a position to actually take the case to the courts."

Anti-poverty activists say the tent city fracas is a result of more than a decade of stagnant social service rates and neglect of the affordable housing file. Stephen Portman of Together Against Poverty said the government has too heavily depended on market solutions, and it hasn't worked. "I think the fact it's come to this crisis point is pretty unforgivable," said Portman.

The government, for its part, has taken some emergency short-term measures, opening new shelter beds as well as transitional housing. In February the government pledged an indoor tent space with meals and support services for 50 campers at a former youth jail. They also opened extra subsidized units at Mount Edwards care home and added 40 rent supplements. All of these spaces and programs are run by Victoria-based non-profit service providers that tent city advocates say have lost the trust of vulnerable patients.

As BC Supreme Court's Chief Justice Christopher Hinkson noted in his April 5 decision, many of the occupiers have been banned from accessing emergency shelters and other services and suffer from addiction and mental illness. Most have fraught relationships with police and service providers.

While the tent city occupiers have so far stood their ground and negotiated with city, police and government stakeholders, this latest swell of tension doesn't bode well for the camp's future.

For a population who is used to evictions and being told to move along, the dwindling likelihood of being able to stay the summer isn't exactly a surprise. "I still think they'll get us on some health and safety technicality," tent city occupier John Roseborough said.

All photos by Jackie Dives

Follow Sarah Berman on Twitter: @sarahberms