LMH_Rally-9Nov11-SD.mov
Channel: Randy Chatterjee
Date: 2011-11-12

Featuring: Activist Linda Shuto 00:11, MP Don Davies 05:52, MP Libby Davies 11:17, and Linda Shuto again at 20:55.  Click on these numbers to skip directly to those speakers.

On the second anniversary of the demolition of a neighbourhood once home to over 700 low-income families, Community Advocates for Little Mountain (CALM) meets to remember those we lost, celebrate the once vibrant community, commit not to let such destruction of decent housing happen again, and vow to keep public land public.  Built for war veterans in 1954, Little Mountain Housing once held 224 family-sized, multiple-bedroom apartments.  They buildings were sited around large open park spaces to ensure safe play areas for both residents and neighbours.

Then, in 2008, it was cleared of all but a handful of tenants and demolished to prepare it for a contingent sale to a foreign buyer.  Two years after Demolition Day (D-Day), 9 November 2009, it is still a hole in the ground and the land has not only not been rezoned or building permits issued, but the sale itself--as much as $200 million for the 15 hectare site--is still not final.

Meanwhile, as the City celebrates Veterans Day, 68 Canadian Forces veterans are forced to live out on the streets of Vancouver, homeless and at risk of hypothermia and death as winter approaches.  It is governmental decisions that force citizens both to risk life and limb for their country and then to face equal hardship and disrespect upon their return, when there is no affordable housing not just for them, but for anyone of modest means.

Little Mountain Housing was a shining light of hope that Canadian society could take care of its most vulnerable, a light that now fades into distant memory and dooms thousands in Vancouver and hundreds of thousands across Canada to an ignominious life on the brutal margins of one of the wealthiest societies on earth.