Do you want your parks and recreation system back, from the virtue-signalers and the do-gooders, who these past four years have promoted the notion that Vancouver’s parks system belongs to the influx of homeless newcomers, coming to our city for drugs, and free accommodation in our parks?

Children playing in parks, parks that are free of needles and crack pipes, human feces and detritus of every description — hey, that’s like so 1999. Parks aren’t meant for families in 2022, parks are no longer the green space, the backyards for the 56% of renters and 25% of condominium owners in our city, for whom parks in the past have provided rest, relaxation, solace, fresh air, comfy benches to sit on, and even some recreational activities, like tennis, soccer and pickleball. No siree, Bob — Vancouver parks now belong to the homeless folks visiting from Halifax or Edmonton, Québec City, or who have made their way up into Canada from the U.S.

Are you living under the delusion our Vancouver parks belong to you, to your family, your friends and your neighbours? Do you have no heart?

The homeless need a place to live. Parks are great, and none better than Vancouver’s parks, lush and green, with all those trees for cover.

However, If you believe the Vancouver citizens who elect 7 Park Board Commissioners to office every four years, that those Commissioners are meant to be stewards of Vancouver’s  parks and recreation system, then we’re here to tell you — as good-hearted as these folks might be — you’re certainly not going to want to vote for candidates for the Greens, ABC Vancouver, Vision Vancouver or OneCity Vancouver — because as socially-conscious as candidates from those parties may be, their kindness extends only to the homeless, not to you or your family, and certainly not to the children for whom Vancouver is home.

Drug use/crack pipe smokers camped out and right by the playground at the park by my house. Crack pipe found by the playground. Unacceptable. Who do I call? I’ve been on hold with the non emergency line for 15 minutes. @VancouverPD @kennedystewart

— BrettdrC®🇨🇦|🦫| 🫎 MBA (@brettdrc) September 24, 2022

When it comes to children in our city, that well-intentioned crew could give a good galldarn about your children — better to learn the hard lesson now that life is tough, and sometimes we have to sacrifice playing on that slide or in the sandbox, to serve the interests of the “greater good” — in this case, the steady influx of homeless arriving in our city from across Canada, and in some cases the U.S., central and South America, and even Europe and the Far East.

Above you see the five Park Board candidates, plus an alternate, VanRamblings endorses in 2022 — that would be TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver’s incumbent Park Board Commissioner, Tricia Barker, her TEAM running mates Kumi Kimura, Kathleen Larsen and Michelle Mollineaux, plus the NPA’s Park Board candidate, Dave Pasin, and TEAM alternate, James Buckson — who believe Vancouver’s parks are for everyone, including the homeless who courts have ruled may, if there is no other shelter available, tent overnight in the parks across our city, but only if these woebegone citizens vacate the park by 7 a.m., in order that families and the general public may enjoy our parks system.

But that’s doesn’t happen, does it? Instead, Vancouver’s lush, green parks have become semi-permanent homes for those who arrive on our shores daily.

Long story short, before VanRamblings relates a story that informs our writing today, and why it is we think it is critical you cast your ballot for the TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver candidates for Park Board, plus the NPA’s Dave Pasin …

• Tricia Barker, a fine, upstanding, incumbent Park Board Commissioner, a seniors’ wellness professional, who these past four years has championed the interests of our seniors and persons with disabilities communities, and as a practicing Tibetan Buddhist whose motto is “pick happy” enjoys walks through Vancouver’s parks system each and every day. Tricia takes her job as a steward of Vancouver’s parks and recreation system seriously, takes her job as an advocate for you and your family seriously, has worked with Vancouver City Council to increase funding to our parks and recreation system, worked with the Queen of Pools-in-Parks in our city, Margery Duda, towards ensuring that there will be wading pools for children in every neighbourhood, and outdoor swimming pools in neighbourhoods across the city. Chances are should Vancouver voters elect Tricia Barker to a second term on Park Board, come December the indefatigable Tricia Barker will be elected Park Board Chairperson by her colleagues, for 2023. We think that scenario is just a little bit of heaven for Vancouver citizens, for families and for children;

• Kumi Kimura, for some while now has held the job as senior manager at the Musqueam Golf Course, so we’re here to tell you that Kumi knows the value of exceptional recreational facilities: they have shaped her upbringing and her career. As is the case with many of us, Kumi Kimura has spent hours, days, weeks, months and years enjoying every aspect of Vancouver’s abundant parks and recreation system, and was one of the first to acquire a OneCard when they became available. A secret? Kumi knows just about everyone in the city. Walk down the street, enter a room, and folks rush over to greet Kumi, and wrap their arms around her in a hug. Maybe 15 years working in Vancouver’s hospitality industry where she’s met thousands upon thousands of people, means that if you’re a good person — and make no mistake, Kumi Kimura is a very good person — affection from those you’ve met and worked with in the past results in the kind of good will Ms. Kimura engenders. Why would Kumi Kimura make a superb Park Board Commissioner, apart from the fact that she’s heartbreakingly bright, knows Vancouver’s parks and recreation system backwards, forward and inside out, and has years of experience in governance? Gosh, we just answered our own question, didn’t we? Tricia Barker and Kumi Kimura are a team, running for Park Board with TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver. Please save a vote for Kumi Kimura — you’ll be so very, very glad you did;

• Kathleen Larsen. The incoming elected Park Board needs to hit the ground running, needs to re-assert Commissioner control and Commissioner priorities that serve your interests. What does that take? For a start, a sophisticated understanding of how decisions are made at the Park Board table, how one must conduct oneself at Park Board to get things done, years (decades) of experience in governance, in meeting and achieving goals that make a difference for the better in the lives of working people, families and children, seniors and persons within our disabilities community. Read these parts of Kathleen Larsen’s bio … “Kathleen has worked as a Community and Heritage Planner in the Lower Mainland for 27 years, and possesses a first-rate knowledge of local government legislation, planning processes, urban design and heritage conservation and preservation.” Save a vote, prioritize Kathleen Larsen as the candidate for Vancouver Park Board for whom you’ll mark you ballot when you cast your vote. We promise that come post-election you’ll be very, very glad you did;

• Michelle Mollineaux has operated within British Columbia politics for years, generally working in the background as a campaign manager, as well as working within all levels of governmental bureaucracy to achieve the best outcomes for all British Columbians and, in recent years, for the citizens of Vancouver. Now, it’s time for Michelle to make her début as a front-and-centre public servant. As an immigrant and a “soccer mom,” Michelle’s understanding of the importance of sports and recreation is second to none. Working to transform and reclaim Vancouver Park Board as a functioning parks and recreation system that best serves the interests of all of us who call Vancouver home is Michelle Mollineaux’s primary goal, as she will focus her energies on upgrading our aging community centres, sports facilities and fields. Working tirelessly to keep Vancouver parks, and the city of Vancouver green and safe for everyone, Michelle — a dynamic and action-oriented member of the TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver slate of Park Board candidates — promises to do better, will do better, and will be ready from Day One to get to work on your behalf to ensure that community pools will be built, water parks will be open in the summer, and Vancouver’s many, many parks will be open to everyone to enjoy. Save a vote for Michelle Mollineaux. You’ll be darn glad you did.

• Dave Pasin, we believe, is our brother from another mother. Dave is someone VanRamblings has known for a great long while. In recent weeks, we have spoken frequently about the current election cycle, and commiserated about the state of parks and the city — in this very confusing, and dare we say, contentious election, so any solace Dave could offer is good by us. Of all the candidates who’ve come forward to offer themselves up for public service, when it comes to Vancouver’s parks and recreation system, Dave Pasin is among the crème de la crème of candidates for Vancouver Park Board in 2022, given his years of service as a member of the Board of Directors for, at various times, the West End Community Centre, the Hillcrest Community Centre, and the Dunbar Community Centre. The every second Monday Park Board meetings at 1111 Beach Avenue has, for many years, acted as a second home for the affable Dave Pasin, so often does he present to the Board on the need for more community pools, increased support for our community recreation centres, and ensuring reduced-rate Leisure Pass access to our public recreation centres — particularly for seniors living on a fixed income, and Vancouver’s indigent population, but also for families and children who are doing their best to keep fit. Dave Pasin has pioneered an innovative all access programme for children, youth, teens and seniors, first at the West End Community Centre, and more recently at the Hillcrest Community Centre. Dave Pasin has told VanRamblings that he  looks forward to the opportunity to work with TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver‘s slate of candidates, to reclaim Vancouver’s parks for everyone. VanRamblings strongly encourages you to save a vote for Dave Pasin.

Andrea Pinochet-Escudero thinks she’s going to lose. Let’s prove her wrong. Yeah, sure, Andrea’s running with Vote Socialist, and you’re not a socialist — if you’re having a hard time wrapping your head around the notion of voting for a socialist, think humanist instead, because Andrea Pinochet-Escudero is certainly that, and more. Why would you cast a vote for Ms. Pinochet-Escudero, you ask? The answer to that question is simple: because you care about the city, and Andrea Pinochet-Escudero means well for our city. Ms. Pinochet-Escudero isn’t one of those virtue-signaling, holier-than-thou champagne socialists, given to the big lie. As the mother of two young boys, who just happens to be married to the great hope of our future, Derrick O’Keefe (who came within a hair’s breadth of winning a seat on Council in 2018), in 2022, Ms. Pinochet-Escudero has emerged as the Park Board candidate who advocated most for the construction of community pools, more so than was the case with any other Park Board candidate this year. COPE’s incumbent Park Board Commissioner, Gwen Giesbrecht — we’re endorsing her next — needs a seconder for her motions around the Park Board table, as Andrea will require of Gwen: that can only be achieved if you cast your ballot for the true HUMANIST socialists running for Park Board this election cycle — Andrea Pinochet-Escudero and Gwen Giesbrecht, who together will bring compassion, warmth of character, heart, unending intelligence, and a commitment to the democratic process to their role as Park Board Commissioners, and make no mistake, both Andrea and Gwen will be YOUR non-partisan voice at the Park Board table. VanRamblings urges you to please, please, please save two spots on your ballot, and fill in that oblong shape next to the names of Andrea Pinochet-Escudero and Gwen Giesbrecht. We promise: you’ll be glad you did.

Gwen Giesbrecht. VanRamblings has known Gwen Giesbrecht for 30 years, and all through those years when she sat as Chairperson of the Britannia Community Centre. When VanRamblings was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2016, Gwen played a pivotal role in helping put into perspective what was going on in our life in 2016 through 2017 — as did Vancouver School Board trustee, Allan Wong (who we’re also endorsing), who played a similar role to that of Gwen. In some measure, we believe we’re here today because of the kindness, the advice, the solace and support of both Gwen and Allan. Now, a bit about Gwen: We love strong women of principle and conscience. Women don’t come stronger — and full of good will, strong will and cheer, and more principled than Gwen Giesbrecht. For the past four years, as an incumbent Park Board Commissioner, Gwen has acted as the democrat on Park Board, for the first couple of years taking the role of Park Board Committee Chairperson — that’s the part of the meeting where the public is provided with an opportunity to present to our elected Park Board Commissioners on issues of concern to Vancouver’s good citizens, who couldn’t have asked for a fairer and more democratically-inclined Chair than proved to be the case with Gwen Giesbrecht. Going forward, VanRamblings sees Gwen as the tough, informed, no-nonsense conscience of Vancouver Park Board. VanRamblings is endorsing Andrea Pinochet-Escudero (who we love!), at least in part, so that Gwen might have a seconder for motions she places before the Board for consideration. Make no mistake: we NEED Gwen Giesbrecht on Park Board for the next four years (and Andrea, too!). Although Gwen’s a team player, woebetide the Commissioner who steps out of line … Gwen will be on them like maple syrup on pancakes.

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The rationale for Endorsing the 7 Park Board candidates identified above

For much of VanRamblings’ adult life we have worked in and around the Downtown Eastside, and on Vancouver’s east side, in the neighbourhoods where we were raised, which we called home all the years we were growing up.

Over the years, VanRamblings has taught Grade 5 at Admiral Seymour Elementary, worked as a summer relief social worker out of both the Strathcona and Grandview Woodland Ministry of Human Resources offices (now called the Ministry of Children and Family Development), as well as taken on work as a Family Support Worker or Family Counselor, with various east side social agencies.

Dating back to 1996, VanRamblings was assigned by both the Pacific Regional Offices of Statistics Canada and the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation as liaison for the Downtown Eastside, and areas east. In recent years, we worked as an Outreach worker with the Lookout Housing Aid Society.

Much of our work involved working with families who lived in one of the many buildings within the Raymur Place housing project, now called Stamps Place.

A few years back, for a two-year period VanRamblings worked with children in crisis who lived in the Stamps Place neighbourhood, mostly boys and girls aged ten to twelve. The children were tender-hearted but angry, having been expelled from one school after another, and when we worked with them were tended to by ‘special needs’ educational assistants, and psychologists.

As such, VanRamblings’ experience in the area is extensive, given that our work involved one-to-one work with families in need, and more often than not — given our background as an educator — work with children in crisis, children — more often than not, girls, exploited or on the verge of being exploited by their parents, neighbourhood teenage boys, and area pimps.

Many of the children resident in Stamps Place have only one safe space where they might find respite from the misery of their lives: parks, in this case Strathcona Park, as Strathcona Park is located nearby Stamps Place.

In 2018, Vancouver voters elected a majority COPE / Green Party contingent as Park Board Commissioners, who responded to Vancouver’s burgeoning homelessness crisis — caused in the main by an influx of a new homeless population arriving in Vancouver from the Prairies, Ontario, Québec and the Maritimes — by opening up our parks system to tent encampments, not just in Strathcona and Oppenheimer parks, but in all parks located across Vancouver.

The impact of opening our parks to those who do not have a home — an issue the Courts have said is allowable, with the proviso this homeless population vacate the park no later than 7 a.m., a provision rarely if ever enforced. Thus many parks across our city have become home to a drug addicted, untreated mentally ill population, where crack pipes, needles, feces and detritus have taken over many of Vancouver’s parks, including children’s play areas.

For the 56% of Vancouver residents who are renters, and the 25% of Vancouver’s population who are condominium owners, Vancouver’s parks are residents green spaces, their de facto backyards, providing a place of solace in the open air, surrounded by trees and grass, a place of rest, recreation and reflection, not to mention playgrounds for their young and not-so-young children.

With tender hearts and compassion, five of our current Vancouver Park Board Commissioners over these past four years — COPE’s Gwen Giesbrecht, Vision Vancouver’s John Irwin and Stuart Mackinnon, and the Green Party of Vancouver’s Camil Dumont and Dave Demers — rather than act as stewards of Vancouver’s parks and recreation system, and given that all three levels of government — municipal, provincial and federal — have failed to provide homes for Vancouver’s ever-increasing homeless population, out of good will and conscience, turned over many of Vancouver parks to our homeless population.

There is no question that Ms. Giesbrecht, Mr. Irwin, Mr. Mackinnon, Mr. Dumont, and Mr. Demers in making Vancouver parks available as home to Vancouver’s homeless population  acted with humanity and good faith.

However, in turning Vancouver’s parks system into homeless encampments, the 81% of Vancouver’s population for whom our parks are a place of rest, relaxation, solace and recreation, all out in the open air, and a place where their children might play in safety … well, let’s face it, in the main throughout our city, that is no longer the case for most Vancouver residents. Vancouver’s parks have, cruelly, become a haven for those in need of care and shelter.

Back to Stamps Place. As we wrote above, for many years we worked with young children, mostly girls, who were exploited by their parents, older boys and pimps, as sources of income for the exploiters, and as sexual playthings — let us remind you, we’re talking about 10, 11 and 12-year-old girls.

The ONLY safe place for the girls who live at Stamps Place, apart from the time they spend in school, is Strathcona Park, because at Strathcona Park there are safe and protective eyes on them always, the park not open to the pimps, the girls’ parents or the teenage boys who mean to exploit these young girls. Parents, pimps and teenage boys on the prowl enter Strathcona Park at their peril.

As such, for a brief period each day snuggled securely within Strathcona Park these young girls are provided with the opportunity to simply be what we would wish for all young children: preteen girls full of joy and the wonderment of life, out playing with their friends in the open air, in a place that promises safety, a sense of awe.

From September 2019 through until April 30th 2021 — nearly two years — Strathcona Park was “home” to a homeless population where homeless residents engaged in property theft, vandalism, a place where rape, violent assaults and fires were not uncommon. The Strathcona Park encampment was itself a hot spot for homicides, sexual and violent assaults, drug trafficking, and stolen goods, where there will multiple incidents of fires.

For VanRamblings, the tragedy of the Strathcona Park encampment was that for a period of some 20 months, exploited young girls no longer had a place of safety where they could meet with their friends, a place of respite where they could rest and get away from their lives, if only for an hour or two.

To VanRamblings that is a human tragedy. Young girls exploited, with nowhere to go, with no one to turn to, as a homeless population “took over” their park, their place of refuge, the only safe place in their neighbourhood where they would not be exploited, gone. A human tragedy involving not just vulnerable young girls, but the hundreds of children enrolled at Admiral Seymour Elementary and Strathcona elementary schools — who, for 20 months, had no place to go, no place of solace, no place to play outside with their friends.

VanRamblings believes we cannot allow this human tragedy to continue, we cannot allow further homeless park encampments to deny our children the same opportunities with which we were provided growing up.

Thus today, VanRamblings endorses the full slate of the very fine TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver candidates for Park Board, as well as Dave Pasin, along with COPE’s Gwen Giesbrecht and Vote Socialist’s Andrea Pinochet-Escudero, who might act as the conscience on the 2022 – 2016 Vancouver Park Board.

We urge you to vote wisely, and in the interests of all Vancouver citizens, and most particularly for all the children in our city, who live across every neighbourhood in Vancouver, who require ready and safe access to our parks.