Is Ken Sim’s office interfering with the police board?

Good morning,

The days are finally starting to get a little noticeably warmer, and I need to tell you that I am here for it. It’s nice to finally have some hope that I soon won’t need to take a long break from working in the middle of the day if I want to get a little bit of direct sunlight in my life. And if I, an easily-burned redhead, am saying that, you know it’s been a long, dark winter.

Today, we’ve got a look at the police board drama and allegations of political interference, as well as a look back at Dr. Bonnie Henry’s safe supply report, now that we’ve had a bit more time to digest it.

— Dustin Godfrey

WEATHER

Friday: 7 🌡️ 3 | 🌤️

Saturday: 7 🌡️ 5 | 🌧️

Sunday: 7 🌡️ 5 | 🌧️

Monday: 7 🌡️ 2 | 🌦️

POLICE BOARD

Political interference in the police board?

More than a week after the Vancouver Police Board’s vice-chair resigned, Faye Wightman is explaining her decision to leave the position she’s held since August 2020: political interference from the mayor’s office.

Background: Wightman, appointed to the board by the province, resigned during an emergency meeting on Jan. 30, leaving questions about the reason in her wake, but Global reported at the time that there had been growing tensions between board members.

Breaking the silence: Wightman sent a statement to several news outlets this week, outlining her reasoning for leaving the board, particularly naming political interference from Mayor Ken Sim’s office and conflicts of interest on the part of two other board members.

• Wightman didn’t name names in her letter, but she identified the two board members to Vancouver Is Awesome: Patricia Barnes and Lorraine Lowe. The former is executive director of the Hastings-Sunrise Business Improvement Association, while the latter is incoming executive director of the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre Society.

Reliance on city funding: The two organizations rely on city funding, putting the board members in a position of needing to maintain a positive relationship with the mayor, who is chair of the police board, Wightman wrote in her statement, according to Global.

Wightman added in an interview with CBC that the board needs to be non-partisan, transparent and objective to “provide good oversight for the VPD.”

Interference: Wightman specifically named Sim’s chief of staff, Trevor Ford, when asked by Vancouver Is Awesome about political interference. She told VIA that Ford attended an in-camera meeting and said he phoned board members to direct them to fire the board’s executive director, Stephanie Johanssen, who lost her job in November 2022, just after the local election.

Wightman also said Ford joined one-on-one meetings between the mayor and other board members. “If that’s not political interference, I’m not sure what is,” Wightman told VIA.

The response: Reached by VIA, Barnes directed comments on the matter to the board’s spokesperson but said business improvement association funds are collected from businesses by the city on behalf of the BIA. Lowe reportedly didn’t respond to VIA’s request for comment.

Sim’s statement: Sim reportedly didn’t address Wightman’s allegations, instead the board is “committed to upholding the board’s mission and objectives,” according to the Vancouver Sun.

A pattern forming: The allegations made by Wightman, if true, would seem to be part of a pattern. If Sim’s office is exerting undue pressure on the police board, it would jive with similar claims about the conduct of Sim’s party, ABC, in council and around the abolition of the park board.

The three non-ABC councillors say the party often introduces major amendments to votes at the last minute and uses its majority to push them through with little debate on council floor, according to the Sun.

Little engagement: The three councillors, which include two Greens and one with OneCity, said the same applies to the push to abolish the park board, calling it a rushed decision with little opportunity for input or questions from the public, other councillors or the media.

Political pressure: It would also reflect claims by the three former ABC park board commissioners who were ejected from the party as the decision to move forward with the park board abolition was made. One said she had “never been asked [her] opinion on folding” the park board, according to VIA.

No room for dissent: If the sudden split wasn’t over the park board abolition, what was it? The three now-independent commissioners told the Tyee it was over other growing tensions, including the election of the board’s chair, Green commissioner Tom Digby, as well as the location of a synthetic turf field and the timeline for removing the Stanley Park bike lanes.

“Ken [Sim] felt very strongly that we needed to remove the bike lane completely,” one commissioner told the Tyee.

VANCOUVER NUMBERS

💰 $28,548: The average one-bedroom unit in Metro Vancouver adds up to that much per year, or $2,379 per month, according to a report by Liv.rent. [Daily Hive]

🌳 30: A new website advocating against the park board abolition counts that many former park board commissioners as signatories. [Save Our Park Board]

🫠 $900: A UBC student estimates he’ll save that much per month by flying from his parents’ home in Calgary to Vancouver for his three hours of class per week and back after class is over. In all, he expects to spend $1,200 on flights, compared to $2,100 on the average one-bedroom apartment. Seems bad? [CTV]

🧑‍⚕️ 743: Out of 1,374 mental health calls since June, nurses in the VPD’s operational command centre have been able to resolve that many (adding up to 54 percent) with no police involvement. [CTV]

💨 12%: Vancouver has managed to cut its carbon emissions by that much between 2007 and 2022, according to a staff report. The report adds Vancouver’s current best-case scenario would see a 40 percent reduction by 2030, short of the goal of 50 percent. [Global]

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SAFE SUPPLY

Dr. Henry’s case for expanding safe supply

Last week, Dr. Bonnie Henry put out the report of her office’s review of the prescribed safer supply (PSS) program the province implemented at the onset of the pandemic. Her ultimate recommendation? Expand with caution.

Rewind to 2020: As the pandemic was shutting much of the world down in March 2020, the prescribed safer supply program was launched as one way to help separate drug users from the toxic illicit supply. At the time, there were concerns that pushing people into the isolation of social distancing would lead to more overdose deaths.

Back to 2024: Today, the unregulated drug supply is killing more people than ever: 2,511 people died in 2023, far more than ever seen in one year before. This comes in a context in which, according to Henry’s review, the number of people accessing PSS has been on the decline since April.

Does it work? Critics tend to focus on the increasing number of deaths as proof it doesn’t, but there’s little evidence to suggest that PSS is causing or even failing to mitigate it. To the contrary, there’s some emerging evidence that PSS can mitigate drugs associated with the unregulated drug supply.

As noted in Henry’s review, a recent study published in the British Medical Journal shows a decline in all-cause mortality by over 60 percent in the week after receiving a prescription for safer supply. The study is limited in that it only looks at the week following a new prescription, but it adds to a growing body of work supporting safe supply’s life-saving effects.

Comparing provinces: In fact, comparing with data from Alberta, the two provinces see near-identical rates of overdose deaths per capita. That’s despite the two provinces ostensibly taking diverging approaches to the issue — one focusing on treatment and the other supposedly focusing on safe supply.

• While the BC government often touts its PSS program, it’s not particularly prevalent. As noted, the number of people accessing it has been on the decline, and even at its peak, somewhere above 5,000 clients, it’s only a small fraction of the estimated 115,000 BC residents with opioid use disorder, according to the PSS review.

That also doesn’t include those who use illicit opioids who don’t have an opioid use disorder, but the report notes that the number of people who fit that description is unknown. 

Medical safer supply: Henry’s report points to a few barriers to accessing PSS. For one, the most marginalized drug users are less likely to access it, as it requires regular formal engagement with the healthcare system, with 2SLGBTQ+ and Indigenous individuals among those least likely to access care for substance use due to stigma in the healthcare system.

Requiring addiction: Another barrier is the exclusion of those who don’t have an opioid use disorder. The PSS review points to a 2018 review from Vancouver Coastal Health, which indicates only 39 percent of those who died had an opioid use disorder, meaning most of those at risk of dying likely wouldn’t qualify for prescribed safer supply.

Mitigating diversion: A common criticism of PSS programs is the diversion of opioids like hydromorphone to the illicit market by those who receive prescriptions, who then buy illicit fentanyl on the street. The argument often follows, then, that PSS should be shut down or come with more strict guardrails.

Henry’s report, however, looks at it another way, noting diversion “should be understood as indicating unmet needs” for people who use drugs. Those unmet needs include prescribing hydromorphone, when a prescription for heroin or fentanyl would be more appropriate.

However: The review also notes a wide range of social and healthcare supports, including more programming to promote youth wellbeing.

THE AGENDA

🧑‍⚖️ The National Council of Canadian Muslims and UBC’s Social Justice Centre are suing Hillel BC Society over “I love Hamas” stickers the society created with the SJC logo. In a Twitter thread, NCCM said UBC leadership “did nothing. No investigations, no statement,” despite SJC members being harassed as a result. [Twitter]

🤐 The disappearance of an anthropology department statement expressing concern over “genocidal violence in Gaza” after then-advanced education minister Selina Robinson visited UBC’s president is raising questions about the influence of the minister, who resigned following comments that, before Israeli settlers, Palestine was a “crappy piece of land.” [Breach]

🏡 In news surprising approximately no one, people in Metro Vancouver may be leaving the region to follow the dream of homeownership, according to a report by ReMax Canada. The report pins at least part of the blame on taxes, noting Alberta has no sales tax and no land transfer tax on residential real estate. [Glacier Media]

🏢 As office vacancy in Metro Vancouver has risen slightly to 10 percent, real estate firm Avison Young expects that number to rise even more, with a cap reducing student visas by 35 percent likely to see universities “re-evaluate their real estate needs.” [Glacier Media]

EVENTS

EBONY ROOTS: Concert, Part 2 | Yaletown Roundhouse Performance Centre | Tonight, 8 pm | A concert that musically narrates the evolving emancipation of the Black community | Tickets $35

Slightest Clue Carousel EP Release Show | Fox Cabaret | Feb. 16, 7 pm | Playing with Nuclear Disco and Cherry Pick | Tickets $17

Illusions The Drag Brunch Vancouver | 817 Granville St. | Starting Feb. 17, 1:30 pm | Spend your Saturdays and Sundays with the ultimate celebrity impersonation drag queen brunch | Tickets $28

Big Mall by Kate Black Book Launch | The Ellis Building | Feb. 24, 7 pm | Local author Kate Black launches her non-fiction debut eyeing the phenomenon of the mall | Free admission

Constellations: a play by Nick Payne | Studio 16 | Until Feb. 25 | A Tony-nominated play put on by Exact Resemblance Theatre Company in Vancouver | Tickets $48

FOOD

🥣 You had me at “free,” but I’m even more sold on açai bowls. Oakberry’s newest location, opening in English Bay, is offering a free açai bowl or smoothie to its first 50 guests . [Daily Hive]

🍸 Chinatown is getting a new cocktail bar! It’s called Meo, and it’s bringing a ’70s Hong Kong vibe (inspired by the work of Vancouver photographer Greg Girard) and cocktails mixed by Denis Bykov, who has global experience in the trade. [Daily Hive]

PHOTO OF THE DAY

It’s easier to take in the view when you’re not actually on the ride.

COMMUNITY HIGHLIGHTS

• The perfect day for cherry blossoms in Vancouver is getting earlier and earlier. In fact, given the warm winter this year, some trees may not even produce flowers, according to a UBC professor. [Glacier Media]

• Water Street between Richards and Cambie streets will go without cars for two months (July-August) this summer, with staff to report back after on other areas of the city that could do the same and on whether it should be made permanent. [CityNews]

• Vancouver musician Paula Toledo has seen a recording of one of her unreleased songs distributed, without her consent, through bootleg Russian DVDs, ending with a fake version of the song being uploaded to online streaming services — while her legitimate copy on streaming services was taken down. [CBC]

• The space once occupied by the Canada Post offices is finally open to the public — now with an atrium on the main floor, a Loblaws City Market grocery store on the second and a gym on the third. The lineup for opening day was so long the new Starbucks sold out of everything. [Daily Hive]

• Want to have your announcement featured? Learn how here.

VANCOUVER GAMES

Congrats to John and Jai for getting the Vancouver Guesser in Wednesday’s newsletter! The correct answer was 57th Avenue.

As for today’s Vancouver Wordle, it’ll get you a penalty in most sports, but the jury’s still out in politics. Can you guess what it is?