Little Mountain at City Hall: PART 2 of 2

Posted on November 5, 2012 by david

Hello viewers,

This is the second half of the June 2012 Meeting where the Policy on Little Mountain was discussed in City Council Chambers.

City Hall meets Little Mountain June 2012: PART 2 from David Vaisbord on Vimeo.

For those of you came to city hall to speak, who missed work, and patiently waited for your 5 minutes to arrive, this is your chance to see how well you did on camera. There are many view expressed here. Some of the speakers represent the Little Mountain Advisory Group, others come from sectors of the community who did not attend the meetings. Some are simply friends of the developer. The speakers list was open to whoever wanted to speak.
Kudos to everyone for PARTICIPATING. Politics is an exercise which (for the most part), takes place IN PUBLIC and IN PERSON.

David Vaisbord
Little Mountain Project
littlemountainproject.com

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SUCCESS – Little Mountain Tenants will NOT BE EVICTED!

Posted on October 25, 2012 by david

Friends,

This battle has been won owing to the concerted efforts of many!
The last tenants of The Little Mountain Housing Project will not be evicted by BC Housing!

Firstly, I want to recognize the last residents of Little Mountain for their heart and tenacity. It’s been their fight from the beginning. Ingrid Steenhuisen, Sammy and Joan Chang, and Karin Nicholetti have been fighting eviction for over 4 years, and this news must come as a bitter sweet vindication, as they remember the community they once lived in – one that was demolished without just cause in 2009.

To find all the PRESS related to the evictions click HERE.

Two mid-century heritage lamps at Little Mountain lay undisturbed for 3 years .

The mobilization of people and ideas which led to the rescinding of the eviction notices, is well documented by my friends at the MAINLANDER. Please read this article by Tristan Markle and Nate Crompton, it saves me the time to repeat it here. Nate and Tristan are members of the Vancouver Renters Union, one of the key elements of this successful campaign.

The RALLY has been CANCELLED. Tonight we CELEBRATE at the screening at the Little Mountain Gallery: 195 E. 26th Avenue. The FREE screening begins at 7pm with special guests, RED 1, Sammy and Joan, Debbie Lawrance, Ingrid Steenhuisen, Ellen Wordsworth, Me (the filmmaker), and more.

Below, is the press release that came from the City of Vancouver, yesterday.

Office of the Mayor

October 25, 2012

Social housing to move forward at Little Mountain; tenants can remain on site

Vancouver –- Mayor Gregor Robertson says it is good news that social housing at Little Mountain will go ahead, and that a deal has been reached to let the remaining tenants stay on site.

The B.C. government, the City of Vancouver and Holborn Properties have signed an agreement that will allow up to 50 social housing units to be built right away at Little Mountain, prior to the completion of the rezoning process.

“Little Mountain has a long history in Vancouver, and it’s great that we’ve reached an agreement to expedite the social housing and allow the remaining residents to stay on site,” said Mayor Gregor Robertson. “The social housing is an important first step to building a new and inclusive community at Little Mountain.”

In a solution found with BC Housing, remaining tenants will be able to stay on site without prior relocation and work can start immediately on what will eventually be 234 new social housing units. Those units are especially targeted for families and seniors, and will ensure a full bedroom-for-bedroom replacement of Little Mountain’s original social housing. BC Housing confirms that rent will remain the same – 30% of income – and the hope is that construction will begin in the first part of 2013.

The City will subdivide the lot and expedite permits to help fast-track the social housing.

It’s an agreement that honours the commitment that the replacement social housing units will be an integral part of the first phase of the new development on the Little Mountain site, and also allows households that moved off site to begin returning to their homes on an accelerated basis.

The Little Mountain property in Vancouver, bounded by 33rd to 37th Avenues between Main and Ontario Streets, is being redeveloped into a mixed-use community. As part of the development, the original 224 units of social housing will be replaced with 234 units of new social housing.

– 30-

For more information, please contact:

Braeden Caley
Executive Assistant, Media Relations and Communications
Office of the Mayor – City of Vancouver
Cell: 604-809-9951 – Email: braeden.caley@vancouver.ca

Find the Mayor’s Office on Twitter: @VanMayorsOffice
Sign up for the Mayor’s email updates: Click here

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Thinking about wildflowers and Machiavelli at Little Mountain

Posted on August 25, 2012 by david

It is Machiavellian, how BC Housing choses the end of summer to evict its last tenants at Little Mountain. It’s so obvious and disheartening that they chose a time when everyone is on vacation, to deliver mean-spirited information to their most vulnerable clients, when critics and neighbourhood supporters are on vacation, and aren’t ready or capable of reacting quickly to the news.

And what I had really wanted to write about was wildflowers and wildlife at Little Mountain. If there was any good news to report about Little Mountain over the summer of 2012, is that the site had become a place of rebirth, if not for housing then for nature and urban wildlife.

It was only two months ago, on June 27th, that all interested parties convened at City Hall to hash out a Policy Statement on redevelopment. And then the BC Liberal Government through its housing organ — British Columbia Housing — lifted its iron fist once again and brought it down at Little Mountain and it was “eviction time” again. But this time, instead of the threat of aesbestos in the buildings, it’s residues of heating oil in the ground water.

But before I go into greater detail on the groundwater testing (in a future blog) can anyone from the City of Vancouver, or BC Housing, or the engineering firm tell me why they had to cut down all the wildflowers? Including a tiny stand of bullrushes – the week after?

David V
The Little Mountain Project, in late summer, 2012.

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Meeting #27 Little Mountain OPEN HOUSE Analysis (Heading to CITY COUNCIL)

Posted on May 17, 2012 by david

Little Mountain Redevelopment
Meeting #27
The OPEN HOUSE Analysis
February 28, 2012 (an intense meeting)

Heading to City Council:
The finish line has been tentatively set for June 27, 2012. That’s the date when the Little Mountain Advisory Committee, the City of Vancouver planning department, the Holborn Group, and You make your thoughts known to Vancouver City Council about the deliberations of the past 2 and a half years. At the meeting the planning department will present a policy statement on the current plans, for the approval of City Council. If approved, the policy statement will guide the future rezoning process at the Little Mountain site. The rezoning process (up to a year or more in duration) will include public and legal processes.

I will post exact details regarding time and date as I receive them from the planning department or you can click here to find them yourself.

Since January I’ve written a thesis on documentary filmmaking and new media, and as a result, postings to this blog were sporadic. But it’s written, and now time to concentrate on this process.

The series of meetings titled “HEADING TO CITY COUNCIL” represent the FINAL POSITIONS of each of the three groups as they head to Council. You will find them here, starting at number twenty-seven. So far there have been 34 meetings. Number 33, the Design Panel is already up.

Meeting 27 is a good one to start with, because it was the first meeting to follow the OPEN HOUSES of January 2012. The North of 33rd Avenue citizens’ group had not attended any previous Advisory Committee Meetings and were in a state of understandable shock when they saw Holborn’s Model for the first time. They were so upset that they called their own press conference. They brought a considerable amount of drama to the meeting, most of which was warranted — some of which was due to the fact that they had not participated in the process and were not up to speed with the program. Nevertheless, in subsequent meetings they have proven themselves to be an asset.

So, WELCOME to the Advisory Group, North of 33rd residents!!!

And a note of caution to communities in Vancouver: Attend your public meetings or else…

The statistics presented in Meeting #27 are important and warrant close analysis. Meeting #28 (uploading next week) looks at them again with respect to postal codes, and correlations are made between distance from the site and opinions expressed.

I have produced 4 videos from that evening:
1. A 12 minute CLIP of highlights from the entire meeting.
2. The Heritage Report on the last standing building
3. The Complete Meeting including the Heritage Report & Open House report.
4. The 1 minute Global Television Report that was broadcast the same evening.

The Heritage Report
Donald Luxton gives a thorough analysis of the heritage value of the last remaining row house on the site, and historical background on the history of social housing in Vancouver. It’s essential information for anyone interested in the history of social unrest around housing issues in this city.

In addition, Global Television did a decent job of covering the evening event. CBC News was also there, but I did not catch their broadcast.

David Vaisbord
littlemountainproject.com

Little Mountain Neighbourhood resident speaks to TV News on February 28, 2012.

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Little Mountain Project wins FARRIS AWARD for Art and Social Media

Posted on May 5, 2012 by david

Tonight (May 5, 2012) I’m at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design, celebrating the completion of my Masters Degree.

The Opening Night of the Graduate Show starts at 5pm and ends at 10pm.

The Duration of the Grad show is from May 6 to May 21, 2012.
Open daily from 10am to 6pm.

Update: David Vaisbord wins FARRIS AWARD for Art & Social Media at Emily Carr University, for the Little Mountain Project.

Elements from Vaisbord's Little Mountain Project on display at the ECU Masters of Fine Arts Degree Show

The large installation includes two video screens with headphones, and an illustration of the interface of the upcoming Little Mountain Project Social History Website. The Charles H. Scott Gallery houses graduates of the Masters of Applied Arts.

See you there.

David

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Meeting #21 Massing exercise number TWO

Posted on March 18, 2012 by david

Meeting #21, was the second major “massing’ meeting of 2011.

This is the second of two density exercises done by the Little Mountain community advisory committee. The community embraces the challenge of forcing (though they may not agree with them), extraordinarily high densities on the site plans. Meetings #20 and #21 will be of interest to everyone who wants to contrast the Little Mountain community’s concept of appropriate massing & density to the Holborn Groups current concept of appropriate massing & density.

The FSR range provided by the architect is FSR 2.0 to FSR 3.25. The omission of the base model FSR 1.4 is noted by one group, who chose to build an FSR 1.4 model on their site plan by omitting a large number of foam chips.

Image from James Cheng's Architecture Slide Show

Timing of the meeting:
0:00 – Meeting opens with general business on selection of community co-chairperson.
5:00 – James Cheng introduces workshop, presents slide show and Dutch architecture book.
15:40 – Community presentation of workshop models begins.

The results show the creativity and intelligence of the community group in dealing with the challenges of densification, and the group is happier with the freedoms of the second workshop.

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OPEN HOUSE 2012: The Video

Posted on February 2, 2012 by david

For those who couldn’t attend, here’s two nights of recording combined into an eight minute clip:

Little Mountain Open House Jan 26 & 28 2012 from David Vaisbord on Vimeo.

Don’t forget to send your feedback to the city on line until FEBRUARY 10, 2012.
Check the Little Mountain site at Vancouver Planning for images of information boards presented at the Open Houses. Click on THIS LINK to got to ONLINE SURVEY.

Canal St East side - Little Mountain models

Canal St West side - Little Mountain models

A Tower Concentration in proposed development

Note: Click on the images to enlarge; then, click on “Full Size is 1440×1080” caption to go to maximum dimensions.

Little Mountain development at 37th and Ontario

Little Mountain development at 33rd and Ontario

Important to remember that an estimated 700 cars per hour will exit and enter from the site at rush hours, the traffic you see in this photo is the average flow at approx. 2am Sunday nights. A neighbour who works in childcare asked me yesterday, if the amenities, such as daycare, for preschool and after-school care especially, are in place for a development of this size? As a member of the Advisory Committee who has been to every meeting, I answered no. She has promised to attend a meeting.

Here’s a brief quote, as we contemplate the future of Vancouver, from a sociologist, named Robert Park:

“The city is man’s most consistent and, on the whole, his most successful
attempt to remake the world he lives in, more after his heart’s desire. The
city is the world which man created; it is the world in which he is
therefore condemned to live. Thus indirectly, without a clear sense of the
nature of his task, in remaking the city, man has remade himself.”

If you want to know more about cities and neoliberalism here’s a link to an interesting talk given by economist David Harvey in 2007 titled:
Neoliberalism and the City.

The Little Mountain Project

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Housing Debate 2011 – Anton vs “Occupy Vancouver” vs Robertson

Posted on November 11, 2011 by david

I recorded this debate for three reasons.

The first is that I attended and recorded the only previous debate of its kind, in exactly the same time and place, 3 years ago. The debaters were Peter Ladner and Gregor Robertson. In that debate the future of Little Mountain was still not certain. Both debaters were asked if they would be in favour of delaying its demolition. Ladner answered no, he was in favour of the Liberal government’s ideas. Robertson’s answer was vague: he was willing to look into other options. The rest is a fascinating and convoluted story, that has left you (the taxpayer) holding onto land with all its economic value stripped from it (for the next 5 to 25 years) for the benefit of an off-shore developer, while a viable community was destroyed, dispersed and forgotten.

Read all about it in Tommy Thompson’s thesis on Little Mountain. It really gets swinging by page 80. There’s a link to it on this website.

The second reason I attended, was that I wanted to know more about the future of Vision’s homeless and affordable housing strategy for Vancouver, and hear Anton’s challenge to it.

The third was to see if Vancouver’s homeless and underhoused were any more militant after 3 years of record real estate increases, and reno-victions.

The Great Debate/Opera

So on to the Great Debate, which if you missed it no worries, my camera was at the eye of the storm, thanks to Lauren Gill (Vancouver civic election candidate and winner of Last Candidate Standing) who gave me a seat in the candidates area.

Lauren Gill was active in the movement to save Little Mountain Social Housing Project. I met her in 2008, as I began shooting my documentary there. In fact, she set up the one and only “Occupy Little Mountain” camp in the winter of 2009.

Lauren Gill

As I expand my web documentary at littlemountainproject.com scenes with Lauren will appear on line. She is sharp, articulate, and compassionate.

A note on the DEBATE/OPERA:

Clearly, there not sufficient time structured into the debate for the public to pose questions to the candidates. Anton and Robertson “had other business to attend to” just as soon as Q&A began.

Promises are made to the attending public

As a result, promises that the public would speak after “official questions” were not kept. At least 20 audience members who lined up at the open microphone did not speak. This audience did not come to be spoken to, they wanted dialogue. Why was there not ample time for Q&A? You’ll have to ask the organizers and the participants to answer that one.

Zimmerman asks the debaters to accept questions from the public.

What “Occupy Vancouver” was shouting throughout the meeting, may have been right after all: “City hall is not listening…” However, I have to say to say this to OV, that although Democracy may at times “look like this”, it’s not its best side. The uproar that followed was however, free and entertaining political theatre.

There was never any danger of a real riot. I didn’t see any Canucks jerseys in the crowd.

Click on the image above to play the video.

NB: Apologies to Mayor Robertson for the typo in the opening credit of the video. (“you say Robinson, I say Robertson!”) It will be corrected asap. Actually it won’t. Sorry about that I’ll have to blame my staff. Where are my copy editors?

Closing words by Sandra Garossino, Independent Candidate for City Hall.

Finally, kudos to St.Andrew’s-Wesley United Church for taking on the the challenge of presenting this increasingly contentious debate.

Stay tuned.

Yours
David Vaisbord
filmmaker
littlemountainproject.com

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