Occupy Vancouver camp turning into mud pit
Posted Oct 21, 2011 06:47:00 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – It’s been almost been a week since the tents went up downtown and the square in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery is turning into a mud pit – but protesters intend to stay put despite the bad weather.
Dan Thompson is the self-proclaimed civil engineer of the Occupy Vancouver movement. He’s digging trenches in the mucky campsite to drain huge pools of water collecting next to the tents.
“What I’m trying to do is keep the water flowing without really disturbing the ground too much,” he explains. “I know this is their ground. We might be occupying it, but we didn’t sign no lease.”
The weather is miserable, it’s cold and the ground under the tents is a soupy brown muck, but protester Matthew Arnott says, “I’ll stay here however long it takes for us to get some change going, you know? I’m ready to stay, like, years.”
Other people also say they’ll stay as long as it takes – even until they die, if necessary.
If that’s the case, people like Arnott are going to need some gear.
“I’m going to go get some rubber boots in about an hour, so I don’t have to deal with these shoes,” he says.
So far the Occupy Vancouver demonstration has cost tax-payers a half-million dollars in policing costs, sanitation, and other services.
Some say it may not look like it, but they’re setting up internal political processes and they’re working on a message rather than being overly-confrontational.
One man named Ezra says they have the luxury of time and space, and they’re thankful to the city for that. As for the cost to the city, he points to the fire command centre truck, police vehicles, and city staff, and suggests it might all be a bit much.
“It’s kind of like when they call an election. They’re like, ‘boo-hoo, it costs a lot of money,'” he explains. “Most of the money goes into paying people for running the election. So, you’re employing people.”
“We are getting electricity from the city as well,” he adds. “We brought in generators and get it all set up ourselves. The city offered to pay for it. So the city’s been very generous, but it’s because they’ve offered, or they have people sitting there in trucks doing nothing the entire time.”
He argues more money is being spent on more wasteful efforts elsewhere.
