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OPINION: Who belongs?

Who belongs? For me, this question is at the heart of understanding changes in the right to access, use, and occupy urban space.
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Who belongs?  For me, this question is at the heart of understanding changes in the right to access, use, and occupy urban space.  The phrase “right to the city,” coined by sociologist Henri Lefebvre in the late 1960s, has become a rallying cry for those wanting to claim (and reclaim) urban space as a meeting point for building collective life. 

In the face of ever-mounting socioeconomic inequality, local populations that have been pushed to the social and geographic fringes — whether by choice or as a result of circumstance —  have clung to the notion of a right to the city in their struggle for social justice, dignified access to urban life, and a sense of belonging. 

For the District of Squamish, which is roughly five years into an affordable housing crisis, the question of ‘Who belongs?’ ought to be the starting point for any decisions about who lives here, under what conditions, and why.  The District is presently reading Bylaw 2679, aimed at mitigating negative environmental consequences of campers staying outside of designated campgrounds, namely: unmanaged waste, ecological impact, and wildlife interface.  However, rather than targeting a select few widely agreed-upon negative externalities of ‘wild camping’ (i.e. public defecation, improper waste disposal, irresponsible interactions with wildlife), the bylaw takes a blanket approach in its determination that it is illegal for anyone to sleep in a tent or vehicle overnight on any public or Crown land within the entire District of Squamish.  Infringement of this bylaw will set someone back financially.

While the District has communicated with the media that the proposal is not aimed at permanent residents who live in their vehicles or a tent year round, the present language of the bylaw does not reflect this.  In the past few years, in the wake of targeted acts of vandalism carried out against van-dwellers, and lacklustre community response to the tragic deaths of Squamish’s most vulnerable, many hoped that the District would follow through on an expressed desire to manage the situation correctly, providing supportive resources and infrastructure. 

The scope of the proposed bylaw is not only unduly punitive: it is too broad.  It leaves the door wide open for targeted discrimination, friction between residents, and for the privileged sentiment ‘not in my backyard’ to prevail above the rights of others to live a life they choose or have otherwise found themselves living, in a place where affordable housing, shelter beds, freedom from renoviction, and earning a living wage are often beyond reach.  We are witnessing the pains of a municipality in transition.  We need our elected officials and enforcement agents to work collaboratively alongside those who will be most impacted by this in order to devise regulations that are nuanced, smart, and create safe spaces for this community’s most vulnerable.  We all belong (so long as we poop and throw our trash out in designated places).

Leanne Roderick is a political economist who researches finance and ‘smart’ urban development.

 

 

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