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Vancouver’s other Olympic torch

// February 8th, 2010 // p2p

p2pnet view P2P:- It’s 10 feet tall, 200 pounds and it’s made out of concrete and an old garbage can. It’s BC’s other Olympics torch. With five days to go before the official launch of the 2010 winter games almost here, “Vancouver’s poorest neighbourhood, the Downtown Eastside, has an HIV rate of 30% — the same as Botswana’s”, says the Poverty Olympics site. Yesterday, “Hundreds of demonstrators turned out for the poverty torch relay in downtown Vancouver”  to “spread the message that money should be spent on fighting poverty, not staging the Olympic Games”, says Metro News Vancouver . “Spending C$178 million ($166 million) for a skating oval isn’t really impressive when you’re sleeping in a doorway”, says Robert Bonner. But this time, the story isn’t in a local newspaper. It’s in Reuters , for all the world to see. “Vancouver, on Canada’s Pacific coast, has been ranked in surveys as one of the world’s most ‘livable’ cities but it is also home to one of Canada’s poorest and most drug-infested neighborhoods — the Downtown Eastside,” it says. The average income for poor BC parents is over $11,000 BELOW the poverty line, says Poverty Olympics. The rate for aboriginal children is more than 40%, and for children in single parent families, 50%. “The Games (February 12-28) have a mostly privately funded budget of C$1.7 billion but the government has spent C$580 million on venue construction costs and budgeted C$900 million for security,” says Reuters, going on > > > A provincial auditor’s report in 2006 put the real cost to tax payers at C$2.5 billion but Olympic critics claim it is actually closer to C$6 billion — figures that Games organizers and government officials dismiss as too high. Olympic critics say the Games have increased homelessness by fuelling gentrification in the Downtown Eastside, leaving the poor with few options in a city that already has some of Canada’s least-affordable housing. But “Olympic supporters say hosting the Games has actually benefited the Downtown Eastside by promoting economic development and spurring job training programs to get residents involved in Olympic-related construction,” sasys the storty, quoting Rusty Goepel, chairman of the Vancouver Organizing Committee (VANOC), as stating: “We’ve been there and tried to help in every way we can. The Olympics are not designed to solve all of the problems of the world.” [Slightly re-jigged photo by The Blackbird] - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi Metro News Vancouver – Demonstrators put poverty in the spotlight, February 8, 2010 Reuters – Give a home to us not the Olympics, say protesters, February 7, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? -