Am Johal

VANCOUVER, Jul 8 2005 (IPS) — Community activists are criticising what they say is a link between cuts to social services and massive budget overruns for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games due to rising labour rates and material costs.

City officials originally estimated Olympic venue costs at 620 million dollars. But according to Steve Matheson, vice president of venue development for the Vancouver Olympic Committee, construction costs are likely to rise 25 to 40 percent. The provincial government is responsible for any cost overruns.

“When it was decided that all levels of government would support the Olympics, it came in the face of cuts to health care, education and expanding wait lists for surgery,” said Kevin Shoesmith, chair of a local watchdog group called Impact of the Olympics on Community Coalition.

“There is a lot of money going into something which many consider to be frivolous and superficial,” he added.

A building boom in British Columbia, coupled with several massive infrastructure projects associated with the Olympics such as the Richmond Airport-Vancouver rapid transit line, a new waterfront trade and convention centre and the multi-billion dollar Gateway Highway Project, will continue to put pressure on costs.

The proposed Richmond Airport/Vancouver Rapid Transit project would be completed in November 2009, just in time for the 2010 Winter Games. And as the government proceeds with these large projects using public funding, community activists note simultaneous cuts to critical social services.

There are also concerns about gentrification in the nearby downtown eastside neighbourhood, where many residents rely on social assistance. It is minutes away from BC Place where the opening ceremonies for the 2010 Winter Olympics will take place.

Major projects in the downtown eastside, such as the redevelopment of the Woodwards building, a historic structure closed for over 15 years, will lead to mixed-use development that includes commercial and academic uses.

The BC government has also made it more difficult to qualify for the welfare system. People must participate in an employment orientation and three-week self-directed job search. Applicants who are 18 years old must show they have been independent for two years after leaving their parents’ home to be eligible for assistance.

Advocates say the addition of three weeks to the application period has been a real hardship in many cases.

“The main thing these past few years has seen is a restructuring of the economy where in the broader social services, there basically has been a cut of a billion dollars on an annual basis,” said Marc Lee of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

“Certainly, when push comes to shove, the government will find money for things they deem to be important. It comes down to a question of priorities,” he said.

It has also become more difficult to obtain disability status, and payments to employable individuals over 55 have been cut. Added to this is a time limit on collecting social assistance.

“Even if you are on welfare you can only do it for two years now with the government cutbacks,” said Gary Jobin, an inner city resident and coordinator of a neighbourhood job training centre. “They need to invest money in people, provide jobs, social housing units in the downtown eastside.”

“With the Olympics coming, they need to invest in the core community and build infrastructure like a new community centre,” he said. “These rooms have cockroaches and landlords who don’t care about the buildings. Everybody on welfare hates it and they certainly don’t want to be on it.”

Jobin cited the example of the construction of General Motors Place Arena near the downtown eastside neighbourhood as an example in which local hiring initiatives worked.

The last major hallmark event in Vancouver, the Expo ’86 World’s Fair, led to hundreds of evictions in the area. Landlords renovated buildings in order to make profits from tourists, in the process displacing long-term residents living on fixed incomes.

Jim Green, a former community organiser with the Downtown Eastside Residents Association and now a Vancouver city councilor who supported a bylaw that would prevent evictions in 2010, recently led a delegation to Turin, Italy where the 2006 Winter Olympics will take place.

“It reinforced my belief in making sure culture was at the forefront of the Olympic Games and to use the opportunity to clearly show that Vancouver and Canada is a multi-ethnic community working in harmony,” he said after the trip. “We also have the opportunity to showcase Vancouver and Whistler and project a sense of our community’s identity to the rest of the world.”