By Dominic Abassi

‘Substantial’ clean-up needed after major Nanaimo bush encampment cleared out

Sep 23, 2016 | 9:02 PM

NANAIMO — The city of Nanaimo has responded to multiple complaints and shut down a messy bush encampment near a public trail.
 
Rod Davidson the city’s manager of bylaw services says they were made aware of the extensive encampment in August. It was on a mix of private and city-owned land at the end of Caledonia Avenue, near the German Cultural Centre.

“This is the first major encampment that we’ve had to deal with in the last several years,” says Davidson.

He says there were about seven people living in the bush on the sloped, undeveloped land that leads down to the Millstone River. Davidson says they gave the people two-to-three weeks notice that they would be coming in to clean-up the site. He says no one was there when crews showed up earlier this month.

“Unfortunately there was a great deal of garbage. I’m told that we took about 40 yards of discarded material, rotting mattresses, stuff that had no real value to anybody scattered all through the bush in the area.”

It’s unclear how much the clean-up work will cost the city. Davidson says it was fairly substantial, took a contractor two days and included a backhoe.

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He says most of the complaints about the encampment were made by people who ride their bikes through the area over a bridge that crosses the river. Some had referenced feeling uncomfortable, he says.

All of the people living there were offered housing, according to Davidson, but none accepted.

John Horn the city’s social planner states via email that all of the people that come into contact with their staff will be directed towards services (like the 7-10 Club and Salvation Army) and all are likely using some of them. He states they are encountering an increase in the number of encampments in all parts of the city and many of the people in them are fairly new to the community. The Caledonia site, he states, is only unique because of the number of people it could hold.

Davidson says while the Caledonia encampment is the only “major” one they’ve had to deal with in recent years, his bylaw officers are dealing with people camping on public land almost daily. He says a spike in that occurrence can likely be attributed to the Shantz ruling.

That Supreme Court of Canada ruling says that people are allowed to occupy public space between 7 p.m. and 9 a.m. as long as they don’t leave a mess and the area isn’t designated by a bylaw as no camping.

A visit to the Caledonia site on Thursday found a fairly large, well-established campsite remained at the top of the property. It was visible from the pedestrian bridge and Caledonia Avenue. There appeared to be at least three people in the camp. They could be heard yelling from inside a tent at one point.

Davidson says it’s his understanding that camp is on private land and the owner is working to have the site cleaned up. 210 Caledonia Avenue appeared on Monday’s council meeting agenda under the property maintenance bylaw section. The agenda lists it as a squat site with garbage, including tarps and tents. In the same section, 1 Chapel Street was also listed for having two squat sites with accumulated garbage. Council voted to direct the owners to deal with the issues.