midweek edition WEDNESDAY, OCT. 20, 2010
Vol. 101 No. 84 • Established 1908 • East
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Shadow dancing
Volley war
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Eight park board jobs back on chopping block $600,000 gift saved jobs last year Sandra Thomas Staff writer
Park board programmers coordinate recreational, health and educational programs.
photo Dan Toulgoet
A budget shortfall in the city’s 2011 operating budget means eight park board programming positions are again at risk of being eliminated. They are the same eight positions that were on the chopping block in 2010 but saved by a reluctant donation of more than $600,000 from the city’s 22 community centre associations. The city’s 23rd community centre, Britannia, doesn’t fall under the park board’s jurisdiction. The eight programmers coordinate recreational, health and educational programs from yoga to language instruction. Keith Jacobson, recently retired president of the
Killarney Community Centre Society, was at a meeting of community association presidents last week attended by the park board’s new general manager Malcolm Bromley. Jacobson said the associations were told the board still had no money to fund the programmers. “Those programming positions were only kept because of that association funding,” said Jacobson. “And now we’ve been told there’s still no funding for those positions and we’ll have to find it.” Jacobson said park staff “strongly hinted” the associations should again pick up the tab. “But that was supposed to be one time only,” said Jacobson. “We paid out $618,000 last year and that’s just not sustainable.” See PARK on page 4
VPD sergeant says punitive head shavings still take place Punishment by dealers designed to shame women in the Downtown Eastside Mike Howell Staff writer
Vancouver police are investigating reports of drug dealers shaving the heads of addicted women in the Downtown Eastside as punishment for not paying drug debts. The type of assault, which is meant to shame a woman and
indicate to others involved in the drug trade not to sell to her, was thought to have curtailed five years ago. But a crowd of about 100 people at a recent meeting at the Carnegie Centre was told by Staff Sgt. Joanne Boyle of the major crimes section that head shavings are continuing. Five years ago, Boyle
was a member of the Vancouver Police Department’s beat enforcement team, which investigated the crime at several low-end hotels in the Downtown Eastside. “They’re still going on and we’re still grappling with that— we’re still dealing with the incidents when we can and trying to work with the victims and the
witnesses of these incidents to make them stop,” said Boyle at an Oct. 8 meeting the VPD hosted in an effort to end violence against women in the Downtown Eastside. “It’s an ongoing problem.” Const. Lindsey Houghton, a media relations officer, said Monday that police will not elaborate further on the crimes so not
to jeopardize the investigations. Houghton acknowledged finding those responsible can be difficult. “Unfortunately, like a lot of crimes down there, it’s something that may happen and our beat officers may see the victim and then that’s what prompts our investigation,” said Houghton. See SOCIAL on page 4
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