January 15, 2022 Carnegie Newsletter

401 Main Street Vancouver Canada V6A 2T7

(604) 665-2289

VACCINES SAVE LIVES: Polio, Measles, Malaria, Yellow ?ever, Shingles, COVID-19, and more. It's not complicated.

Railroaded I'm at home, drinking an "Ensure." It's a small bottle of some kind of milkshake that was supposed to provide nutrition toHIV+ tenants in the social housing facility I worked at fourteen years ago.

At that time my wife was being interviewed for an aid worker position with Medecins Sans Frontieres.

My job at what is now the Al Mitchell Residence in the DTES, then the Hazelton Residence, felt at times like a shelter in the developing world. The walking wounded of the drug wars lived and spent what must have seemed interminable hours of boredom and despair at that facility.

They had small rooms, sometimes with a radio or TV set, and they took their meals in a small, decent cafeteria on the main floor, not far from a communal TV room near the front desk of the shelter. For there were shelter beds, two to a room, and there were permanent residents, although they were never intended to be permanent. Many of them died in those small rooms, alone, disabled, in complete poverty, or in a kind of Canadian relative deprivation in the DTES. In some ways the permanent residents were living on a palliative care ward. Others on my watch were transferred to a hospice. My duties for them included dispensing cocktails of pills, sometimes twenty a day in two or three passes per person to keep these residents as healthy as possible. HIV+, diabetes, hepatitis C, heart conditions: these were just some types of illness the men and women there lived with. Some were diagnosed with serious and persistent mental illness. There were medications for that, too.

Despite all the medical care, drug use was very common. Crack was popular. Some crystal methamphetamine was used in those days. In another facility at Lookout I encountered a tenant on the nod on heroin.

Fentanyl was not a problem at that time.

One tenant died from a lung problem caused by inhaling bits of metal from an improvised crack pipe screen. I remember he and his three friends who all lived at the Hazelton used to socialize to help the time go by. And there was a lot of time to kill.

Victims of the drug wars, their lives were badly scarred. Why individual men and women get railroaded into serious drug use leading to institutionalization in medically intensive, slum social housing facilities is a sad question.

Some of them, whom I met and saw briefly on a daily basis were wonderful people, giving people. With a guitar or a pen and paper or just joking with friends I am certain there were good times, too.

By RON CARTEN i1

I never met Ken Lyotier. I recognized him on the Main Street sidewalks a few times, but knew him only from Carnegie Newsletter articles over a number of years.

I admired him for organizing a vast crew of Binners to deposit their bottles at a central depot, which diminished the burden of landfills.

Mr. Lyotier was certainly a pioneer of Recycling before it became a compulsory duty.

May his legend live on through all time.

Sincerely, Garry Gust

VOLUNTEER

UPDATE

Happy New year, I hope you're staying safe in in the recent-extreme weather conditions and rise in Covid - Omicron numbers. For volunteers who were away for the holidays, welcome back!

We encourage you to follow important messaging from Public Health Orders, including physical distancing, stay home if you do not feel well, frequent hand washing and wearing your face mask.

We are starting up the Returning and New Volunteers orientationsagain post holidays. Volunteer opportunities will continue to be limited based on safe areas of programming, to ensure the health and safety of all community members, volunteers, and staff.

These are the training requirements, including health and safety protocols, that all volunteers will need to know and follow in order to return to volunteering at Carnegie.

Here is what you need to know: We are inviting both people that have volunteered at Carnegie in the past and new volunteers for training sessions The new and updated "Volunteering at Carnegie" training, which includes new mandatory health and safety protocols, is required for all new and returning volunteers Food Preparation, Runner, and Server roles are being offered at this time - other positions will be added as Centre capacity allows Tutor, Computer tutor, and Receptionist positions for the Learning Centre are available but limited to certain days Only scheduled shifts are being offered at this time - drop-in volunteering opportunities will be added as Centre capacity allows Sign up for an upcoming Volunteering orientation and training session if you: A returnirig Volunteer (No application needed) New volunteer: make sure you have completed a volunteer application on: https:llvancouver.calparksrecreation-culture/volunteer-at-carnegie-centre.aspx Are able to commit to 1 regular scheduled shift (3 hours) per week, the shifts available will be mornings 9am-12pm, afternoons 1-4pm, Evenings 5:30-8:30pm (Learning Centre hours are different, please connect with them directly for available shifts, and no drop in volunteering is available at this time) Are able to commit to the full 4 hours of "Volunteering at Carnegie" health and safety orientation and j site tour (2 hours) and role training (2 hours) All City of Vancouver volunteers are required to be fully vaccinated as a condition of onboarding and ongoing volunteerism. Candidates may only be exempted from this requirement ifthey request and are approved for an accommodation based on a reason related to a Human Rights Code ground (such as disability). Such a request must be made during, not after, the recruitment process.

Upcoming Orientation dates: SATURDAY Jan 22- Returning and New Volunteers-10:OO-2:00pm (Last 2 hours with Kitchen if applicable) -.

TUESDAY Jan 25- Returning and New Volunteers- lO:30-2:30pm (Last 2 hours with Kitchen if applicable) FULL! SATURDAY Feb 5- Returning and New Volunteers-10:OO-2:00pm (Last 2 hours with Kitchen if applicable) , Once again, these training sessions are now being offered to RETURNING AND NEW VOLUNTEERS, additional orientation dates will be shared in February. For those volunteers who have already returned, thank you so much for your ongoing time, efforts, and commitment!

BLACK CHRISTMAS The Matchstick Girl has AIDS, She's a hooker on the street.

Tiny Tim's ajunky, hiding from the heat.

The elves are alcoholics, Santa's a pedophile.

This Christmas, unlike others, I can't afford to smile.

Scrooge is making fortunes, He's pulled out all the stops, The snowman's an informant For a squad of riot cops.

So, take an evergreen, Wrap it in barbed wire, Dark angel hung on high.

This Christmas unlike others, Just makes me want to cry.

Decorate that tree with Hypodermics And crosses for the dead.

This Christmas unlike others Deserves to be blood red.

Then take that Christmas tree, Drench it well with gas, Grab a Bic lighter, And shove it up The Premier's ass!

PS: I wrote Black Christmas during a manic episode. I can't remember what triggered it maybe too much tinsel and too much hoopla juxtaposed with the crushing poverty and addiction of the Down Town East Side, Canada's signature slum. Anyway I nosedived to a dark, delusional place and wrote Black Christmas. I proudly made copies and passed them to friends. When I snapped out of the mania, I realized I'd deeply offended some people and Black Christmas severed some friendships. One friend, however, said he'd read my poem to a terminal ward of AIDS patients where it received a standing-- or should I say-- reclining ovation. It's worth noting when it came to writing the last line I originally had Prime Minister but changed it to Premier because it sounded better.

It's like filling in a missing blank because it doesn't matter their station on the career ladder all politicians pay lip service to poverty. They promise a lot but do little. I'm always reminded of Mark Twain's famous remark: "Politicians, like diapers, should be changed regularly and for much the same reasons."

Stewart Brinton

OUR PARK PROJECT A Creative Residency-in Andy Livingstone Park Our Park Project was a summer-long creative residency in Andy Livingstone Park led by artists Sylvan Hamburger and Carnegie

From the Library rs" from

On Sunday, January

Writing

City of Vancouver's

2-3pm the

the City:

Launch of Poet Laureate's City Poems Contest will be taking place on Zoom. Five local

Community Centre Elder in Residence Les Nelson in 2021. The project . poets will be reading

and discussing

poems

invited the park's many users to draw and create prints together and

that explore the theme

fill the park with art. Neighbours worked together, shared stories, and

poets are as follows;

learned about each other.

Desil, Evelyn Lau, and Kevin Spenst, Writing

of "the City". The

Joanne ,Arnott,

by all aforementioned

The Western Aboriginal Harm Reduction Outreach Team provided

be found

harm reduction supplies, food, hydration, and community connection.

at any of our VPL branches.

as people made art together. This 'harm reduction through the arts' initiative aimed to reduce stigma related to substance use and to support connection and resilience in the communities that use Andy Livingstone Park.

in our catalogue

Junie

authors

can

and checked-out

The Lunar New Year is fast approaching and will take place on Tuesday, st

1 .The year ofthe

February

tiger will be celebrated

by VPL online with the event Lunar New These drawings were made by community members in

Year: The Secret of the Red Envelopes. From 6:30-7:30pm on Thursday, 3rd, the VPL will be hosting Jeffrey

'j response to suggestions,

February

• activities, or casual " conversations led by Sylvan

Wong of the Wong Association Chow ofthe

Hamburger and Elder Les

town

Nelson. Many are

tory and practices

collaborations, with

To join either

contributions from

and look under "Special

numerous hands.

event

These images were then made into screen prints that were used to

make large banners displayed throughout the park: Our Park Project was a collaboration between the Vancouver Park

in livfily conversation

and the City of Vancouver.

ofthe

ofthese

calendar

In the Carnegie

about the hisLunar New Year.

events visit vpl.ca Events"

an interactive

display

we are asking

of the community

decorate

in care facilities.

in our

Reading Room, we are

called "Caring Cards" where all members

for China-

4 the links.

happy to be hosting

Board, Western Aboriginal Harm Reduction, Vancouver Coastal Health ate and

and Doris

Youth Collaborative

to help cre-

cards for isolated

seniors

These cards will help re-

mind people who are living alone that they

This work took place on the unceded, ancestral territories of the xWmatJkWayam(Musqueam), S!sw~wu7mesh (Squamish) and sali!wata{ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations.

are valuable

members

of them!

Visit

the library any time to drop off your own cards or to decorate

This sign describes the artwork now gracing the Art Gallery on Carnegie Centre's 3rd floor. There are 3 display cases full ofthe energy from the project.

of our local commu-

nities, and we are thinking

the cards we have on

hand.

Well wishes, Izzy.

Onward to Earth Alive Humans and Earth have together created a new geological era: the Anthropocene. Our future together, our atmosphere, biosphere, ecology, and climate, all continue to evolve via natural processes, but are now all disproportionately affected by human activity. A healthy future depends on changing the way we see ourselves in nature and how we create a world economy in harmony with the ecology of Earth. Our carbon-based industrial economy continues to damage our planet's health to such a great extent that we have created an era defined by human choice, defined by howwe structure our industry and our economy.

Capitalism, with its drive for endless profit, and ongoing colonialism, motivated by the need for constant resource extraction for carbon fueled industry and transportation, have transformed the Earth. Rising temperatures, droughts, more intense storms, cyclones, tornados, fires, floods, and a virus imported from wildlife are now our daily reality. The natural world rebels against human hubris, ignorance, and alienation from the environment.

Biblical injunctions to exercise dominion over nature, as if we were something above and apart from the natural world, morphed into scientific objectivity and reductionism which alienate us from the world we live in and strive to understand, although Science's evolutionary tree of life does connect us to a common ancestor and to all that lives. Nevertheless, the scientific paradigm is some distance removed from a felt connection to ourselves, to our environment, to our planet. For that unity we need to search outside of Western so called 'civilization' with its history of oppression.

The violent legacy of settler colonialism almost succeeded in its drive to assimilate and eliminate First Peoples from the world. In 1927 in Canada, following the Gradual.Civilization Act of 1857 and the Gradual Enfranchisement Act of 1869, revisions to the Indian Act made it against the law for Indigenous People to hire a lawyer. Written permission from the Indian agent was required to leave the reserve. Anyone caught without permission was jailed with no rights at all. The only way out was rescue by the agent, who was also the watchdog forbidding cultural activity and enabling theft of ceremonial goods. Native spirituality, ceremony, drumming, singing, gathering and teaching were forbidden, as was an economy based on gifting that ensured no member of the community was deprived of the necessities of life.

• Fortunately, Knowledge Keepers persisted at great risk to themselves.and in the last 30 to 40 years, despite residential schools, graves in school yards, ongoing oppression, the sixties scoop, and missing and murdered women, First Nations are reclaiming their culture, sharing their stories, and telling us their history from their own lived experience. We can only hope that those of us born into white privilege will listen and begin to understand and connect with a beautiful way of being, seeing, living, and sharing that is intimately connected to our Earth Mother, to water, air, and land; and to a way of life and to an economy that cared for everyone.

We need to keep listening and learning. It's not enough to analyze and understand the chemistry of what keeps trees alive. We need hear their breath. We need listen to First People's voices, need listen to the soul of land, air, and water, and-we have to hear Earth's call to help her heal.

Alliances are forming among First Nations, environmental activists, 'climate scientists, and sympathetic politicians, We all share a desire for a healthy future. There is no guarantee that we humans will not get swept into the sixth great extinction being wrought in the Anthropocene carbon juggernaut, but there is hope.

Together we can build a sustainable home for future generations; we need to communicate and implement a strong vision that embraces nature, that cherishes biodiversity, that legislates against endless exploitation and profit seeking, and that implements a steady state economy as a subset of ecology and the biosphere. Human rights, Indigenous rights, equity and equality need to evolve beyond aspirational goals.

We must realize, make real, our intimate symbiotic interdependence, connection, and identity with land, air, and water. That's the stuff we're made of. It's who and what we are. Our every step has to become a prayer of gratitude to Earth Mother, Father Sun, and Sister Moon all of whom sustain us ..

By Gilles Cyrenne

On Viewing Giorgio de Chirieo's "The Philosopher and The Poet" Murmuring in hushed, secretive tones the stars' message travels across the universe"Have you come here for forgivenessTtowards one who works with their hands, heart, and mind.

The stars' message travels across the universe.

Within the philosopher and the poet's quiet, prismatic world lies a Promethean story . waiting to be reimagined by one who works with their hands, heart, and mind while searching for hope and truth under cloudy, pale green skies.

Within the philosopher and the poet's quiet, prismatic world lies a Promethean story.

Once their hands, hearts, and minds bridged civilizations while searching for serenity and strength under misty grey-mauve skies.

But now their voices, once moving in mysterious ways, have been silenced.

Once their hands, hearts, and minds forged civilizations.

But now the philosopher-mannequin stands blind and mute at the indigo chalkboard.

Their voices, once moving in mysterious ways, are silent.

Now the poet-statue stands blind and mute near the doorless exit.

At the indigo chalkboafd, JQ.~l21lilosopher-mannequinstrives to throw her thoughts onto it.

"Where are the stories we need to hear?"

At the doorless exit, the poet-statue tries to catch the skylarks' song in flight.

Murmuring in hushed, secretive tones, the Maker prays: "When next we meet 1'11 untie this tongue of mine and rejoice that the Earth is in the Sky." Barbara Morrison

i:

. Jean Swanson will seek Re-election "I've been pondering for a while. Should I retire, or should I keep working for housing, renter protections, ending homelessness, racial and indigenous justice, climate action, and supporting working and low-income folks in the city? Now I've decided. Basically these things are too important to me to stop working on them.

I want to say a few words about some important issues that we desperately need a majority of council to work on fiercely: One is affordable rents. In December this city council agreed to implement vacancy control in SROs. This is a huge victory that will protect thousands of tenants from being evicted, slow the loss of low-income housing, and prevent homelessness. It means SRO landlords can't raise rents as much as they like when tenants leave or are pushed out. It's a huge problem in the DTES, where rents can go up by hundreds of dollars a month when tenants leave, and the rooms are no longer available for low income folks so homelessness can increase.

It's also a huge problem in the rest of the city. According to CMHC, rents in apartments that are for rent are 20% higher than in apartments that are rented. So in an apactment that has a reasonable rent, especially if it has a long term tenant in it, if that tenant dies, leaves, gets renovicted, or bought out, then the rent goes up by hundreds of dollars a month on average. CMHC also says the turnover rate in apartments in 2020 was about 11 %. Fortunately, for very little money, we could expand the vacancy control we now have in SROs to all or most apartments in Vancouver, and stop this loss of affordability. . Since I've been on council, I've learned how absolutely unfair and unethical it is, really, for an entire level of government to not have the ability to levy fair or progressive taxes. In December, city staff sent councillors a memo outlining over $350 million in services and facilities that the city provided in one year that were downloaded from provincial and federal governments. For the city to pay for these services, under the current property tax system, we have to tax Chip Wilson and Amazon and Walmart at the same rate that we tax a $400,000 condo owner or a small coffee shop owner. That's not fair.

When we live in a country that has billionaires, homelessness is both a disgrace and unnecessary .. I think ending homelessness must be a priority of any council .. I think virtually everyone can be housed if we have the political will.

Poison drugs are killing over six precious people a day in our province, more than COVID is killing. Almost every family knows someone who is affected, or has a lost loved one. This is another issue where senior levels of government need to act, but where the city can lead. I support working with people who use drugs and their organizations, along with Vancouver coastal health, to open up compassion clubs where people can be assured that the drugs they get are not poison. I'd like to be part of a council that works on this more proactively.

Two July's ago council passed my resolution to replace police with community led services in the four areas of homelessness, sex work, drug use, and mental health. City staff is working on this but the work is slow. I want to be around to make sure this resolution is actually implemented and doesn't die of neglect.

We are all living on indigenous land that belongs to the host Musqueum, Squamish and Tsleil-waututh Nations. I want to be part of'Working with them to implement their economic, social, cultural and land rights in the city, and to end the racism they face.

I also want to be part of making sure that Vancouver does its part to reduce greenhouse gases and prepare for climate change, and to do this in a way that doesn't hurt those who can least afford to pay. COVID, the heat dome, and the atmospheric rivers have all shown us that we can't keep doing things the same old way. Essential workers who provide health care and education, who grow, process, and sell our food, who clear our streets, who fix our electricity when it goes out, who keep our water clean - these are the people we can't live without and these are the ones who should be making living wages and getting danger pay during the pandemic. Hopefully, with a strong progressive council we can lead in showing how we need to change the way we live in a way that is just and fair for everyone, and that can preserve the planet as a secure and welcoming place for our children and grandchildren.

I'm hoping COPE will nominate me to run for council and that voters will give me another chance to work fiercely for these changes."