Workers and residents in the Downtown Eastside are letting out a cautious sigh of relief. With the 2010 Winter Olympic Games opening on Friday (February 12), predicted police sweeps of the neighbourhood have not come to pass.

“It was something I was extremely worried about,” Karen O’Shannacery, executive director of the Lookout Emergency Aid Society, told the Straight.

She said she feared that tickets handed out in 2009 for minor offences such as jaywalking could be used to jail homeless people for the duration of the Olympics.

But, O’Shannacery continued, the Vancouver Police Department’s promises to refrain from using arrests to clean up the area before the Olympics have, so far, been honoured. “Everybody is kind of amazed,” she added.

Her observations were supported by some other people who spoke with the Straight, but not by everybody.

David MacIntyre, executive director of the Motivation, Power and Achievement Society, said he hasn’t heard reports of increased police activity in the Downtown Eastside. RainCity Housing’s executive director, Mark Smith, told the Straight that his people haven’t observed an increase in arrests. And John Richardson, executive director for Pivot Legal Society, echoed both men’s words.

“I haven’t seen anything unusual or any kind of targeting of homeless people or anything like that,” he said.

But Ann Livingston, executive director of the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users, told the Straight she believes that in the final days before the Games begin there have been more arrests than usual, especially for procedural offences such as failing to appear in court.

“I’m getting visual reports from people saying they [the police] are pulling up and running people’s names,” Livingston said. “And if they work hard enough at it, they eventually can get some sort of warrant on almost anyone, especially with people who are poor or marginalized.”

Wendy Pedersen, a community organizer for the Carnegie Community Action Project, offered additional anecdotal evidence indicating that the police have recently become more aggressive in the Downtown Eastside.

“I see more police activity for sure,” she said. “And more arrests and more harassment of people that had never been harassed before.”

The VPD is steadfast in its denial of such claims.

“We’ve said, probably a hundred times now, on record, that there are no sweeps going on in the Downtown Eastside,” VPD spokesperson Jana McGuinness emphasized. “There never have been; there never will be.”

Richardson remained skeptical. “Let’s cross our fingers and hope this is the way it continues,” he said.

You can follow Travis Lupick on Twitter at twitter.com/tlupick.