The City of Vancouver apparently can’t even wait until the March 12 submissions on the Downtown Eastside local area plan proposal to show it to be the fraudulent exercise many locals feared it to be. That’s demonstrated by the city imposing on the community a developmental behemoth (a high-tech beehive) in the former cop shop on Main Street [“City rejects cutting-edge hub”, February 20-27].

Despite two years of pretence that the city wanted to hear from local residents and other stakeholders as to how their community can solve its emerging issues in the coming years, it’s business as usual: the city knows what’s best and here’s what you’re going to get.

How can anyone possibly see how an entity like this fits within the current context of this neighbourhood or will contribute any recognizable value to the existing low-income community? It will only further the anger felt by that community that the future there increasingly does not include them.

The high-tech application proposed here could not only function efficiently anywhere else in the city, it could likely do so anywhere else in the province. This is about money and exploitation, and nothing else. That the city intends to starve out a potential partner in a new proposed partnership, SFU, by relentless delay is the same tactic that brought about the demise of the Pantages Theatre redevelopment proposal. Now, it’s condos.

This administration always seems perplexed by accusations of being the party of developers, big money, and the leisure class. With cynical manipulation like this, it’s not hard to see why.

> Ian MacRae / Vancouver