A Protest is a protest is a protest

By Roger Bill

The current tent encampment protest at the Colonial Building isn’t the first time the pre-Confederation seat of government has been the scene of a protest. For example, the riot of 1932 will soon celebrate its 100th anniversary. What is curious about the current protest is that some, like NDP Leader Jim Dinn, contend it is either “not a protest” or “more than just a protest.”
Nobody was under any illusions that last October’s tent encampment on an exposed wind-swept hill opposite Confederation Building was a protest. Then the wind swept across the hill and the tents ended up in the road and the police, as a matter of public safety, dismantled the encampment. Its move to Colonial Building was, in the words of one organizer at the time, “strategic.” The question is, what is the “strategy”?
Ask an urban planner, where are the most popular sites for homeless people seeking shelter in cities? High on the list will be under bridges or expressway overpasses. The reason? It is like a roof over one’s head. You can stay dry. As a much younger journalist I found myself in one under an expressway in downtown Miami. The homeless community was so established that the local social services agency maintained an office beneath the expressway. The office was a house trailer surrounded by a chain link fence topped by barbed wire. It was a dangerous, but a dry place to live. It wasn’t a protest.
Want more examples of homeless urban living? See the examples from the U.S. Midwest, and Montreal below this column.
There are good reasons why homeless people from different parts of North America all seek shelter in the same kind of places. These are not protests. These are survival techniques. Now, take a stroll on the west end of Water Street, beneath the arterial road overpass adjacent to the old railway station and look for tents.
Moving the Confederation Hill protest to Colonial Building is proving to be a good political strategy. It is focusing attention on a serious problem. Additional shelter has been secured near the airport. Not an ideal location, but it’s a step in the right direction.
There appears to be community support for the tent encampment. However, if the encampment spills over into Bannerman Park that community support could evaporate suddenly. Those are matters for the protest organizers to weigh and strategize over. There are risks. A tent caught fire. Some of the people in the encampment are there because of issues that have gotten them kicked out of shelters. Things could go wrong. There are risks associated with the strategy of staging a protest at the Colonial Building, but a protest it surely is.