The Vancouver Police Department has decided that after recent anti-Olympics demonstrations and seeing their request for more officers shortchanged at City Hall, they need something that will make them look like they mean business. Of course, nothing says 'we mean business' than their very own tank.
This page recalls being in Calgary during the 2000 World Petroleum Congress. I remember three things about that week: there was another summit going on somewhere back east which severely cut into the ranks of the demonstrators, A restaurant owner on the Stephen Avenue Mall called me a "f**kicing socialist" and told me to go back to Vancouver (I went "back" to Vancouver when I moved here four months later), and the Calgary Police Service bought their own tank for the occasion. The Calgary Police never actually used the tank at any of the protests, they just put it on the front page of the Calgary Herald to scare the small handful of protesters in town that week.
This page recalls being in Calgary during the 2000 World Petroleum Congress. I remember three things about that week: there was another summit going on somewhere back east which severely cut into the ranks of the demonstrators, A restaurant owner on the Stephen Avenue Mall called me a "f**kicing socialist" and told me to go back to Vancouver (I went "back" to Vancouver when I moved here four months later), and the Calgary Police Service bought their own tank for the occasion. The Calgary Police never actually used the tank at any of the protests, they just put it on the front page of the Calgary Herald to scare the small handful of protesters in town that week.
The VPD wants their new toy (or a set of them) in time for 2010. Their tank, or "armoured rescue vehicle" as they're calling it, is to be used against heavily armed suspects. What heavily armed suspects? This page questions the mortal threat to Vancouver police officers when it seems more suspects have been dying in police custody over the past few years than police officers. Of course, one can't spell "armed suspect" without the letters APC -
It's not about protection, it's about intimidation.
Inevitably, the VPD will need to come up with an excuse for their overpriced hardware, in the same way Calgary police used their HAWC I helicopter to entertain school children and harass the gay stroll in Stanley Park (there's a Stanley Park in southwest Calgary, it even has a pool and a tennis court like the real Stanley Park). The reactionaries and hotheads will drool at the VPD's shiny new toys, and the rest of us who don't relish living in a police state will die inside a little more.
1 comment:
When I lived in Calgary, I was no friend of the helicopter, which seemed to enjoy a more-than-occasional hover at unfortunate hours down my street when I lived there.
But in fairness to it, the helicopter also marked the end of the high-speed car chase in Calgary. I'm not sure the helicopter made a single Calgarian any safer from assorted scofflaws, but the end of the danger posed by those pursuits might have made it worthwhile.
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