Okay, so it's Kim Hothead here at my spot, I invited my friend Kevin, who's currently
homeless.
Thanks for coming.
Yeah.
I'm doing it.
My name's Kevin McPhee.
And as far as it goes, I lived in Ten City from almost the end of October until they
got us out.
Pretty shady way to do it, I think.
But we all moved into the Johnson building, well, the majority of us.
And it started, you know, downhill from there, as far as I can say.
It was a lot of promises and guarantees and none of it came true.
Actually everything we asked for, we didn't get and everything we didn't want, we got.
So it was pretty shitty that way.
What's the biggest thing that you didn't want that you got?
The police in our building and, you know, them just working together against us.
Because we knew that it doesn't work good and now, you know, there's lots of people
in jail and lots of my friends are dead.
I mean, that doesn't have to do with the police as much as, you know, it could be made out
to be in my opinion, but it's not good, it's not good at all.
How many friends did?
By my count, ten.
Yeah.
So that's horrible.
Yeah.
Sorry about that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So there's a policy that play at PHS that are affecting people's lives and can you tell
me about how people kept saying that they felt like they were in jail?
Well, you're isolated.
It's like at the start of Ten City and the whole way through, you could hear everything.
It was like being in an apartment building where you could hear every neighbor and you
could hear the person in the farthest corner, you could hear what was going on.
So, you know, we were all a lot more responsive to what was going on and, you know, anything
happened.
Everybody, everybody came up, right, as a community.
And now it's like the SWAT team could be on the fifth floor and there could be an overdose
on the second floor and you could be eating cupcakes on the third floor and not having
a clue, right?
So it's like, it's not, it's not good.
And we're all behind, they kept saying, oh, we can't let you in the basement because we
don't want people to overdose and we can't open the public, like the public washroom
because it's another place people could overdose.
So the showers, they could overdose and I'm like, you have 140-something people in rooms
that all lock.
I'm like, so three more rooms that are public, how does that make sense?
Good point.
Right?
And we are the ones who end up checking the showers and checking the bathroom and by them
not letting us, you know, like, that's just another person that's going to go behind a
closed door, right?
And there you go, right, that's how a lot of people are going, right?
And I heard residents over months talk to managers and staff requesting the public bathrooms
be open, that they have access to all their storage down in the basement.
And could you please open up the stairwell doors and I was like, what do you mean open
up the stairwell doors?
And I understand when you moved in, all of the stairwell doors were all locked and often
the SWAT team came in and then would lock your elevator and you would all be locked
in and they said it was like a jail.
Absolutely.
And I was horrified to hear people were using sheets to tie them together so they'd get
out their windows.
I personally made like 10 rope ladders for the people that I thought needed them the
most, right, and like, it takes a lot of work when you're making one for someone on the
fifth floor, right?
I had no idea you made them, I heard about it, I heard about it, yeah, that's amazing.
And like, you know, and then it's like some of the things that like I've been charged
with and like I don't think that it makes sense at all because it's like, if we right
off the bat were making rope ladders to go out our window in the case of a fire because
all the doors are locked and elevators are shut down, and the worst part is like, we'd
all be standing at the elevator, like five people, ten people waiting, waiting, fifteen
minutes, whatever, right?
And the staff would come by and they wouldn't say anything, they'd just kind of do it,
do it, do it, and then use their key card and they would go down the stairwell.
And we were like, what the hell, like, we feel like, you know, now we really feel like
we're like some animals or something, right?
And like, I'm proud to say that like, even under those conditions, nobody has ever, like,
as far as I know, no staff member has been seriously harmed by like an attack or anything
stupid like that at all, true, and you know, we're the ones who are, you know, dead or,
you know, in way worse shape than any of them ever would be, so that's pretty scary.
They had hospital cameras in that hospital facility, and I understand the Vic PD went
in and took all the hospital cameras out and replaced them, but didn't just replace them,
they added all these, and it's like, they are surveillance cameras, and I believe that
they designed it like an incarceration situation, and after months of not getting those stairwells
open, it seemed that people did direct actions against those doors to get those doors opened,
and I understand PHS said after that left them open.
Is that right, the ones by the elevator?
Yeah, they were open, and it was like a collective decision from all the residents that we want
these open and don't even think we're closing them, because I think we have the right to
be like anybody else and have a stairwell to go out, right?
And then what they do is once you're charged, you've been arrested, been charged and whatever,
and then you have all these court dates now, and they try and string out the court dates
as long as they can, because when you're at the courthouse and you are either getting
out or going to jail for something you haven't been found guilty of yet, they say, agree
to these conditions and we'll let you out, right?
And then so now most people are going to say, well, of course, yeah, I can deal with that,
that's better than being in jail.
I was quite frustrated with the whole camera situation and that seemed like no matter what
we said or what we wanted, they weren't listening.
And I actually looked up in the Canadian Charter of Rights, there's a under basically surveillance,
right?
It's an accept, it's called acceptable levels of privacy.
And basically the way it works is in a public space, right?
Where there's free flow of, you know, whoever come and go, you can expect to be filled.
And that to me makes total sense.
Because if anything happens or whatever, they can go and say, hey, we have the footage to
prove that this is so-and-so.
But PHS puts their foot in their mouth because they have these cameras and they say that
they're acceptable.
But the thing is, is they also have a guest policy, which now we found out they're not
allowed to have and they still do enforce it.
I don't know how they get away with this, it's amazing.
We're trying to deal with it.
You know what, it's like they have everyone in their pocket, it seems like, but the thing
is that they have a guest policy.
So they're basically taking it all upon themselves to say, hey, we're going to make sure that
everybody who comes in the building is accounted for and we know who they are, right?
And that to me means they shouldn't have any camera.
Well, I can see a camera in the elevator, maybe the main lobbies, but not down every
hallway, not pointed in people's suites, like no.
It's gross, yeah, I know.
And that's the thing, that is not an acceptable level of practice.
It's like jail.
It is, totally.
It's gross, it really is.
Everyone notices it.
You come on your cell and you're on film, and it's like you can't do anything without
them.
And it's very creepy.
Yeah, I don't like that feeling of you walk on the hallway and it's like, is somebody
watching me?
They are.
They sit there.
I can't now stop doing that.
And it's like over time, months go by and you're like, now I feel like they're studying me.
And it's like, I can't do anything without them knowing, right?
And that's not right.
Like eventually you just say, okay, that doesn't work, right?
What can you do?
And then people do, like you say, direct action, right?
And they say, okay, here go the cameras, right?
And then they have a big panic and it's like lock the whole building down and yeah, but
yet SWAT comes and they cover the cameras up.
I've worked out basically that what they're doing in that building is they put you under
these living conditions that make people break.
Like they had the fire alarm, okay, someone they say was pulling the fire alarm to get
people in.
They just let it happen.
So for, I think it was a good, it was a least, it was over a month at least.
Every 15 minutes, the fire alarm would ring and ring and ring and ring.
It was going to drive me mental.
And like now it's even worse because there's a real fire and people are like, whatever.
You know, like it's not, it's not fire or care.
By locking us all in there is the worst thing possible.
So I live on the third floor and you could hear something going on on the fourth floor
in the morning.
So I went upstairs to see and there's another resident and it's quite common for him to
be, you know, having an episode or whatever and we all are accepting of that and we know
how to work with them, right?
Yeah.
And we just deal with it.
And so I don't really want to get into the details of what his situation was, but it
was, it wasn't pleasant to be looking at for him or anybody else.
And I felt bad for him, right?
So I did put electrical tape on the camera and I tried to, you know, help him by saying,
hey, like you might get in trouble or whatever.
You don't want other people seeing you like this.
Like, so let's just go back to your room and just, you know, you can freak out in there.
That's fine.
And he was like, okay, thanks.
Right.
And actually it was like, thanks for coming up and treating me like a normal person and
just, you know, helping me up.
But when I left the floor, I didn't take the tape off the camera, right?
And then previous to this, I had a discussion with Patrick, the project manager, an electrical
inspector and the fire inspector and we were talking about the common rooms.
And I said, well, why aren't the other common rooms open like the third floor is?
And they said, well, we could open the other rooms if we had responsible people to take
care of them.
And the fire inspector said that the third floor was doing a great job and that every
time they come in, we'd always met, you know, whatever they set forth as far as like what
they want to see for fire safety and whatnot.
And I had told other residents that they said, okay, yeah, like if we can do this and that
everybody can, everybody in that building is capable, I know this for a hundred percent.
And you know, they're not, but the thing was, is they said we could, we could have the community
rooms, but they weren't going to open them for us.
They could easily just lock off the door and said, here you go guys.
And you know, that could have been a huge overdose prevention thing right there, right?
Because if everybody has a room that they can all go to, and yeah, sure, you use and
whatnot.
And people, for the people that, you know, make a mess, and you know, people just fill
in the roles where needed.
And they're not hiding behind doors, getting high and dying.
And that's P.A.
Justice Fault 100% in my opinion.
And so a couple of residents, I guess, and I don't even know, right, because it's like
I was not part of this, but they took it upon themselves to open the fourth floor common
room, right?
And just previous to that though, I had covered the camera with tape.
Ah, right.
Gotcha.
Gotcha.
Okay.
So what they're saying is that I was aiding them in their master plan to open the common
room.
And so they gave you a mischief?
They charged me with mischief for the third time.
Oh man.
That's unbelievable.
Two of them I had beaten, right?
Yeah.
And the third one is the one that PHS told the police we don't want them in the building
anymore, right?
That's the one that-
Yeah.
And then the PHS talked to Crown, who put the condition on me that I'm not allowed to
go within a block of 844 Johnson Street, and I can't go in the building or within a block,
like I said.
But that's crazy because that's my home, that's my community.
All my belongings are there, and now I'm not allowed to go there.
Someone started a petition.
She needs help though, the elder woman, older woman with the walker, trying to get you back
in.
Yeah.
I think this is the story that needs to-
Yeah, Deb is my good friend, and I actually met her because all my bikes were in the hallway
and she used to walk by.
I think they were cool, and I talked to her and opened the door for her, and make sure
she got around easy, and if she needed anything, just was polite like anybody should be, right?
And I gained her respect and trust like that, right?
I really appreciate that she does that for me, and I get that love and respect back,
so for PHS to do this to me, it hurts, man.
Because I feel like now I'm a strain on my community, and I'm not able to get back.
I feel like I'm just another issue in a sense, and I have no home, and I've been on the street.
And thanks to people like yourself and my friends and whatnot, I've been able to do
okay, but I could see where some people would have a harder time, just by circumstance, right?
And how you guys can justify spending this kind of money on this, shame on you.
I don't like it too much, eh?
It doesn't feel too good to be on camera all the time, does it?
Shame on all of you.
Shame.
That's right.
