Group plots strategy in wake of eviction notice
Mark Bowers and the Occupy Whitehorse group aren’t sure if they are going to leave tent city.
Photo by Vince Fedoroff
COMPANY MEANS BUSINESS – To complement its signs near the Yukon government administration building, the White Pass and Yukon Route served an eviction notice on the Occupy Whitehorse movement Tuesday (top). ORDER NOT APPRECIATED – Mark Bowers says he wasn’t thrilled to receive the notice to leave the area he parked his camper on last month.
Mark Bowers and the Occupy Whitehorse group aren’t sure if they are going to leave tent city.
Bowers was hand-delivered a trespass notice from the White Pass and Yukon Route on Tuesday morning.
It gave him and other tent city resident 48 hours to remove themselves from the lawn outside the Yukon Legislative Assembly.
To the surprise of many, a strip of land from Second Avenue to the banks of the Yukon River is owned by White Pass, not the territorial government.
Tent city is right in the middle of a chunk of that land.
White Pass wants the campers out.
The letter says the company can appreciate the cause for the protest, but anticipated the demonstration would have been over by now.
“We have been patient for several months,” the letter reads.
It says violence, vandalism, nudity, destruction of property and littering have risen significantly since the tent city protest began.
As well, the accumulations of human waste, pet feces and garbage are posing serious health risks, the letter adds.
White Pass officials were not available for further comment today. How they plan to take further action, if it’s needed, remains unclear.
The Occupy Whitehorse movement — which Bowers emphasized is comprised of a core group of 10 or so people and even more on online— had its annual general meeting last weekend.
Members decided Bowers, the only Occupy member in tent city, should move out. He just received knee surgery, and said things are “tender.”
They’re also worried about personal safety.
Helen Hollywood, the woman who started tent city last June, is using an open flame propane heater in her tent, Bowers told the Star yesterday.
“We’re worried about Helen,” Bowers said. “That in a nylon tent is a major fire issue.”
The Occupy group decided to put together some money to buy two carbon monoxide detectors for tent city dwellers.
Bowers emphasized that tent city and Occupy Whitehorse are two separate movements.
He moved to tent city with his family camper on Oct. 19.
He was planning on pulling his camper off the lawn sometime this week. A husband and the father of two, Bowers has a job with the Yukon government.
Now that he’s received the eviction notice, Occupy Whitehorse is rethinking its decision to leave.
“The letter said they were hoping winter would kill this thing,” said Bowers. “Well, it didn’t.”
He said that before he received the notice, he had “heard” he was on White Pass land.
“But did we know for sure? No.”
Bowers said he doesn’t take kindly to “large American corporations extending their power across boundaries.” (The main White Pass offices are in Skagway.)
But as of this morning, Occupy Whitehorse’s online presence seems to have grown.
Raising awareness is what the whole movement is about, Bowers said.
He and the rest of the Occupy group planned to come up with a response this afternoon.
But not every tent city resident received an eviction notice.
Hollywood, deemed the “unofficial mayor” of tent city, didn’t.
She’s hoping the other few tenters left on the legislature’s lawn will move off White Pass land and off YTG property.
According to buzz on the ArtsNet mailing list this morning, residents have been offered rooms in the Stratford Hotel on Fourth Avenue.
Hollywood told the Star this morning she’s been offered a room at the Chilkoot Hotel.
“I wish it was Stratford.”
She said the Chilkoot has “deplorable living standards.
“I don’t even know why they would even let anyone live in that place,” she said.
Hollywood is planning on staying the winter in tent city and wants to make more room in her two other tents so other Yukoners can “keep warm.
“I’ve got a heating system inside and a carbon monoxide detector, so nothing’s going to happen,” Hollywood said.
“I’ve got many people in the health department, nurses, everybody contributing to my safety within my space. They’ve come in and seen it and said, ‘Hey, who could ask for more!’”
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Francias Pillman
Nov 9, 2011 at 7:13 pm
Why does this story constantly make front page news? What does Helen do? Nothing, except sit there and complain. It’s unbelievable she is offered a FREE place to go but it’s not up to her standards. Give us all a break and do something with your life. You are owed NOTHING.