Itchy the Bed Bug: an Olympic Mascot for Vancouver

nobugsonme — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 15:44:07 +0000

Originally uploaded by ardenstreet

Graffiti from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.

Remember VANDU? They’re the grassroots community group in Vancouver that got a grant and implemented a plan to help fight bed bugs in Vancouver’s beleaguered Downtown Eastside.

Well, they’re back at it, this time as one of the sponsors of this weekend’s Poverty Olympics (along with Raise the Rates, DTES Neighbourhood House, CCAP, BC PWA, and Streams of Justice).

And this is no joke. According to a press release, the organizers couldn’t be more serious about highlighting poverty and homelessness in the city that will roll out the red carpets for the Winter Olympics in 2010:

“When people visit Vancouver in 2010, they will be treated to eye-popping scenery, efficient services, and relaxed and friendly residents,” says Wendy Pedersen of Carnegie Community Action Project. “But they’ll also be treated to a city that could have more homeless people than athletes competing in the 2010 Games.”

“We want the world to know that Vancouver and BC have world class levels of poverty and homelessness,” says Jean Swanson of the Raise the Rates Coalition. “More than 2,000 people in our city are homeless today. Many are so poor they have to search through the garbage for food and things to sell.”

The Province online reports that volunteers are drawing attention to the problems faced by residents in the city. Organizers have come up with some appropriate mascots:

Itchy the Bedbug, Creepy the Cockroach and Chewy the Rat will be front and centre as the mascots at the Downtown Eastside’s Poverty Olympics at the Carnegie Centre on Sunday.

My money’s on itchy, if the rat doesn’t eat the other contestants. What’s in store on Sunday?

Ten torch carriers will run a two-block relay down East Hastings, said organizer Wendy Pedersen, before a five-metre-high “End Poverty Torch” is lit to mark the opening ceremonies.

Other events in the Poverty Olympics will include “the long jump over the bug-infested mattress,” “the poverty-line high jump” and the “welfare hurdles.”

“We have world-class poverty and homelessness in Vancouver” said Pedersen. “It’s a fun way to send a serious message.”

And perhaps fun is the best way to get their message across to more people.

I wish I had a photo of Itchy the Bed Bug.

View the Poverty Olympics poster (and find out how to attend!)

And another ray of hope from Vancouver’s VANDU

nobugsonme — Sun, 15 Jul 2007 05:47:07 +0000

Vancouver’s Radio CKNW (AM980) reports on their website Saturday:

Advocacy group fights bed bug outbreak

VANCOUVER - Community advocacy group the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users VANDU is trying to fight a massive outbreak of bedbugs in that city’s Downtown Eastside by gutting infested rooms.

The group’s Anne Livingston says residents have had six weeks notice to decide what to do with their possesions.

After the rooms are gutted, crews move in to spray with powerful chemicals to kill the bed bugs.
Livingston says residents get to bring 60 pounds of clothing out of their apartments that will be laundered and returned to them.

Anne Livingston and VANDU were mentioned here in a post in March. Last summer, they got a $51,000 government grant to provide a round of 2 PCO treatments for bed bugs in two badly infested Downtown Eastside hotels. The residents also got replacement furniture and beds.

The city commissioned a study which said 1/2 of those rooms were bed bug free two months later.

Although the funding was probably was not enough treatment to achieve a higher success rate (which would likely require more PCO visits in many cases), the VANDU activisits definitely know what they’re doing. Back in March, we quoted an article in which Livingston said,

“You really need to create a system whereby you can knock on the door, get a room prepped, get the spray guys in and come back in 10 days and do it again,” said Livingston.

“And then, the real project is to not have people pulling bedbug-infested garbage out of the alley into another place. This creates constant reinfection. So that’s why it needs to be a neighbourhood campaign.”

Livingstone said bedbugs are a growing problem everywhere in Vancouver, and trying to get rid of them in the city’s poorest neighbourhood is money well spent.

Education, as we keep saying, is key–for residents of every treated building, I might add, whether it’s an SRO hotel, an expensive NYC co-op apartment building, a tenement, or a homeless shelter. (Remember, I live in NYC, where well-to-do professionals shop at bohemian flea markets, and yuppies take used furniture off the curb.)

I applaud the work of Livingston and the other folks at VANDU. I know with more funding and support, they will be able to continue to make a huge difference in peoples’ lives.

I hate that community activists like VANDU and the Allston-Brighton Community Development Corporation in Boston have to step in, since I think we need more infrastructure and government assistance helping people get good bed bug treatment and supplies they need (from XL ziplocs to furniture). Both of these groups have had government funding, which is great. I just think they probably need a lot more.

And is anyone in NYC or San Francisco, Montreal, Toronto, or anywhere else doing similar work? We’d love to hear about it.

Got bed bugs? Bedbugger.com » VANDU

Itchy the Bed Bug: an Olympic Mascot for Vancouver

And another ray of hope from Vancouver’s VANDU