VANCOUVER—As he welcomes his first new year at the helm of Canada’s third-largest city, Vancouver Mayor Kennedy Stewart says he discovered very quickly in his term a gaping “policy gap” hurting the city’s most vulnerable citizens — and kicking thousands from their longtime homes.

In words that might seem either odd or refreshing in an era when politicians fear being labelled “too professorial” — recall Michael Ignatieff or Stéphane Dion — the mayor said his “nerdy academic brain” mulled over the contradiction in kicking longtime tenants from their existing rental housing in order to obtain more new rental housing.

“What we’ve missed in our city policy is the idea of displacement, a keyword you’re going to see a lot more of in 2019,” the former NDP MP and London School of Economics doctoral graduate told StarMetro in a sit-down interview.

“In 2019, you’re going to start to see more conversation around how we craft better dislocation policy that’s actually about the people hurt the very most.”

Thousands of renters have been evicted across the region by landlords hoping to capitalize on skyrocketing land values. Under long-standing laws, landlords could raise the rent by an unlimited amount when tenants move out.

Many have been “renovicted,” so landlords can renovate their units to increase the rents, while others have been “demovicted,” so landlords can demolish and redevelop the properties. This means that city incentives for landowners to increase rental stock have also pushed out the very renters such policies were meant to help.

But a Dec. 5 city council motion requires landlords to allow tenants to temporarily move out to accommodate renovations without ending their tenancy.

Stewart admits the crisis shouldn’t have surprised him. After all, he says he is the city’s first renter mayor to his knowledge — at least since 1920s and ‘30s multi-term leader Louis Taylor, who “died penniless in the Downtown Eastside.”

During Stewart’s mayoral run, after resigning his federal seat in neighbouring Burnaby, he was repeatedly taken to task for failing to criticize that city’s New Democrat mayor for the evictions of low-income renters — dubbed “renovictions” because repairs were cited as justification. The numbers of renovicted tenants in Vancouver has climbed steadily as property values have climbed skyward and developers eye better-paying dwellers.

Likewise, during his run for office others criticized Stewart’s perceived closeness to the previous Vision Vancouver council and mayor, who ruled over a time of unprecedented tenant evictions in the city.

“It surprised us, but it shouldn’t have,” Stewart admitted. “It was such an overwhelming problem that crept up on us like a frog in boiling water. We were watching it happen, and it got really, really bad.

“That is really a big gaping hole: people who are renters, especially if they’ve been in a neighbourhood for a long time, they don’t care if there’s more rental units. They care about staying in their neighbourhoods.”

The problem had gotten so bad that the council motion from newly elected, far-left councillor Jean Swanson — though watered down — was adopted unanimously by politicians from left, right and centre.

That, Stewart recalled, was a “moment of pride.” It didn’t come out of the blue but thanks to “respectful debate” in the public eye and, importantly, “talking offline,” meeting with party caucuses every week to hammer out common ground or address concerns.

“That’s how I think we’ll be successful,” he said. “And it was just a first step.”

Stewart’s idea of crafting policy through a “displacement” lens is not just about particular real-estate development projects, neighbourhood plans or even just tenants.

Much of the city’s and Canada’s history can also be understood through that lens, he noted, again allowing his public policy academic bona fides to show in defiance of any worries about professorialism.

Asked whether displacement might also frame approaches to issues such as the 1960s eviction of Vancouver’s once-Black neighbourhood, Hogan’s Alley, to make way for the Georgia Viaducts, or long-standing calls to preserve historic Chinatown from development (and protect many low-income seniors who live there), Stewart replied, “Absolutely.”

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And he compared his hope to have Chinatown declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site to the successful quest to gain such protection to where he grew up in Nova Scotia, where 18th century Acadian residents were forced from their lands.

The previous renting mayor’s story also bears links to waves of displacement in Vancouver. Populist mayor Louis Taylor used the newspapers he owned to foment racism against Asian immigrants, a legacy that saw Chinese and Japanese businesses and homes vandalized and families forced from their homes.

“I hate to say it, but in this city there’s a long history of racism that stretches back a very long time,” Stewart said. “The Chinese head tax comes up, the inability to vote, the persecution of groups that were perceived to be a bad influence on society, let alone First Nations who could not vote until the ‘60s.

“People always look for scapegoats when they’re under pressure … The kind of image I want to project is this city that makes multiculturalism work at a time that’s not happening around the world.”

But it’s his status as a renter and fiery first-hand stories — like those shared by evicted and struggling tenants at city hall during the renovictions motion this fall — that Stewart says will drive him in 2019, not just academic theories or public policy ideas.

“People have an attachment to their neighbourhood, their neighbours, their local services, their library, their local pubs and cafes,” he mused. “It’s weird that our city kind of forgot that.

“Jean’s renovictions motion allowed that kind of discussion that was so respectful, and in the end we crafted something that’s a first step I’m proud of.

“Ask people what they’re most upset about, and they’re upset about getting kicked out of their neighbourhood. How do we make sure people can stay in their neighbourhoods? That became clear to me. We’ll see more of that in the spring.”

But will Vancouver’s new mayor take a page from his predecessor Gregor Robertson’s environmental, homelessness or pedestrian safety sloganeering — often mocked by critics as unrealistic — and aim for a “displacement-free” or “racism-free” Vancouver by 2030?

“I don’t know how much that branding stuff helps,” Stewart said, chuckling. “But I think showing what we can do is a great export.”

With files from Jen St. Denis

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