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Park board and city councillors reacted with surprise Wednesday at Mayor Kennedy Stewart’s bid to take control over Oppenheimer Park as a step toward ending a continuing tent city at the site.

John Coupar, a park board commissioner with the Non-Partisan Association, called the move, which he said he learned of late Tuesday after reading an article by the Vancouver Sun, a “shocking development.”

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“I’m not aware of anything like this happening in the history of the park board since 1888,” Coupar said.

The park board’s work is valued by residents and entrenched in the Vancouver Charter, Coupar said, and he fretted that this move may just be “the thin edge of the wedge.”

Coupar said he would not support the mayor’s idea. Rather, he said the next tool in the park board’s toolbox was an injunction and he encouraged other members to consider that. It is unclear whether board members had already discussed that option, andCoupar would not say as much. Had it been discussed, it would have been in camera.