Downtown Eastside Market Closure Bad News for Vendors and Community

[Editor’s note: After publication of this story, The Tyee learned the lease for the street market has been extended to late April. City staff say they are still working on a plan to minimize disruption to vendors.]

Vendors who rely on the Downtown Eastside Street Market have been told they must be out of their current space by March 24.

That’s causing a lot of anxiety for people who depend on the market to help supplement very low incomes, says Sarah Blyth, a former co-ordinator of the community run market. The market may be able to open in a new space by June, but that will leave two months when low-income vendors will be left hanging.

“Right now is when the market tends to grow, it’s nicer out, and it’s a crucial time for the market,” said Blyth. “There are hundreds of vendors, and a lot of folks rely on the market to put a couple dollars into their pocket.”

The market has to move from its current location, a vacant lot at 58 W. Hastings Street, because a new social housing development is starting construction this spring. The city has identified another site, at 26 E. Hastings St., where the market will be able to move after a building on that site is demolished.

In the two months the market is closed, Blyth worries vendors will be forced to sell their wares on the street, something that’s not allowed under city bylaws, putting them in conflict with city sanitation workers and the police who regularly patrol East Hastings Street to prevent people from vending or setting up tents.

The Tyee spoke to a few of the vendors in January, when many people who rely on the market were first learning it would have to move.

Marcel Mousseau makes and sells dreamcatchers and decorated wallets and lighters. He also works to help set up the market every day. He says he’s not on income assistance and is able to support himself through his booth at the street market. He’s also able to send money home to his family in Manitoba.

“I wouldn’t want to do anything else. I can’t get fired, I can’t get demoted,” Mousseau said.

Shane Bowlus was at a booth selling used DVDs for a friend. He said the market is essential for many residents who are living on disability or social assistance benefits.

“For me, with my physical impairments, it’s kind of the be-all and end-all,” Bowlus said. “A lot of people in this community, they don’t have a lot of options — they’re stuck in a dark place.”

The Army & Navy department store at 36 W. Cordova St., which sold a wide range of affordable items, closed a few months ago because of the loss of business caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. That means there are fewer options for people to shop in their neighbourhood.

Blyth said that a lot of the items people sell at the market are donated or discovered through dumpster-diving. Other vendors buy things at stores like Costco and resell them at the market.

“Some of it is shoes and things like that, and I think it’s great that if someone gets shoes donated and they’re the wrong size and they can’t wear them, they can come here and sell them and make a couple bucks,” she said.

“Or they have a can of soup, they don’t really want that can of soup, they can put it on their table and then someone gets a cheap can of soup. That’s kind of how it works here.”

Public space throughout the Downtown Eastside has gotten tighter and tighter during the pandemic. Many drop-in spaces have reduced capacity to curb transmission of COVID-19, and some outdoor spaces are also closed: part of Pigeon Park has been used by a real estate developer to store equipment for two years, and Oppenheimer Park has been closed for the past 10 months after a tent city was removed in May.

Blyth, the founder of the Overdose Prevention Society, said the housing project means the community will also lose a peer-run drug inhalation site that operates beside the market.

Overdose deaths have risen sharply during the pandemic, and while there is a new outdoor inhalation site at 99 W. Pender St., it’s a problem that “one OPS will evaporate,” she said.

People who have been using at the site will need support, Blyth said. “No matter where it goes, there’s going to have to be someone on hand to help out with overdoses. Maybe not an overdose prevention site, but folks who can be on hand that are trained with oxygen and Narcan,” she said.

“Even if it’s in the street, there’s going to have to be someone in the street monitoring who can help out.”

The market may go back to Pigeon Park, where it was first located when it started a decade ago, Blyth said. The alley behind the Army & Navy building could be another option.

Blyth will attend a meeting with city staff on Friday to discuss options, but she’s urging the city to communicate directly with vendors.

“I’m hopeful that some solution will make itself available. It’s tough times down here, and we don’t need to lose any other service,” Blyth said. “I can’t state how in desperation some people are about the state of the market. They ask me about it, and I feel so bad for them.”

*Story updated on March 11 at 9:35 a.m. to reflect the date of the planned market closing.