To the editor:
Re: “Lowe tells VPD to reduce ticketing in DTES,” Dec. 6.
Police Complaint Commissioner Stan Lowe is lost, the mayor is manipulated and Pivot is poison to the truth about jaywalking in the Downtown Eastside for both pedestrians and drivers.
I have independently served people on the streets and in the alleys of the Downtown Eastside four times a week, 52 weeks of the year for the past 10 years.
Jaywalking may be a minor offense but it can have life or death consequences for guilty pedestrians and horrific trauma and haunting memories for innocent drivers, like me.
I know the area. I drive very slowly on Hastings. Within the past two months, while serving I have almost injured two people who ran out onto Hastings Street from Insite in front of my car, with them ending up sprawled on my car hood and me hard braking, pulse racing, like a heart attack and sweating blood. No warning at all, no use of the expensive new pedestrian-activated street crossing a few meters away, and thank God, no deaths, yet.
Support the VPD enforcement of jaywalking in the Downtown Eastside for the health and safety of both pedestrians and drivers.
Clark Katona,
Vancouver
