What the hell is up with all the empty storefronts in this Cow Town? Who voted this city council in or put the chamber of commerce together? I am very confused when walking down the streets when I have a chance and see all the stores closed. For someone like me who is new in this area it is a very negative when I think that I may get a job after hearing that things were opening up and there was or is some kind of boom happening. I should have stopped in Alberta I guess.
It’s very difficult to know what the council is thinking, or what is on their agenda, but it is interesting to note that the CN yard, which will be decommissioned in a few years, is in the process of being quietly rezoned from M1 (manufacturing) to C1 (commercial), the same as downtown. There is information about this gleaned from council records on www.e-princerupert.com .
This suggests that the long term plan - if there is one - is for commercial development to shift towards the waterfront. Apparently the old CN station is already in the process of being re-developed as an office.
Perhaps the rather forlorn sections of 3rd that you are no doubt referring to will become like a PR version of Hastings Street in Vancouver, which was at one time ‘downtown’ with many grand buildings (eg the former Carnegie Library) and thriving businesses, but was left behind as the centre of commercial activity moved elsewhere. Hopefully 3rd will not become a skid row or sorts, but things certainly are not looking good.
I hate to say it but the down side is already happening as we post, from the West End Restaurant down toward Lea & Anns is covered with heavy drug users and alcoholics. They could post a couple of street cops just to cover that section. Behind or in back alleys people are drinking, smoking and being sexually active like behind the D.N. office. It would be nice to see some of city council leave their chamber and take a nice slow walk down the main drag.
with all the times they have raised taxes . i would be hapy to pay more taxes to have a couple constables on bikes or walking the downtown on night shift
Where did you come from?
Cornerbrook Nfld.
It snowballs… a few stores close, and the traffic increases to the ones left. But the winos, druggies that were always there move to where the people are. The ones left open.
There aren’t any more of the unwanted but it seems like it as there’s less people around in total and those guys are in your face all the time.
Here you literally have to push people out of the way to get in the front door at Fields, they’re leaning on the door for support, hanging in groups of ten mooching smokes or asking for change when you go in an out. Stumbling down the sidewalk.
It’s disgusting, and I’ve met people who won’t ever come here again because of it.
I’m THE LAST STORE in our mall, the newest one in town. Put two tables out for the summer and I spent all May and June chasing the treads from Alternate Ed away, and all since then telling ppl the tables aren’t there to sit and sober up at, they’re for tree-planters and tourists to surf the Net in the sunshine.
I can relate to you guys. You have to pry them out of the copshop with a crowbar or if we have a town hall meet then you get patrols for one week… WTF do they do in there all day?
I have to wonder what is happening with the cops also and the justification for their seemingly lack of visibility in the community of " shortage of officers" is running a tad thin…The drunks were out in full force tonite, wobbling down the main drag, making nuisances of themselves, the night when we are attempting to shine in the town for the cruise ship passengers and this is what they see. Where were the cops? It is disgusting that this town is in the shape that it is. At least the RCMP were out in full force in one area of town, the musical ride is here and well worth the time to check it out. But please, what the hell is our city council doing, if anything? They ought to be ashamed or have they even noticed the shithole we live in as obviously they don’t care. 
I’m sorry but why are you blamimg the police for a job that they do well? People have to remember.The R.C.M.P are contracted out to the city. they actually work for Canada. Maybe if Certain other areas of GOVERNMENT would step in and ,open up a Detox and treatment centre, these drunks would do there wobbling in treatment instead of embrassing our town. You have to remember also… these (drunks) Most of them used to have JOBS!!! But with all areas of Industry going down the toilet around here, and there lack of education, by no fault of their own… (most of these people had to work to support themselves mainly cause their parents wouldn’t or couldn’t do it cause they had there own drinking or drug problem or what ever!) And now because of their lack of education, and been stuck in the loop hole of the welfare system.They can’t afford to go back to school, and they find it hard to explain themselves so that they can get a decent education they find it much easier to turn to drinking and drugs. I have lived here all of my life and this town is in shape it is in cause people have given up! We have been promised so many things that have never come to fruitation!In order for a town as small as ours to change the people in it have to change! And that change has to start in the home! Especially when our children are small .We are our children’s first teachers,and they learn what they see… So if all a child see’s growing up is an abuse of booze or drugs they are more likely to turn to the same thing! Please take into consideration also that it is up to people to change and for some the only way to change is to get help, but they must also want to help themselves! It is much easier to give up to a bottle or drugs instead of trying to help themselves.
There are other towns in much worse shape then ours…Oh excuse me
I don’t hang out to watch the drunks or druggies of this one, But It seems to me that we don’t make the news as much as the Bigger communities such as ,Vancouver or Victoria. where the gang violence has esculated to guns and death! Rupert has drunks staggering around.So Compared to Van and here I shall Pick living here! thank you very much!
I think the seeds for the whole downtown situation have always been lurking under the surface but it took the prolonged period of economic downturn to really make things this bad-years of no pulp mill jobs and a depressed fishing industry were bound to take a toll but what was confined to a block or so many years ago sounds like it’s mostly taken over the downtown core.
The difference between places like Rupert and Vancouver or Victoria is that Rupert has so few areas for shopping and dining chances for the tourists,etc compared to the bigger cities and therefore the odds of coming across someone who is drunk or incapacitated is so much greater. I’ve run into a few sem-drunk panhandlers in downtown Victoria but really, it’s spread over a large number of blocks versus Rupert’s pretty small (and apparently increasingly dismal) downtown core.
Where I live it’s three whole blocks from the copshop to the end of the retail sector.
If two of the cops on duty would walk the three blocks every hour, people would see them, get to know them and the trash would get intimidated away.
That’s all it would take.
Especially in the summer when we’re trying to impress tourists.
We all sympathize with the RCMP as it is, having to stuff the same people into the vans day after day after day and haul them to the drunk tank.
So right Gemini,I know a couple of those street persons, the ones that I know were quite intelligent people at one time and producing members of society.
I say “were” and “at one time” because the booze and drugs have rotted their brains to the point where the person I knew no longer exists.
This town needs a treatment centre more than ever and the people need more than a bowl of soup and “Gods Blessing”.
Some could possibly come back from their current path of self destruction, others might be too far gone.
But they should not be warehoused somewhere away from sensitive eyes and ears.
Whats the solution?
More 25 year old RCMP oficers to throw them in the Tank?
More social workers climbing the internal bureaucratic ladder?
More soup kitchens?
Those solutions only treat the symptoms, not the disease.
The failed economy is just the most recent reason, the problem goes much deeper and has been around for many years
I am just as frustrated with what I see downtown on a regular basis. However, when I have to pull up to a stop and wait for a guy stumbling across the road I can’t help but think…One day he was just a baby, then just a child like my own now, somewhere, somehow, something went terribly wrong for him. Of course this is not an accuse and of course I am not ok with seeing this activity increasing. I just wonder what happened to these people and what can be done to ensure it won’t happen to their own children.
It’s not the Police force’s fault that public intoxication isn’t dealt with, it’s the city. The RCMP only do what our city council hires them to do. If it’s not in the books, to walk down the street and have a police presence to keep the drunks in line, then it won’t happen.
It is not your RCMP that you should be complaining to, it is your city council, traffic violations and rolling stop tickets produce far more for the citys coffers than throwing a drunk in the drunk tank.
SO, if everyone has such a problem with it, go down to city hall as a group and protest it! What happened to the days where if we didn’t like what a form of government was doing, we protested it. When we didn’t like what “the powers that be” decided for us, we spoke out against it. Now, we just sit on our asses in front of the computer and bitch about everything instead of DOING something. As a youth it saddens me that our society has come to this. We have enough energy to bitch, but we are too complacent to actually do anything about it. Doesn’t that make us, exactly like the powers that be? We tolerate it don’t we? So it must be okay…
Lets see less complacence, less “I’m just one person, what can I do?” If everyone said that, nothing would ever get done. Sound familiar? Maybe, somewhat similar to what’s going on now???
Lack of storefronts? That has little to do with whinos and druggies. Really. Knocking the police for not cleaning up the social issues %110, is irresponsible.
Lack of storefronts in Prince Rupert is due to business viability and overhead. Poll a few building owners to ascertain the rent for most business district locations. The rent is atrocious more than likely due to utilities, taxes and other services in this town. And really, how many “niche” clothing stores does a tiny town need? Especially with high cost on merchandise.
It’s a vicious cycle: Property taxes are high, utilities are high. Repair services are high. Material cost is high.
Rent is high. Tenant pays high rent and high services cost, passes high cost off to customer. Not enough customers pay cost + markup, business fails due to lack of revenue.
If I were a business owner I’d be scared shitless about doing business in this town - understandably. The businesses that do make it in Prince Rupert have provided either necessary service or product or innovated the way they provide deliver already established services. Perhaps the City and City Council should innovate the way they deliver services and provide extra incentive to the public to become entrepreneurs.
¢2
Haha… yeah go right down to city hall and complain that the police should be doing something about the drunks.
While you’re there, make sure you donate to the funds we’ll need to build a new police station with many more cells to hold all these drunks. Oh… and the funds the city will need to hire more civilian guards to watch them.
[quote=“bobo”]
Whats the solution?
More social workers climbing the internal bureaucratic ladder?[/quote]
More?..which social workers do you know who are busy climbing the
“internal bureaucratic ladder” as opposed to bustin their asses
trying to help those covered by their mandate?
That wasn’t my point.
My point was, we all complain, but then it still happens. We do have a voice, why don’t we ever use it?
If we ever did, we might find other solutions for the drunk problem. Like maybe a treatment facility (keeping in mind, you must WANT help to take help).
So, let us know when you plan to sit at a city council meeting and we will be there to provide our voices also…This is a forum which in part, I believe, is a place where we can “complain” as you say due in part to the fact that when confronted, the powers that be, will not come forward with any answers. A great deal of the opinions on here are sheer frustration. I wonder why they are building this new walkway by Cowpuccinos’ and up George Hills Way, for example and what is the cost of this new esthetic wonder that I am sure is totally necessary 
We have a City Council that seems tired, bored, uncreative and unresponsive. Terrace seems to have some great ideas regarding their downtown area, maybe they should take a look at what is happening there. Not perfect but they sure can take pride in knowing they are trying.
We do not see too many social workers climbing the food chain as we did years ago, but we have so many who are so young they smell Baby Wipe and if they do not find the problem they are supposed to deal with on page so and so they are completely lost. I still believe this problem we are facing is a multi cultural problem and we must get places like chances to stop pushing their alcohol and buying up more drinking holes. We must get people who are in the field to not be there for their pockets but6 for the people. Kids are not there for profit but our future resources. There are some out there who may think they are heros but they are making profits from peoples misery. They must be stopped and someone must do an audit. It is bad enough that pimps and dealers are making profits. I will never let go when I see this shit going down.