Justice committee  No, I haven't had discussions with other organizations, primarily because we were the organization that literally dealt with the aftermath of the riot. It impacted our members, and frankly, when we do that, the other organizations—I don't know if the Board of Trade took a positio

Justice committee  Two of our committees looked at the bill, and we had a number of people on one of the committees who had backgrounds in either security or police enforcement. We then presented a position paper to the board of directors, and the board of directors discussed it and unanimously app

Justice committee  There are 8,000 members, and they are business members. They are property owners and business tenants.

Justice committee  Yes. We actually hosted a breakfast here in Vancouver that Mr. Richards attended. He had an opportunity to elaborate on the bill and answer questions from our members. That was an event to which we invited primarily the businesses that had been impacted by the riot, but it was ce

Justice committee  We had no members express dissatisfaction with the position taken by the board of directors. We do make a habit of communicating the policy positions the organization takes to our membership through the newsletter, and we communicate our positions to the media, as well, which th

Justice committee  There are countless examples of businesses that were on their own to clean up or that had to contract the services of companies to help them with that. Certainly it was very gratifying to see citizens coming out the day after, and we're certainly appreciative of all their efforts

Justice committee  Unfortunately, I don't, but I have a couple of anecdotes. We know that some businesses took literally months before they were able to reopen, because their businesses had been trashed in the interior. For example, a coffee shop near the epicentre of where the riots started was li

Justice committee  I'm not aware of what the municipal costs were, but I can assure you that our organization literally had to shift gears. We spent literally the next couple of months working—we still are working—with a number of the riot victims who are dealing with the trauma they suffered as a

Justice committee  I'm sorry?

Justice committee  Okay.

Justice committee  Hi, Jamie.

Justice committee  I can, thank you.

Justice committee  Okay. Thank you. Good afternoon. Thank you for this opportunity to address you. As the speaker said, my name is Charles Gauthier. I'm the executive director of the Downtown Vancouver Business Improvement Association, a role I've had for 20 years. The DVBIA was established in 19