Kingston city council approves more than $1M to repair Belle Park vandalism

City council in Kingston, Ont., will spend up to $1.5 million to repair infrastructure at a retired city landfill after vandalism near the Belle Park homeless encampment put the Cataraqui River at risk.

In early August, vandals cut down six hydro poles and tore out copper components from electrical boxes, damaging infrastructure that prevented contaminants from leaking from the landfill into the river.

No one has directly attributed the vandalism to members of the Belle Park encampment, who've faced several legal challenges dating to shortly after the camp was established in 2020.

The money, from a municipal "emergency environmental" fund, was approved Tuesday.

Paul McLatchy, Kingston's environment director, said the damage was unlike anything their crews had seen before. 

Temporary measures should keep the contaminants contained for several weeks, McLatchy said. The emergency fund will be used for both repairs and improvements, he said.

"We don't want to replace wooden poles with wooden poles so they can be cut down again," said McLatchy. "We're going to source concrete poles and other types of more robust equipment."

Axes, chainsaws ordered to be removed

After the damage was discovered, the City of Kingston filed a motion with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, ordering the removal of axes and chainsaws from the encampment.

Justice Owen Rees endorsed the motion on Aug. 23. In court documents, Rees acknowledged that city bylaw officers had once witnessed encampment residents cutting a tree and — at another time — reported damage to hydro poles. 

John Done, the executive director with the Kingston Community Legal Clinic and a legal representative for several of the encampment residents, consented on their behalf to the confiscation order.

However, Done said it's by no means an admission of involvement. 

"We don't really see that anybody [in the encampment] has a particular need for an axe or chainsaw," said Done. "But by consenting to an order that prohibits this, we're not agreeing to any facts."

Done added that he's unsure if any axes or chainsaws have been removed since the order was endorsed.

The decision to spend $1.5 million on repairing the vandalism is troubling, said Sayyida Jaffer, an advocate with the Providence Centre for Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation.

"Sometimes in these situations, we are forced to pit things like environmental protection against housing," said Jaffer, who's campaigned for the city to fund for housing for the park's residents.

"We make choices about how we spend resources, and we shouldn't have to choose between those two things."