Pellerin: Ottawa police prepare for the last protest, not the next one

In terms of future demonstrations, all the cops can do is promise that the trucks we know aren’t coming won’t be allowed to park.

Where I’m from, we call people who specialize in breaking down doors that are already wide open “défonceurs de portes ouvertes.” On the anniversary of the convoy, the Ottawa Police Service is flipping that on its head by slamming a door that was already sealed shut. In the process, it is missing the one thing that matters most to residents of SoPa (née Centretown): public safety that actually makes the public feel safe.

Not to digress unduly, but I’ll never be able to say SoPa, for South of Parliament, without guffawing. It sounds like soupe aux pois to me, which is about as removed from “cool nightlife” as Jordan Peterson is to, well, cool nightlife. It’s too silly for words, to say nothing of faux-cultured acronyms.

I’m all for breathing new life into downtown. I’d even be in favour of haltingly sputtering anything mostly undead into it. I mean, the place has suffered. Especially from that convoy. It needs help.

Last year’s police response was way too little, way too late. It took many long weeks, and the unprecedented invocation of the Emergencies Act, for cops to start arresting people. When they did start arresting people, everyone realized how quickly the occupiers, who had vowed to stay as long as it takes, decided that suddenly someplace else was more attractive. Once leaders were in the clink, followers fled.

But for weeks before that, they had been allowed to make downtown an unspeakable mess of noise and stink with their trucks and nastiness. Municipal bylaws weren’t enforced, to say nothing of the Criminal Code.

Worse than the idling and honking trucks were the people sympathetic to the ragtag crew of anti-government tub soakers who were allowed to roam the streets of downtown terrorizing residents, leaving human feces on front porches where Pride flags were displayed, harassing mask-wearers and generally behaving like the thugs and hooligans they are. All this while police did precious little to maintain order or ensure that residents of the core didn’t feel terrorized in their own homes.

You know you have public safety when residents don’t feel that going outside to get groceries puts them at risk of harassment. For too many weeks last year, Ottawa did not have that. That wound is still open, by the way.

This year, now that we’re told the trucks aren’t coming back, the Ottawa Police Service is beating its chest like a clueless gorilla saying there will be no tolerance for another truck protest … that they say won’t happen.

As my 14-year-old put it, “they’re only planning for the past, not the future.”

On the potential for a repeat of last year’s ambulatory street violence, there has been little word except for police Chief Eric Stubbs expressing hope any protest will be “lawful, peaceful and safe.” (Hill security officials expect up to 500 people, perhaps, to protest over the weekend.) Memo to Chief Stubbs: Your job isn’t to hope. It’s to serve and protect. Especially that last bit.

What guarantees do the residents of Centretown have that they will be safe to step outside if lots of occupiers ever do show up for an encore?

Everybody agrees on the right to protest, even for insufferable morons who can’t tell the difference between wearing a mask to protect others from a highly communicable deadly disease and the freaking Gulag. Anyone is welcome to walk up and down Wellington Street and make their opinions known, even if they can’t explain what their opinions mean in a vaguely coherent manner.

There is a big difference between legitimate protest and harassing or terrorizing downtown residents by engaging in illegal activity and getting away with it because nobody in the Ottawa Police Service, apparently, has a plan for ensuring those who live in the core aren’t taken hostage again, sans trucks this time.

We’ve had a year to prepare for this weekend and all the cops can do is promise — sternly — that the trucks we’re told aren’t coming won’t be allowed to park. That is nowhere near good enough for the future.

Brigitte Pellerin is an Ottawa writer.

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