Granville bar owners call for BC Housing inquiry as SRO disorder plagues entertainment district

Businesses on Granville Street are calling for the province to do something about a notorious SRO building where chaos has become routine.

A group of hospitality business owners gathered Wednesday morning to say they’ve had enough of the street disorder and building damage that often forces them to shut their doors and turn away customers in the city’s entertainment district.

It comes one day after a fire at a single-room occupancy hotel owned by the province caused significant water damage to Aura Nightclub on Granville Street.

As firefighters poured water into a top floor unit, it cascaded down six-storeys and tore a hole in the ceiling of the ground-floor business.

“I don’t even know if I’m going to be open this weekend. Just last month, I was closed for 16 days,” said Aura owner Alan Goodall. “I had 50 staff members out of work. People that live paycheque to paycheque were given 24 hours notice, and they didn’t know how they were going to pay their rent.”

According to Vancouver Fire Rescue Services, there have been 44 fires in the building since 2020, when it was converted from a Howard Johnson Hotel to a BC Housing SRO.

“Just in the last month alone, my ceiling has caved in in three different locations,” said Goodall.

Investigators deem the latest fire accidental and say it was caused by a butane torch used for smoking drugs.

The business owners say much of the disorder in the entertainment district can be traced back to the two SRO’s directly across from each other in the 1100-block of Granville Street.

Each also has a nightclub on the ground floor.

On Thursday morning, a man smoking something out of a glass pipe in the doorway of Aura startled Mayor Ken Sim and Vancouver Police Chief Department Chief Const. Steve Rai as they made their way inside with Goodall to survey the most recent damage.

The Hospitality Vancouver Association is demanding the province take steps to relocate the supportive housing units away from the entertainment district.

“This is not an anti-poverty message. This is a message to get people who need help the proper help,” said Dave Kershaw, who owns Cabana Nightclub on the ground floor of one of the SROs. “They are not being served being put in SROs on Granville Street. And at the same time, it is destroying our businesses.”

Provincial Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon appears to be onboard with moving supportive housing away from Granville Street, but no timeline has been made public.

“We appreciated the city offering to bring three pieces of land to the table so we can build purpose-built supportive housing elsewhere,” said Kahlon. “We’re committed to that, and I confirmed that with the mayor yesterday.”

At the former Howard Johnson Hotel on the east side of the street, many of the windows are covered in thick layers of pigeon feces, suggesting the building may not be getting the regular maintenance one would expect of a BC Housing property.

“We at Hospitality Vancouver Association today are calling for a full inquiry related to BC Housing, their funding model, their oversight and their accountability,” said Laura Ballance, a spokesperson with the Hospitality Vancouver Association.

The province did not directly respond to questions about whether it would open an investigation into BC Housing, but did provide a statement.

“As BC Housing continues to deliver on government commitments, we must also modernize and adapt to create more efficiencies in how it operates,” it said. “This work is underway and is supported by government.”