Whistler Community Outraged by Lower Mainland Gang Invasions in May

"Village Idiots" - that's what Bob Davis, a former resident of Whistler, wrote about the gangs of young punks who descended upon Whistler over the May 17th long weekend.
Most of us know by now that there were 3 stabbings over a period of 2 days in our usually tranquil and safe mountain resort.
I blogged my disappointment at the unrest and the violence and I expressed my support for Dave Gibbon's idea to have a road-block set up just outside Squamish where the RCMP could screen the cars and turn away gangs who are coming up to cause trouble.

Seems there are others who agree - take Chilli Thom's expletive letter to the Pique this week , entitled "UFC WHISTLER....WTF?", where he ends off : "I hate to say it but I feel we need to put a gate just outside Function and start doing some "profiling" on long weekends, turning people around and standing up for our citizens."
Yes, but Function is a little too close for comfort , in my opinion - I can quite easily imagine these gangs camping near the Cheakamus and sneaking into the village at night just to upset our people and wreak havoc.

As Mr. Davis writes in his letter to the Pique News Magazine: "The reports [of the unrest] failed to indicate the fact that the perpetrators were gangs of young East Indian men from the Vancouver or Surrey area. Obviously omitted so that racial tensions aren't escalated. But let's discuss facts, this is who they are and they are bringing a behaviour to Whistler that is common in the Surrey and Lower Mainland area. The difference so far is that they haven't pulled their guns out and shot a resident yet. Is that what it's going to take to get some real action out of the "leaders" in our community?"
I don't know Bob, I hope not. Does anybody know a councillor with enough "cajones" to stand up and look at preventing a repeat performance next year? I can't think of one. I know that the RCMP, Dave Gibbons and other nightclubs are doing everything possible to keep the peace, but our councillors need to stand up together [asking for a miracle] and vote that gangs and groups of young people from this area should not be allowed to enter Whistler. Plain and simple.

Again, I pose the question, are we going to allow these gangs into Whistler during the Winter Games in 2010? If so, the May long weekends will seem like a picnic compared to the violence that will erupt in our community for those 2 weeks - it's just par for the course. Gangs = trouble.

It doesn't matter if our local RCMP are bolstered by 30 or 50 police officers from Vancouver, incidents will occur regardless, as they do in Vancouver and Surrey. It is the "element" that these gangs bring with them that makes them dangerous and unpredictable.

Methinks we need to hold a referendum whereby these "idiots" as Bob so eloquently describes them, are kept the hell out of Dodge - in this case, our peaceful town.

So Dollz, the next council meeting is on Monday, June 2 at 6.30pm at Millenium Place in Whistler Village. See y'all there!