Another downtown Vancouver business calls it quits, citing crime and disorder

Another Vancouver business is calling it quits, and laying the blame on crime and street disorder.

The owner of the high-end consignment store Mine and Yours is closing her Howe Street location, citing growing concerns for the safety of her staff and customers.

Courtney Watkins has been at the location for nearly eight years and told Global News the decision to close up shop was hard.

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“It really was our first real store, it’s where I felt like the business began,” she said.

Watkins has since opened three new stores but said the downtown location has become a magnet for problems, even with bars on the windows and a buzzer entry for clients.

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“We’ve had our window broken 10 or 12 times,” she said.

“I feel like the final straw happened a while ago but then I kept holding on.”

Watkins said the store alarm has been triggered in the middle of the night countless times. Once, she said, she was hit with a double dose of crime.

“I drove in, window was smashed,” she said.

“And while I was waiting in the store for five hours to come have someone board it up my car windows got smashed in the alley and they stole things out of my car as well.”

During the COVID-19 pandemic, her neighbour made headlines when someone walked out of the business next door with an ottoman.

Staff at another boutique on the same block were also victimized in a bear spray robbery in 2022.

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“It’s not just our business that is feeling it,” she said.

The Retail Council of Canada is calling for changes in federal sentencing guidelines for repeat offenders.

“Retailers are complaining that when somebody is taken away by police, that person can be back at their store door or inside their store within hours of being arrested,” said Greg Wilson, director of government relations with the Retail Council of Canada.

The City of Vancouver is also calling for help from both the province and the federal government, saying they need to do more to fund drug treatment and recovery.

“We have a mental health and addictions crisis here in Vancouver, this is the epicentre of it, and we need an all-hands-on-deck approach,” Coun. Peter Meiszner said.

Any help will be too late for Mine and Yours downtown, which is preparing for a closing sale, before shutting the doors for good at the end of June.