Activist group declares war on UBC administration

Vandalizes university in return for razing of green space

Brandon Adams, the Ubyssey (University of British Columbia)

VANCOUVER (CUP) — A group referring to itself as the “Wreath Underground” has declared war on the UBC administration and vandalized several university buildings.

The group sent an e-mail to the Ubyssey, the student-run newspaper of the University of British Columbia, on December 20 in which they claimed responsibility for several acts of vandalism on campus.

“We, the warriors of the Wreath Underground claim responsibility for the recent targeted acts of vandalism on campus,” reads the e-mail.

“The first of these attacks hit at the Old Administration Building where the Board of Governors and higher administration have their offices . . . Our second target was the central building in the Ponderosa complex where the Board had its last significant meeting.”

Following the vandalism, the Old Administration Building had several boarded-up windows. Several windows at the rear of the Ponderosa complex were peppered with over a dozen golf-ball-sized holes.

The group pointed to a lack of student consultation about campus development projects as one of their primary motivations.

“We signed petitions. They were trashed. We laid grass and built ourselves a paradise. It was paved over and SUVs stand on Trek [Park’s] grave,” the e-mail read.

“Trek Park” is an independent green-space project established by students at UBC to protest a nearby underground extension of the bus loop.

“We put on a festival and invited President Fucker but he never showed. And we tried to play their game. We let them suck us into their process. We went to their consultation sessions. We sat and we waited our turn to speak. It never came.”

The e-mail’s authors demand that the administration “refinance,” “reconsult” and “rezone.”

The notice closed by saying: “we will push these fuckers until they concede every inch. This is our declaration of war, declared here in public.”

Trek Park organizers Stefanie Ratjen, Jasmine Ramze-Rezaee and Nathan Crompton said that they did not know who was involved in the vandalism, but agreed with the group’s demands if not their methods.

“The ‘refinance,’ ‘reconsult,’ and ‘rezone’ is something that the Trek Park protesters have been advocating for some time. The rhetoric used is a bit stronger,” Ratjen said.

Crompton said that the attacks should be taken in context, arguing that the university was the first aggressor when it demolished the student-built Trek Park.

“The university, in its own way, has kind of launched into a type of war against the park in destroying [it],” said Crompton, “I hope that if this is at all depicted as a form of violence or something, that it’s done in the context of the university’s own aggressive bulldozing of the park.”

Staff Sargent Kevin Kenna of the UBC RCMP detachment said that the incidents were being investigated.

“We’re investigating this and we intend to follow up as far as we can,” said Kenna. “Currently we don’t have any suspects, however, if anybody out there in the general public has any information we’d appreciate hearing from them.”