APEC – Commission Interim Report

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6. The Agreement Between UBC and Canada

In 1995 the Government of Canada had sought expressions of interest in hosting the November 1997 APEC meetings. Positive responses were received from Calgary and Vancouver. Vancouver's bid included support from UBC, which was interested in holding the leaders' meeting on its campus. Dr. David W. Strangway, who was then UBC President, wrote to Prime Minister Chrétien on September 25, 1995, extending an invitation to hold the event on campus and advising that the "university community would be proud to participate in such an important event." The Vancouver proposal was accepted and the UBC component was to involve the use of Norman Mackenzie House and the Museum of Anthropology.

6.1. UBC's APEC Coordinating Committee

By 1996, UBC's planning was well underway and UBC established a UBC/APEC Coordinating Committee to facilitate UBC's involvement. The committee was chaired by R.A. Christopher Brown, a federal civil servant then on an executive exchange program, working at UBC. The committee members were all UBC personnel. The committee was concerned with logistics, the disruption of activities on the UBC campus, the opportunities to engage members of the UBC community in APEC-related issues of an academic nature, the development of the two sites, and other related matters. Eilis Courtney sat on the committee and had responsibility for the logistics of the leaders' meeting from UBC's perspective. Ms. Courtney also attended the meetings of ACCO's operations subcommittee. Also involved from the senior level of UBC's administration was Dennis J. Pavlich, a professor of law on administrative secondment to the President's office. Prof. Pavlich held the position of University Counsel.

6.2. The Licence Agreement

A formal agreement between Canada and UBC was negotiated over several months and signed on September 29, 1997. UBC's Treasury Department negotiated on the university's behalf and the agreement, entitled "Memorandum of Agreement," was sent to Prof. Pavlich for his review prior to its execution. UBC's Treasurer and its Comptroller signed on behalf of the university. The agreement was signed on behalf of Canada, as represented by the Minister of International Trade, by Mr. Vanderloo of ACCO, who was the principal negotiator on Canada's behalf. The agreement was referred to during the hearing as a Licence Agreement and that is how I will refer to it in this report. Particularly relevant are the preamble and sections 1 and 6 of the Licence Agreement. They provide:

Whereas:

1. The 1997 APEC Economic Leaders Meeting (the "Event") will be convened at the UBC campus.
2. UBC has agreed, subject to the provisions of this Agreement, to licence to the Minister certain buildings and their surrounding areas (the "Properties"), in the vicinity of the Museum of Anthropology as shown on Schedule A.
3. The Event will necessitate the temporary expropriation or partial closure of some UBC buildings, as shown in Schedules B and C, the upgrading of certain facilities, and modification to parts of Norman Mackenzie House.

Section 6.3 was inserted at the direction of Prof. Pavlich. He said he considered it to be important as it "recognized the rights of people on campus to protest peacefully, and freedom of speech."

Schedule A to the Licence Agreement is a UBC campus map with the following notation at the top of the page: "Note: 'Properties' are circled." Those circled were: Nitobe Memorial Gardens; Pan-Hellenic House; International House; Norman Mackenzie House; Museum of Anthropology; Parking Security; Thea Koerner House; Graduate Student Centre; Faculty Club; Rose Garden Parkade; Chan Centre; Mary Bollert Hall; Green College; Cecil Green House; Cecil Green Coach House; and the Anthropology and Sociology Building. All of the circled buildings are listed on Schedule B, Schedule C or both. Schedule B refers to buildings where full control by ACCO would be required and Schedule C refers to the buildings requiring partial access. Times for the start of closure and the end of closure are listed. On Schedule B, the start of closure of the Museum of Anthropology is shown as 12:00 p.m. on

November 24, 1997 and the end of closure as 8:00 a.m. on November 26, 1997.

Ms. Courtney was the one who had drawn the circles around the Properties on the map. She said the circles "were just to indicate the properties and the surrounding areas that would be impacted by the event."

She was asked about the circle around Green College:

Q: What was your understanding of this in terms of areas of protest, if you look at this schedule? Could people protest anywhere outside of your circles?

A: The circles don't indicate areas – the secured areas. These were areas strictly that would be impacted.

Q: Right.

A: These do not – this does not refer to any areas that would – where protest would or would not be permitted.

Prof. Pavlich said he did not recall seeing Schedule A – the campus map – when he reviewed the Licence Agreement. He was asked what he understood the word "Properties" to mean when he drafted section 6.3:

A: Well, what I understood was that there would be certain areas on campus, particularly where the Prime Ministers would congregate, and neighbouring areas that were important for security.

Q: And so as long as it was outside whatever that security area was, it was your understanding that this clause was applicable? Is that correct?

A: That's correct.

On November 22, the Licence Agreement was amended. The significant changes were:

• Schedule A was replaced with a new map identified as "revised Schedule A." No buildings were circled on the new map. Rather, a heavy line appeared on the new map which otherwise was nearly identical to the original Schedule A. Mr. Vanderloo indicated that the heavy line represented the security perimeter that by then had been finalized. All of the circled buildings on original Schedule A are within what Mr. Vanderloo described as the security perimeter as shown on revised Schedule A, with the exception of Green College, Cecil Green House and Cecil Green Coach House. The perimeter line is drawn along Cecil Green Park Road, clearly placing all the "Green" buildings outside of the security perimeter. There are no buildings within the perimeter that were not circled on the original Schedule. The perimeter line goes along Crescent Road in front of the Chan Building and then cuts across the lawn in front of the Curtis Law Building and down to Northwest Marine Drive where it embraces Gate 3 before it turns back to come along Cecil Green Park Road. The security fence, marking the secure zone, outside of which protesters and others were required to locate, substantially followed the heavy line – the security perimeter as Mr. Vanderloocalled it – shown on revised Schedule A. (See the map of UBC showing approximate location of finalized security perimeter identified by the heavy line at Appendix V);
• The start of the period that the Museum of Anthropology would be licensed to the federal government was moved ahead in Schedule B from noon on November 24, 1997 to 6:00 p.m. on November 22, 1997; and
• The reference in Schedule B to the museum was changed to include the museum grounds.
  
  Mr. Vanderloo explained the changes to the map:
  
  A: When you look at the agreement that we signed at the end of September, there were still a lot of things up in the air in terms of were we using – the Faculty Club or the Student Union for the media centre. And I don't think the definite perimeter had been finalized. So the buildings that are circled on Schedule A of the September agreement were those buildings that either we would utilize during the seminar – or, during the seminar – during the Summit; or buildings that would be impacted by the Summit. There's a schedule which is attached, Schedule B, which, I think explains our access to the buildings. For example, if you look here, at the Cecil Green Coach House, the Cecil Green House, the Green College, those were buildings that we would never have utilized. However, they would have been impacted because of the security perimeter, and it would have been a limited access into those buildings. The same applies to the other buildings just below Cecil Green House and Green College. By the time that the November agreement was signed, the security perimeter had been defined. This was two days before the main event, and I think this is the big change between the two.
  
  Q: So the map that is included as revised Schedule A was intended to confirm the security perimeter that was to be utilized for this meeting?
  
  A: Yeah, at the end of September the security perimeter I don't think had been finalized. In fact, if I recall correctly, Eilis Courtney's letter, the one from mid-October, also raises a concern about getting the final word on the security perimeter.

Mr. Vanderloo was asked to explain what prompted the second change, which brought forward the time of the takeover of the Museum of Anthropology:

A: Sure. I'd be happy to. I don't have the dates so I'm going to have to refer to the actual days of the week. On the – on the Wednesday, students occupied the Garden behind the Museum of Anthropology. I don't remember the exact number of tents for people, but I think there were three to four tents and six to eight people. There were some concerns expressed on – on – on the – what the impact this would have. Wayne May and I got together and figured, well, it's better not to do anything. The event was still a few days off and why create a story by removing students without any jurisdiction to do so. By the Thursday, the situation had changed. There were two aspects. I just received a query from PMO, asking what are you going to do about the students? Why aren't they being removed. More importantly, I was receiving quite a bit of pressure from our conference facilities people that this damage was being done to the back garden and also the students had spray painted or soap painted the back windows. I had a meeting with – what's her name – Ruth Phillips, who was the director of the Museum of Anthropology earlier. I still remember her statement quite clearly that the student demonstrator had come to her and said, "We know you have nothing to do with APEC. We respect the integrity of the museum." When they started doing the damage, I became increasingly concerned, and I was under quite a bit of pressure from my conference facilities people. They were – they were concerned about the damage. There's a long history with our work on the Garden at the back of the University. It was a very emotional issue in getting the agreement from the community. We had spent a lot of resources. If there was tremendous damage being done, we didn't have the time to – to – to fix that up, and so I – I concurred with the request from the PMO that something should be done. I would have pushed that myself –

Q: Can I just interrupt you for a moment? When you say, the request from PMO; when you refer to PMO, who are you referring to?

A: Jean Carle.

Q: Jean Carle.

A: He – he called to say, "You know, what are you guys doing with them?" So we – we sat down to – to explore the various options. There were – the first option that was available was to see whether the RCMP had a legal right to take over the property. They checked with Ottawa and they did not...

Q: Sorry, you approached Elaine Kosack from the province?

A: Yes.

Q: And the purpose was to do what?

A: To see whether the Provincial Government had the authority to – for us to take over the property earlier; whether they were willing to get involved to give us that authority, and the answer was no. So we – we commenced discussions with UBC through Chris Brown, and we reached a compromise solution that we would take over the property as of six o'clock on the Saturday.

This issue will be discussed fully in Chapter 11.

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