Beach lifeguard funding unclear after Vancouver council punts issue back to park board

There are no lifeguards on duty at Trout Lake in Vancouver on March 18. Photo by Jason Payne /PNG

Article content

The status of lifeguard services at some Vancouver beaches remains uncertain for the summer, after city council rebuffed the park board’s funding request Wednesday, instead urging the other elected body to reallocate money in its own budget.

Article content

Green Coun. Pete Fry introduced a motion at Wednesday’s council meeting, seeking to fulfil the elected park board’s request three weeks earlier for council to allocate $600,000 within the city’s operating budget or contingency funds to restore lifeguard services.

Article content

Article content

Article content

Significant backlash met the news last month that the number of Vancouver beaches patrolled by lifeguards would be halved, from 10 down to five for this spring and summer. Park board management notified lifeguard staff last month about the staff reductions, saying the changes were part of the city’s cost-cutting efforts to achieve a zero per cent property tax increase for 2026, which Mayor Ken Sim’s ABC party has dubbed the “zero means zero” budget. But safety advocates warned that the loss of supervision would needlessly increase the danger at these beaches.

Article content

Article content

On March 31, the park board’s first meeting after news broke about the lifeguard cuts, commissioner Scott Jensen introduced an urgent motion seeking to ask city council to allocate funding to restore lifeguard services, calling the $600,000 required “a modest investment relative to the scale of public use and safety benefit.”

Article content

Article content

“Their contingency fund is there to address … the unknowns that this ‘zero means zero’ budget is going to continue to present to them,” Jensen said. “So, as they move forward and unearth new cuts that the city is going to be unhappy with, or fee increases that residents are unhappy with, they are going to need to continue to look into their reserves and find ways to, again, meet their obligation that they will not be cutting core services.”

Article content

Article content

Jensen’s motion sought to restore service at four of the five affected beaches: Spanish Banks East and West, Sunset, and Third Beach. Jensen didn’t propose bringing lifeguards back to Trout Lake, he said at the meeting, because he understood that beach had few swimmers and was often closed due to contamination. But, he said, resources were best allocated to the other four beaches.

Article content

There are no lifeguards on duty at Trout Lake in Vancouver on March 18, 2026 Photo by Jason Payne /PNG

Article content

Article content

That motion was unanimously approved at the March 31 meeting, with the support of commissioners from the ABC party.

Article content

ABC commissioner Marie-Claire Howard said she supported Jensen’s motion and was “actually very surprised park board staff would even suggest removing lifeguards at city beaches.”

Article content

“It’s obviously a necessity, not necessarily at all beaches but certainly at Spanish Banks and Third Beach, where people are known to swim,” Howard said.

Article content

But when the matter came to council on Wednesday through Fry’s motion, the ABC majority punted it back, directing the park board to find the money within its own allocated budget.

Article content

Dozens of people signed up to address council about the motion Wednesday, with all of them speaking in support of restoring lifeguard funding.