WHEN CRACK COMES TO TOWN

No one tried to hide the crack house on a one-block street in Vanier.
And no one in the area was surprised when a man was killed inside.

Emond Street runs one block. At one end is a tattoo parlour, with a
store-front entrance on Montreal Road and two apartments above. At
the other end is a city park, named Emond Park.

In the dying days of the municipal election, with crime and safety an
issue in the campaign, there was a killing on Emond Street. It
happened in one of the apartments above the tattoo parlour. This was
a month after a shooting on Emond street, and not long after a
stabbing, just around the corner.

The killing of Michael Lee Hibsman, 42, took place in what police
later called a well-known crack house, which left many people in this
Vanier neighbourhood scratching their heads. Wondering why a crack
house should ever become well known. (Two men have been charged with
second-degree murder in the case.)

"It was pretty open, no doubt about it," says Rob Stephan, one of the
owners of Eddy's, a 24-hour diner at the corner of Emond Street and
Montreal Road.

"All night long cars would pull up, someone would run upstairs to
that apartment, then the cars would leave after a few minutes.

"I'm talking traffic jams some nights. He was doing a better business than me."

It really was that open. The stairs to Mr. Hibsman's apartment are
outside, fire-escape stairs pretty much -- right next to a vacant
lot, no less -- and anyone on the street, anyone sitting in the diner
or exiting the Playmate strip club would have easily seen people
going up and down the stairs. On a busy night, it would have been
like looking at an ant colony.

You turn a blind eye after a while. That's what happens in some
neighbourhoods, even though there is a lot of huffing and puffing
during an election campaign about crime and safety and putting the
safety of families first.

A lot of rhetoric, but I doubt any mayoral candidate spent much time
canvassing Emond Street. All of one block. With a crack house at one
end and a sad little city park at the other.

I went to Emond Street this week and spent a couple of days in the
neighbourhood, in what Ottawa police say is the area with the highest
crime rate in the city. That stat also came out in the election
campaign. Which surprised, I can tell you, just about no one down here.

Shahrdad Ahmadzadgan has a funny story to tell about his safe.

It was stolen a couple years ago. In the middle of the night, someone
came through a back door of his corner store on Deschamps Street and
loaded a backpack with cigarettes; on the way out the door, they saw
his safe and tried to take off with that as well.

The thief lugged it out the back door, down the street, had travelled
a very strenuous block when he saw someone coming. Rather than
running away, or trying to hide the safe, he called for help.

"The police caught them like that," says Mr. Ahmadzadgan, "arguing
over how much the other guy was going to get paid for helping carry the safe."

Funny story, although the Iranian immigrant says on most days what is
happening to this neighbourhood is not that humorous. He can point,
from his store, twirling his body and saying: "one block that way,"
or "two blocks that way;" at no fewer than three crack houses surrounding him.

They are well-known. No attempt at all to hide them. These are not
undercover grow-ops, or hidden gambling parlours. That's the weird
thing about crack houses, says the storekeeper, just how bloody
annoying and obvious they are.

"Everyone knows about them," he says. "You cannot hide the houses,
just like you can't hide the people who go there. They are sad
people. Desperate, sad people."

He shakes his head, this man who fled Iran shortly after the shah was
deposed, fearing for his life and wondering if he would ever become
an old man. Shakes his head as if he can't understand why anyone
would wish misery upon themselves.

Emond Park is one of the smallest city parks I have ever seen. It was
built where there used to be a single-family home, until the house
was torn down, which should give you some idea of its size.

It has four metal benches, a path cutting through it and a small
plastic play structure in the middle, with sand surrounding it that
has turned to mud. Directly across from the park lives William
Blanchard, 68, who lives in the house his grandfather built more than
a century ago.

"You never see children in that park," says Mr. Blanchard.

"The city puts all this work into building a park, and who uses it?
Just the prostitutes and the crackheads."

Only at night does the park really get used, says Mr. Blanchard.
Lighters are seen all night long -- like fireflies or something -- as
people light up crack pipes. Prostitutes used the bushes until the
city cut them back this summer, but any day you can still walk
through there and find used condoms and needles.

The neighbourhood changed, he says, when crack cocaine moved in. He
is old enough to remember the days of Vanier bootleggers -- when beer
stores in Ontario closed at six and liquor stores thought that was
pretty risque -- also the days of hippies and marijuana; but those
seem almost quaint by comparison.

"I love Vanier and would never leave," he says. "I think there is
something special about this place. But I don't understand why we are
letting these things happen. My wife phones the police to complain
about the park, but nothing changes.

"Some nights, the police even call us back, to ask if the people are
still there. Sometimes they come and talk to the girls. But every
night, it starts again."

In the time I spent around Emond Street, I thought often of what it
would be like raising a family here. With the crack houses. The strip
clubs. With so much out in the open, and how a child would ever feel
secure living through that, I have no idea.

This is a residential community that has a lot of strange businesses
around it. There is even a sandwich board on Montreal Road for
Majixxx Video (a block and a half from Emond Park) advertising
"fantasy lingerie shows" and a "Triple-A spa." It's right next to a
bus stop where I saw school children lined up all morning and afternoon.

I walked into those businesses one afternoon and thought I had walked
into a bad movie.

Behind the counter of Majixxx Video was a man who looked like Anthony
Perkins, only his hair was greasier and he acted stranger. He asked a
few questions of me at first ("how did you find out about us?") but
after I told him I had seen his sandwich board, he seemed satisfied.

"What exactly do you do here?" I then asked.

"Well," and at this point he took a couple books from beneath the
desktop, "we have a fantasy lingerie show. That is $20 for the room,
and $50 for the model. This is a private room and, if you wish, you
can of course take off your clothes as well.

"The model will do a variety of poses, and you can suggest poses as well."

I nod my head.

"We also have a large-screen theatre with 18 seats. This shows a
variety of movies. It's right through there."

I turn to where he is pointing and see a door with a blackened
window, behind which there is much moaning and gasping.

"This is a wide-screen, I remind you, and there are a variety of
movies" -- he flips open the books -- "gay and lesbian. She-males.
Bondage. The cost for the movie, either wide screen or in a private
room, is $12. If you wish to bring someone with you into the private
room, the cost is $20."

Once again, I stare at him and nod my head. I don't really know what to say.

"What are your hours?"

"We're open 11:30 a.m. to 11 p.m." he says. "Every day except Sunday."

"You have to be kidding me. You have Sunday hours?"

"Yes," he says, without missing a beat. "We don't open until noon."

On the last day I was on Emond Street, I walked to the crack house
where Mr. Hibsman was killed. I decided it would be negligent of me
to leave without at least knocking on the door and seeing what would happen.

It was closed, of course, the metal door of the apartment screwed
into place by police. I stood there for a minute, and was about to
leave, when someone walked up the stairs behind me.

"Is it still closed?" he said.

I stared at him. He was young, early 20s, although he didn't seem all
that healthy. He had a bad running nose and pale skin.

"Yes it is."

"Man, I got to get in there. I've got two bags of clothes in there."

"You lived here?"

"Yeah, I did. Until this weekend."

He pressed his face up against the metal door. You couldn't see
anything inside but he tried for a long time anyway.

"That ain't all I got in there," he said finally, turning away from
the door. "I've got an ounce in there too. I've got to get in there."

And then he told me how he had an ounce of crack cocaine in there,
nearly $3,000 in his pocket if he could get inside, maybe I had some
idea how? No? Well, I've still got to get inside.

"I can't believe this is happening to me again," he said.

"This summer, I was on top of the world. Now it's happening again."

I asked him what happened in the summer.

"The police arrested me with two-and-a-half ounces and a loaded .22
automatic. Now I'm getting screwed again."

And we just stood there. As bizarre as it seems, we just stood there,
as I listened to him complain about being arrested with crack cocaine
and a loaded handgun -- still out on the street awaiting a court date
- -- now his roommate is killed and bad things are happening to him again.

How do you end up thinking like that? Maybe this drug really does fry
your brain.

Anyway, once again, it's all out in the open. Nothing secret about it
at all. Just a couple of days spent on Emond Street.

If the mayor-elect of Ottawa is serious about making communities
safer, I have a suggestion on where he can start.