Talk of the Town

Talk of the Town

Jamie Lee Hamilton … On December 23, long-time West End resident and social justice advocate Jamie Lee Hamilton died at the Cottage Hospice, age 64.

Hamilton was among the first to draw public and political attention to the fact that a predator was preying on sex workers in Vancouver. She protested police inaction in 1998 when she dumped 67 pairs of stilettos on the steps of Vancouver City Hall to raise awareness about missing women.

In 2016, Hamilton co-founded Canada's first sex work memorial, located outside St. Paul's Anglican Church, at the West End intersection of Jervis and Pendrell streets. The memorial, a retro lamp post with a red bulb, honours sex workers in the neighbourhood who were forced out by city hall, police and the provincial government in the 1980s.

Services will be held for Hamilton on Thursday, January 23 at 2 p.m. at St. Paul's Church, to be followed by a reception in the church hall and a gathering later at The Junction nightclub on Davie.