In a shifting tribute on Saturday, group members from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside (DTES) and past turned out to have fun the lifetime of Trey Helten, who died instantly final month at age 42.
Helten spent a number of years managing the Overdose Prevention Society (OPS) at 141 East Hastings Avenue, the place he’s credited with saving a whole bunch of lives through the poisonous drug disaster.
“He made a promise to me that he wouldn’t return on medicine and he saved that promise for seven and a half years,” recalled Derrick Nash with OPS.
Nash, who knew Helten by means of OPS, mentioned he remembers his good friend’s forgiveness, thoughtfulness and endearment.
“He was an inspiration for everyone, and it’s unhappy the best way it ended, however it’s (going) to go down in historical past as the person who nearly did it,” Nash advised World Information in an interview.
Norma Vaillancourt, who labored with Helten at OPS, remembered how he skilled new employees on methods to give oxygen and use naloxone, and cared about saving lives in the neighborhood he cherished.
“It takes coronary heart and soul to do what we do,” Vaillancourt mentioned Saturday. “Trey was a particular man.”
Helten was open about battling habit, she mentioned, as a result of he needed to assist others.
“He introduced a number of like to this group within the Downtown Eastside and all people cherished and revered him down right here as a result of he was an important man,” Vaillancourt advised World Information.
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Avenue artist Jamie Hardy, a.ok.a ‘Smokey Satan’, was Helten’s artwork accomplice and shut good friend.
“A giant a part of my life is gone,” Hardy mentioned Saturday. “He was particular as a result of he was somebody that was down right here at one level, and he was tousled and had a drug habit like all people else, and he acquired out of it, he got here again and saved folks and saved folks and saved folks — like a domino impact.”
Whereas he continued to help hurt discount and restoration work, Helten had not too long ago taken a job with the BC Coroners Service, doing physique elimination.
“He needed to supply dignity to individuals who handed away,” mentioned OPS govt director Sarah Blyth.
It should have been actually arduous for Helten, she mentioned, as a result of a number of the deceased he picked up had been folks he knew from the DTES.
“He needed to offer folks the dignity of being seen and being touched by somebody who cared about them,” Blyth mentioned.
A powerful advocate in opposition to gentrification, Helten usually used his sense of humour to spotlight points dealing with the group.
In 2023, he responded to a viral TikTok video showcasing a renovated SRO unit renting for $2,000 a month, with a mock video of life in the neighbourhood full with sirens, overdoses, mattress bugs and public defecation.
Helten mentioned he and different DTES residents “needed to point out the entire reality” and provided viewers a glimpse of the 200-square-foot residences with shared bogs and kitchens in a single room lodging (SRA) or SRO throughout from the Lotus Resort the place the controversial TikTok video was filmed.
As an artist, Helten used his present of graffiti to construct bridges with Chinatown, when retailers had been hit with undesirable graffiti tagging on their storefronts.
Together with Hardy, he created a number of murals to assist beautify Chinatown, including repainting the rolling shutters of two businesses focused by repeated graffiti vandalism in 2022.
“We had been just like the odd couple, he was all the time the one which was like, clear and getting his stuff collectively, and I used to be all the time the irresponsible man,” Hardy recalled Saturday. “It’s actually unhappy seeing him not with us.”
Helten’s demise was sudden, mentioned Hardy. “He was the final particular person on the earth that I assumed would move away.”
Hardy was amongst a whole bunch who dropped in to the Balmoral Resort lot over six hours Saturday to recollect Helten, who helped create Vancouver’s first legal graffiti wall, and had a dream to color the Balmoral wall as a group mural.
Helten was an animal lover, and his canine Zelda, who’s now being cared for by a good friend he met on the Vancouver Restoration Membership, labored the room at his memorial.
Ken Fantinic was tapped by Helten to be the “Dogfather” within the occasion that something ever occurred to him.
“He (Helten) was simply optimistic, simply advised all people by no means quit proper, in order that’s one thing that caught with me,” Fantinic advised World Information Saturday, as he and Zelda navigate the grieving course of collectively.
“Trey will all the time be missed,” added Vaillancourt. “He’s in all people’s hearts down right here.”
© 2025 World Information, a division of Corus Leisure Inc.
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