Roads were closed near the site of the Lapu Lapu festival tragedy in Vancouver, B.C., on April 29, 2025.Jimmy Jeong/The Globe and Mail
All the necessary precautions were taken in the planning of last month’s tragic Lapu-Lapu Day festival by organizers, police and city staff, a preliminary review by the Vancouver Police Department and the City of Vancouver has found.
Eleven people were killed and many more were injured when an SUV ploughed through a crowd shortly after the official end to festivities on the evening of April 26.
How the horror of the deadly Lapu-Lapu vehicle attack unfolded
The review found the festival posed no particular security concerns and did not warrant a dedicated police or traffic officer presence, even though the event, billed as “a block party for everyone,” had expanded in size since its inaugural iteration in 2024 and organizers had told they city they expected 100,000 attendees.
Mayor Ken Sim and Interim Vancouver Police Chief Steve Rai told reporters Friday morning at city hall after releasing the analysis that no new policies have been created, but a more full accounting of next steps and recommendations will be delivered in a final municipal report near the end of summer.
Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim says the Lapu Lapu Day festival where 11 people were killed in April was well organized and all the right steps were taken to prepare.
The Canadian Press
In the meantime, Interim Chief Rai said his force will screen any requests from organizers of upcoming events for a police presence and do its best to send officers there when necessary.
Both leaders and city staff highlighted the recent purchase of new mobile stanchions capable of blocking vehicles from entering pedestrian areas of future events.
The mayor said authorities across the world are grappling with how to ensure people feel safe enough to celebrate in public while also protecting them from the harrowing risk of a person driving through a crowd.
“I don’t think we want to live in a police state per se,” he said on his city’s efforts to strike that balance.
Mr. Sim said the new report shows proper safety processes were followed.
“The event was well organized. All the right steps were taken, including multiple reviews, site walks and co-ordination with first responders,” he said.
“But that doesn’t mean that those steps were enough, and that’s what this moment demands – a rethinking of how we assess risk, how we respond to emerging threats, and how we ensure people, no matter where they are in this city, feel safe gathering in public spaces.”
Councillor Pete Fry, a member of the Green Party who is not part of Mr. Sim’s ruling ABC Party, said afterward that the findings of the report acknowledge the sad reality that neither the police nor the city might be able to foil such a random attack.
“This could have been like the intersection of Robson and Burrard or anywhere where there’s pedestrians and vehicles,” he said.
Even if a police presence were mandated at certain events, Coun. Fry added, many grassroots organizers can’t afford to pay the extra costs of having officers patrol while getting paid overtime.
A site walkthrough by the city’s film and special events office the morning of the event confirmed that organizers had sawhorses blocking vehicular access to the streets where food trucks and vendors had set up, staff said at the technical briefing.
Interim Chief Rai said that before the horrific tragedy, officers in the area responded to two calls earlier that day: a missing child that was quickly found and somebody who had issues finding their parked car.
Inspector Jeff Neuman with the VPD’s emergency and operational planning section said that in hindsight, the department would have liked to have deployed police cruisers or other vehicles in place of these sawhorses.
Just 10 special events last year required dump trucks or other heavy vehicles to block perimeters to stop any cars from entering celebrations, the report stated. It did not say how many times cruisers or other light vehicles were also used to block roads into events last year.
The province has called its own review into the public-safety risks faced by hundreds of summer events, which is being conducted by former B.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice Christopher Hinkson and is expected to be finished by the end of next month.
The final municipal report to be released in August will focus more on the police and municipal response to the attack.
Adam Lo has been in jail since he was detained by bystanders at the scene and then arrested. He has been charged with eight counts of second-degree murder. The Vancouver police have said more charges are likely.
With a report from The Canadian Press