The Trump International Hotel and Tower in Vancouver accounted for almost one-third of police calls to luxury downtown hotels in 2017-18, Vancouver Police Department statistics show.
In fact, calls to the Trump hotel outstripped the number to the Downtown Eastside’s notorious Balmoral Hotel seized by the city last year.
Demonstrations, suspicious or unwanted persons or circumstances, disturbances and fights topped the list for the property bearing U.S. President Donald Trump’s brand name, data obtained by Glacier Media through access to information laws shows.
The hotel attracted 195 calls for the Jan. 1, 2017 to Feb. 22, 2018 period.
Meanwhile, police received 162 calls to The Balmoral, with the most calls being for annoying circumstances, unwanted persons or calls for assistance.
However, both were a long way from the 845 calls to the Downtown Eastside’s Regent Hotel at Main and Hastings. More than 50 categories of calls show police responded to calls about assaults, fights, drugs, weapons, robbery, theft and extortion.
Even with 20 demonstrations removed from the calls list, the Trump hotel remained far ahead of the Hotel Vancouver, which made 121 calls for police service.
There, major numbers of calls to the city’s grand dame of hotels involved alarms, property issues, theft and unwanted persons.
The city’s elite hostelries attracted 638 calls for the period.
Hotels included in the statistics requested from police include The Trump Tower, The Hotel Vancouver, The Opus, The Shangrila, The Sheraton Wall Centre, The Pinnacle Waterfront and the Hyatt Regency.
The biggest issue at any of the luxury hotels was theft. It wasn’t a major concern at The Balmoral.
The Trump hotel was developed by Holborn Group.
CEO Joo Kim Tiah’s business relationship with the Trump Organization extended only to a brand-licensing and hotel-management agreement for the hotel part of the tower developed jointly by Holborn and a related company, TA Global Berhad — a venture that Tiah also heads as CEO. His father, Malaysian billionaire Tony Tiah Thee Kian, largely built that company.
The brand-licensing and hotel-management agreements between Trump Organization, Holborn Group and TA Global Berhad for Trump International Hotel and Tower Vancouver were entered into in March 2013.
The Trump hotel’s security chief did not return calls for comment but a staff member said the hotel could not comment.
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