About 50 protesters marched up to a line of police officers outside a downtown hotel where B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell was marking the two-year countdown to the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games Monday.

Protesters say the 2010 Olympics Games are bringing more problems to the poor and homeless in Vancouver.
(CBC)

More than 1,000 people were at the Hyatt Regency Hotel on Burrard Street for a Vancouver Board of Trade luncheon to recognize Olympic sponsors and to assist B.C. athletes training for the Games.

Protesters blocked traffic as they marched up to the entrance of the Hyatt, where they were met by police barricades.

Several groups were protesting the possible impact of the Games.

First Nations people opposed to the Games who took part in the protest said Olympic construction has already destroyed native people's trap lines, hunting grounds, salmon stocks and sacred First Nations sites.

Angela Sterritt, of Native 2010 Resistance, said the four First Nations that are Olympic hosts do not speak for the native poor and homeless hurt by the Games.

'We're seeing the rate of people going to homeless shelters is growing.'— VANDU president Richard Utendale 

Richard Utendale, president of the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU), said the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games hasn't lived up to promises to provide affordable housing and protect existing rental housing.

"We're seeing the rate of people going to homeless shelters is growing," he said. "People that are seeking advocacy because they have nowhere to go [are increasing]."

Campbell, who was speaking at the celebration of the upcoming Games inside the hotel, dismissed the protest, saying there will never be consensus on any issue.

The protest — despite reducing traffic on Burrard Street to two lanes — was peaceful. No one got into the hotel and the luncheon went on without a hitch.