Candidates outline visions for troubled Toronto Centre ward in municipal election

Theglobeandmail.com
Oct. 16
Victoria Gibson

Aldo Morson never knew much about Saheed Mohammed. The two men worked side by side for years, trying to breathe new life into a small square of plants and tree-stump seats outside All Saints Church Community Centre -- a worship house and drop-in at the corner of Sherbourne Street and Dundas Street East.

Mr. Mohammed’s life has since been reduced to a simple white plaque on the church wall, remembering the “beloved gardener” who died last year at 57. He was alone at the time, Mr. Morson said. No one found him for days.

The death paints a stark picture of some of the major election issues in the Toronto Centre ward, from housing and isolation to community support. While discussions between politicians often focus on the delivery of these services, Mr. Morson says, those seeking to be elected should have conversations with the people who need such services.

“It’s the interaction that makes the difference,” he said.

Right now, 19 people are campaigning to become Toronto Centre’s next municipal councillor. The most prominent are incumbent Kristyn Wong-Tam; Lucy Troisi, who was appointed to fill an empty seat in a ward that has become part of Toronto Centre; and George Smitherman, a former Liberal MPP. Whoever is elected on Oct. 22 will have to handle some of the city’s most poignant struggles -- the battle for overdose-prevention sites that has been fought in Moss Park, the aftermath of alleged serial killings in the Gay Village and the handgun issue, which has struck particularly in Regent Park, where at least eight shootings have been documented since January and heartbroken mothers have gathered for support.

The population growth of Toronto Centre has long outpaced the city’s overall rate, with a density more than four times the citywide average. More than 80 per cent of residents live in buildings of five stories or more, most renting. Twenty-four per cent of residents -- 11 per cent more than the city average -- have a household income of less than $20,000 a year.

Beyond its struggles, the ward has many pockets of vibrancy and innovation. Paul Farrelly, who runs the Church Wellesley Neighbourhood Association, praised the ward’s “stable” and “self-sustaining” co-operative housing. But with so much demand these days, getting a spot is like winning the lottery, he said. So is finding a seat on the southbound Sherbourne Street bus, for which riders often line up around the corner on Bloor Street in the mornings. Local transit does not seem like it is for residents anymore, Mr. Farrelly observed. By the time it reaches them, it is jammed with commuters from other parts of the city and beyond.

But the candidates are also faced with the larger, citywide fights, such as the supervised-drug-use debate. Ms. Troisi has called for a moratorium on new drug-use sites, saying the ward already has five of Toronto’s eight. She blames the sites for increased violence and disorder. “I support harm reduction, but this is a citywide issue,” she said.

Ms. Wong-Tam does not see a moratorium as supportable, although she agrees petty crime has increased. All candidates are calling for more support services around supervised drug-use sites, including employment, education and detoxification. Ideally, Ms. Wong-Tam says, all could be delivered in a health centre or hospital.

Mr. Smitherman says a moratorium does not sit well with him, either, citing a previously approved site in Parkdale that the provincial government put on pause in August. Volunteers from Toronto’s Overdose Prevention Society had been providing the service in tents a few blocks away, but have been unable to continue since October’s rain and winds set in.

As for gun violence, the ward’s 51 Division police responded to nearly 10 per cent of the city’s shootings this year. Ms. Troisi is proposing a $1-million investment in a gun amnesty program in response – she hopes that over the next four years, 10,000 handguns will be exchanged for cash.

Ms. Wong-Tam is stressing the need for community programming and operational community centers, to steer young people away from guns and gangs. Community centers in St. Jamestown and Regent Park were taken over as shelter for tenants displaced by a recent fire at 650 Parliament St. “The communities that really, desperately needed their community centers and recreation centers all of a sudden lost it, because they had to be commandeered for the residents who really needed shelter,” she said.

Mr. Smitherman, too, has a plan for violence prevention. But his would involve kids as young as 7. “All the solutions sound like all the ones you’ve heard, but the big distinction is, I think, we wait too long,” he said.

But as he talks about Regent Park, Mr. Smitherman moves into a discussion of how little the city knows about socially isolated residents, laid bare by the recent fire on Parliament.

“We have no idea where the vulnerable people lie,” he said.

Back at the community garden, Mr. Morson tucks three flowers – two orange, one pink – into the top of the plaque he affixed to the wall for his late friend Mr. Mohammed, and gets back to work.