Angela is a proud mom to a 13-year-old boy named Misha - he loves ice-skating, summer camp, recently was the recipient of his school’s Perseverance Award and lives with severe autism. Because of ABA therapy, Misha developed the skills he needed to live an ordinary life.“There’s this quote that really resonates me: parents of kids without special needs want their kids to live extraordinary lives, and parents of kids with special needs want their kids to be able to live ordinary lives,” Angela shares.But it is going to get harder for kids like Misha to be able to live ordinary lives – last month Ontario Conservative Minister Lisa Macleod revealed plans to change the province’s autism program. These changes have been largely criticized by not only the autism community but by experts and professionals in the field.Angela explains that her son has been on-and-off the waitlist for years since he was diagnosed at 18-months. Misha first came off the waitlist when he was 3 went back on when he was 6. He received intensive and life-changing ABA therapy – therapy that would have cost around $80k out of pocket per year. The new Conservative plan does not fully cover any child’s therapy but instead offers what many families consider to be insufficient relief.Once Misha was back on the waitlist, Angela and her husband worked full-time to be able to afford his treatment. 100% of her paycheck and a significant portion of her husband’s helped pay for this speech and ABA therapy as well as homecare. Angela not only worked full-time job but also designed the programs, managed the staff, and stayed up every night until 2am to learn more about the best treatments. Unfortunately, this lifestyle was unsustainable – Angela reached her breaking point. She left her job and took measures to address her own health. Her family cut corners and implemented an even-more stringent budget to make-ends-meet. Life was manageably unmanageable – a reality too common for families coping with autism who do not have access to the resources they need.Luckily, in April 2018, Misha came off the waitlist. He was able to get the therapy he needs – lifting a huge weight off Angela’s shoulders.“I want my son to be able to access the world around him,” Angela shares – and with the help of years of fully-funded therapy, he can. Recently, Misha attended an overnight school trip – a trip he could only take because of the accommodations made and also because of the ABA therapy he has had. Despite his severe autism, Misha can put on his own clothes, can communicate effectively and has developed coping mechanisms when he feels overwhelmed.Many consider the waitlist to be less than ideal but also reference it as a source of hope – without the possibility of fully-funded therapy, life with autism is extraordinarily bleak. This is why Angela and a group of parents have organized - they attended rallies, contacted their MPPs and organized their community demanding the government to not go through with these changes.Angela recently spoke with her MPP Roman Baber when she shared Misha’s story with him and urged him to stand up for her family and families like hers. To her disappointment, Angela was met with hollow words of sympathy and an MPP who was steadfast in supporting his government.Angela notes that Misha is not in the worst position. Children who are younger than him and their families will have little support. The new program no longer fully covers the ABA therapy Misha received as a child.The repercussions and the fallout of this cut will affect thousands. Children living with autism will be integrated into a school system that is not ready for them. Many will not be able to afford the ABA therapy that has changed Misha’s life and these families will have to cope with financial and personal strain. The reverberations will be felt by many - affecting everything from classrooms to the mental health of families who cannot access the supports they need.“It’s infuriating when the Ford Government says they’re for the people – if you’re for the people, then is my child not a person?” Angela expressed. *Edits have been: other versions of this article misspelled MPP Roman Baber's name.
State of Toronto's 2019 budget
Our city faces many challenges, like affordable housing, strained infrastructure, climate change and social inequity. Our municipal government at City Hall has a responsibility to stay on top of these ongoing challenges by restructuring elements of Toronto’s budget. City Council must find ways to secure income and funding in order to provide us with the services that we need and rely on.The City’s budget committee has approved a $13.46 billion operating budget for 2019. This year’s budget includes a 2.55% property tax increase, a 3% water rate increase, and a 10-cent TTC fare-hike.Budget Chief, Councillor Gary Crawford, highlights that the 2019 budget operates without cuts to services and makes substantial investments in transit, policing and other important initiatives. Other councillors, including Councillor Mike Layton, don’t foresee the proposed budget rectifying issues effectively enough to sustain the growing needs of people throughout Toronto.Layton says, "We need bolder solutions and a break from the status quo.” Layton also notes he would challenge other councillors to make the necessary investments in services like winter road maintenance - which is popular among many Torontonians after recent snowstorms. The idea of building a prosperous city for everyone has become a guiding principle in the budgeting process, but that needs to be a reality supported by numbers.While allocating more towards the TTC is critical for our future, the 10-cent fare hike will negatively impact many TTC riders - from students to seniors. TTC riders already pay some of the highest prices for transit in North America. The lack of affordable housing and homelessness are large issues here in Toronto. The City has reaffirmed its commitment to adding 1000 shelter beds by 2020, costing $62 million. Toronto Community Housing will be receiving $195 million towards priority repairs. While these increases are seen as steps in the right direction, many demand more long-term investments in social housing, shelters and other supports in order to help alleviate the burden for those in need and Toronto’s record-high rents. Many have either heard of or witnessed construction for the Basement Flooding Protection Program in their neighbourhood. This program provides the necessary upgrades to our sewer and watermain system to help ensure that we can handle heavy rainfall during serious storms. These upgrades further help to prevent basement flooding. This program costs $58 million and is one way that we can be better prepared for climate change at the municipal level.Executive Committee must deliberate the budget before it moves ahead to be fully debated and finalized by the rest of City Council this month. For more information, including a thorough breakdown and explanation of different elements of the budget, please visit: https://www.toronto.ca/city-government/budget-finances/city-budget/
Hundreds march in protest of OSAP changes and cuts
In January, hundreds of people gathered outside Queen’s Park to protest the provincial government’s plans to cut tuition grants for low and middle income students.The Ford government announced sweeping changes to OSAP. Grants that many middle to low-income families relied on to in order to afford obtaining a post-secondary education will change. The new rules will not only greatly narrow the number of Ontarians who qualify for grants but also limit the number of those who can qualify to get OSAP loans at all. The provincial Tories also announced that they would eliminate the 6 month grace period so recent graduates would not have to pay interest. In addition, the grant-to-loan ratio will now make it a minimum that students have to have a minimum of 50% loan - limiting the amount of grants. Many students and critics have greatly criticized the cuts to OSAP by highlighting how they compound the problem and create more barriers for those who are seeking post-secondary education. “The Ford government is going after low-income and middle-income students by cutting grants, making loan support harder to get, and cranking up the amount of interest they’ll pay,” MPP Chris Glover from Spadina-Fork York said, “This is going to mean more debt, holding back young people already desperate for relief from debt.” The PCs softened the blow of these changes by adding that they would cut tuition by 10% and would freeze it at the same rate for the following year. The 10% cut will come from the funding the government pays institutions. This will force schools to restructure their budget and many are skeptical that the difference will come from the salaries of high-up administration but rather will come from schools’ bursary funds, course allocation, and student support systems. Glover predicts that courses will be cancelled, classes size will grow, and contract faculty will be laid-off as a result. He added that it is the students who will pay for these cuts by receiving, “two years of a lower quality education — followed by skyrocketing tuition in 2021 to make up for the shortfall.” Many have criticized that the 10% cut in tuition as deceitful and as a strategic move to distract from the cuts to the grant and loan supports. OSAP’s crippling levels of interest rates and the huge burden of debt that too many young Ontarians are forced to grapple with has made this a dire situation. Ontarians who pursued post-secondary education are already under stress and Ford’s moves will make future decisions to pursue post-secondary education even more difficult. The previous OSAP system was rightly criticized because of its high interest rates and its scant debt relief options, but the PC government’s changes to OSAP have made it even more dysfunctional. “The government should not be cutting grants, it should be converting [already existing OSAP] loans to grants and eliminating all interest,” Chris Glover noted.One thing we know for sure is that making OSAP more unmanageable and creating more barriers to access post-secondary education has inspired thousands to take to the streets and protest.
Youthful and full of promise: exploring how Youth in Politics is promoting grade 10 students' civic engagement
Young people play a vital role in the political and civil life of Canadian society through traditional and non-traditional forms of activism and community engagement. However, there remains a strong need to promote more civic engagement among young people at an earlier age. There is a necessity for more systematic mapping of youth community and civic engagement. Facilitating civic engagement at a young age in Canadians as well as systematically charting a picture of youth civic and community engagement will challenge the socio-normative notion of young people as being apathetic to community development and civil life. #YiP fulfils this need to engage students in civil and political life from an early age and allows them to showcase their civic engagement. Dr. Nombuso Dlamini and Dr. Uzo Anucho co-designed the YiP project to engage grade 10 students in the October school board trustee elections. #YiP also builds students’ capacity to involve their families and communities in local governance issues. Moreover, #YiP facilitates youth action projects that are connected to youth learning about the governance of schools and their communities. #YiP sees youth as having the power to examine their schools and communities, to decide what is good in them and what they want to change. #YiP does three main activities - 1) designing and leading student civic engagement workshops; 2) designing and learning teacher professional development workshop and 3) funding student mini-projects.
- Student Civic Engagement Workshops
We have facilitated a series of youth-led, student-focused 3-day workshops in Ontario to stimulate student interest in community and civic engagement. Our youth presenters engaged students in a conversations and workshops about how they can be change agents in their communities and how to be civically engaged citizens.
- Teacher Professional Development Workshop
We also hosted a workshop for teachers and leaders of experiential learning with student representatives. We engaged our participants in conversations about reframing the Civics curriculum to make it more connected to the students’ lived experiences and community knowledge.
- Promoting Student-led Community and Civic Engagement
What differentiates #YiP from other civic engagement projects is we propose to provide financial support for students to design mini-projects, which would have facilitated the participation of our student participants’ families and communities in the school board trustee elections. Unfortunately, due to logistical reasons, our funding for the project was reduced, and we could not fulfil this aim. To compensate for this, we have provided a series of online resources such as our “Hosting a School Board Trustees All Candidates Meeting: A Student’s Guide.” These online resources provide students with practical ways in which they can host the trustee meetings and encourage their parents to become more politically aware and active.We learned some vital lessons from #YiP;
- Students are engaged in their communities. The majority of our student participants actively participate or led community/school projects. They were members of their student councils, organisers of community activities such as barbecues and summer camps, and volunteers at their public library. They also advocate for issues in their communities.
- Students are concerned about social justice issues. They showed great interest in Canadian and global social justice issues and how it affects their local communities. Our participants are passionate about finding solutions to social justice issues such as human trafficking, gender-based violence, environmental racialization and precarious unemployment. They also commented that due to ageism many young people’s contributions and voices are not taken seriously.
#YiP has taught us numerous lessons from which we can posit the following suggestions. This list is not exhaustive but rather acts to stimulate a more in-depth and thoughtful conversation about youth civic engagement.Our first recommendation is for more systematic research to ascertain the impact of the work that young people are already doing. Second, we need to find exciting ways to increase students’ political engagement. Politicians and their political machinery need to find intriguing ways of connecting with young people about issues that matter to them. Third, we must listen to youth voices and engaging students should go beyond using them as tokens on committees and boards. Our student participant shared with us that on the one hand, this resulted in their opinions being ignored or meaningfully used to impact policy changes while on the other hand, it made them more reluctant to voice their views.In sum, any real efforts to increase young people in civic engagement needs to be research-led and multifaceted. These efforts also need to be informed by and for youth to impact policy changes and practices rather than attempts to solely increase the youth vote.
A new City Council faces new hurdles
The City election is over, and it was a wild, unprecedented ride. Changing the number of Councillors and changing the boundaries for each of the Wards had a significant toll on voter turnout. Changing the rules for the election while the election was already started was unfair and confusing to the public. Many people who voted in the previous election did not vote in this election as a result.Voter turnout was lower City wide. Here, the Downsview area had one of the sharpest declines in turnout - over 28,000 people voted in 2014 however, in 2018, only 22,500 voted. This is a 20% drop.Doug Ford forced the changes to the election because he reasoned it would save money, but that seems to be mostly words to rationalize his dislike for the City of Toronto Council as a body. He did not make the samedemands of other Ontarian cities and was in a rush to push this through, even creating a constitutional crisis in the process. Reasons as to why Ford did this never add up- many speculate that it is because he has a personal vendetta against Toronto. It was unfair to Torontonians who were given such little time to assess and adjust to the new changes. One fifth of voters in Downsview reacted by staying away from the polls and this is bad for our community. We may not like one politician or another, we may not like a party or we may not like the whole of them in power, but our democratic system is based on a number of principles that we need to protect. Fairness and predictability are pillars of a democratic society.I think most would agree that we ought not to mess around with the rules during an election again. At the basis of any democratic election is a sense that people need to be given equal and fair opportunities. Elections are races and imagine training for months for a 100 metres dash race only to be told once the race starts that you have to run a kilometre instead? This was unprecedented. Let’s not do it again.
More cuts: Ford scraps rent control leaving tenants vulnerable
The Ontario PC’s fall economic plan was released on November 15th and it has been received with much animosity. By removing rent control for newly built or converted units, Premier Ford has broken his campaign promise to leave the regulated system alone. Back on the campaign trail, on May 15thto be exact, the Ontario PC party website published Ford’s statement, which said, "I have listened to the people, and I won't take rent control away from anyone. Period," Ford continued, “When it comes to rent control, we're going to maintain the status quo.” It is clear that Ford concealed his motives from the get-go.The scrapping of this legislation is part of the new Housing Supply Action Plan, which protects existing tenancy agreements but puts potential ones at risk. In 2017, the former Liberal government expanded rent control to all units, including those built after 1991. This legislation ensured that annual rent increases would not surpass the rate of inflation. Rent control is a means to protect occupants from superfluous rent increases. Scrapping regulation legislation will only worsen this issue. Landlords and tenants both have responsibilities and neither party should be allowed to take advantage of each other financially.Increasing rental supply is just as important as ensuring that tenants can afford their rent in the first place. It is understandable why certain neighbourhoods and specific accommodations come with an expensive price tag, but the consensus is that it’s becoming increasingly difficult to find affordable housing across the province, especially within the GTA. According to Citynews, 47 per cent of households in Toronto spend more than 30 per cent of their income on rent. Ideally, that number should be 25 per cent in order for people to afford other necessities of life. In the past, rent control exemptions have not been proven to increase rental supply. People need a place to live, a place that they can afford to call home for more than a few months at a time.Geordie Dent, Executive Director of the Federation of Metro Tenants Associations, said, "I'd like to congratulate our millionaire premier on signing the eviction orders on thousands of tenants going forward." Having no rent control in new units means that landlords hold the position of power and can potentially evict tenants who cannot afford their ever-increasing rents. Affordability is a key component of stabilizing our housing supply. Youth, seniors and those living on a fixed income are the most vulnerable when it comes to finding stable accommodations. The battle for affordable housing and tenant rights goes on, and advocates are ready to defend the cause. Ontario’s Housing Supply Action Plan is set to be unveiled in spring 2019.
NDP keeps pushing for auto insurance reform
Over 150 local residents packed an auto insurance town hall meeting I hosted in November to pressure this government to bring down the unfair auto insurance rates we pay in our community.
The community meeting was part of a series of auto insurance town halls Ontario's NDP is holding across the GTA, each packed with people demanding change.
Our community continues to pay some of the highest auto insurance rates in this country even though we do not have the highest number of accidents on our streets. In fact, there are even some in this community who are unable to drive because the insurance is simply unaffordable.
Ontario's NDP has been fighting against auto insurance postal code discrimination for years but the Liberals, and now Doug Ford’s Conservative government, sided with big auto insurance corporations over the people.
In 2012, former NDP MPP Jagmeet Singh (and current federal NDP leader) tabled a private member's bill that would have ended postal code discrimination, but both the Conservatives and the Liberals voted against it, and the bill failed. Later, the NDP extracted a promise from the provincial Liberals to reduce auto insurance rates by 15 per cent, but the Liberals simply broke their promise.
Most recently in October 2018, an NDP bill by MPP Gurratan Singh who attended our community meeting, called for auto insurance companies to treat the GTA as a single postal code when determining insurance rates.
Unfortunately, Doug Ford's Conservative government voted against this NDP bill that aimed to bring down insurance rates for drivers. What’s more, one of the first things the Ford government did when taking office was to pave the way for a nine per cent hike to auto insurance rates.
Our community is tired of being taken advantage of by auto insurance corporations and deserve to be treated fairly. I will continue to keep up the fight.
Ford uses notwithstanding clause to override court ruling
On Monday September 10th, Justice Edward Belobaba ruled Bill 5, the Better Local Government Act, unconstitutional. Bill 5 is the controversial bill that would nearly halve council from 47 to 25 in the middle of the 2018 election.Later that Monday at 2pm Premier Doug Ford took an unprecedented step and vowed to amend the Better Local Government Act to include the Notwithstanding Clause in a new bill titled “Efficient Local Government Act.” Prior to this week, an Ontarian provincial government has never included this clause to bypass a court ruling – it is seen as the “nuclear” option of our constitution that has been used only a handful times across the country. This clause would allow Premier Ford to bypass Charter Rights and Freedoms in Section 2 and 7-15. In short, the clause allows Ford and the Progressive-Conservatives to suspend our Constitutional rights in order to ensure that Toronto city council would stay at 25 councillors.The Notwithstanding Clause suspends sections that include freedom of thought, religion, expression, association, peaceful assembly, belief, and the right to life, liberty, unreasonable search and seizure, and other Charter items that are cherished by Canadians. The clause allows the legislation to be free from judicial review or challenge for up to five years. If Efficient Local Government Act passes it will make future uses of the clause much easier – other bills that infringe on your Charter Rights and Freedoms will be easier passed. The Notwithstanding Clause can lead to bills that infringe on your freedom of practicing your religion, your right to not be subject to cruel and unusual punishment, and your right to be equally treated before and under the law. Our judicial system, which includes the Supreme Court of Canada and its judges, are integral to upholding our Constitutional rights. Ontario’s democracy consists of three branches – the Executive (the Premier and their cabinet), the Legislative (the elected Members of Provincial Parliament), and the Judicial. Ideally, these work in tandem with each other to ensure our democratic and constitutional rights and freedoms. The three branches should have equal power – however, with a majority government, the Legislative and the Executive branches effectively work as one. Therefore, without a healthy Judiciary, the government works without any checks or balances. Casual uses of the Notwithstanding Clause allow governments to trample on our constitutional rights in favour of political gain. The careful review of our bills is integral to our democracy and democratic process – we must stand up against Ford’s glib use of the Notwithstanding Clause. The ramifications of this can be severe.
What do council cuts mean for us?
On July 27th 2018, the last day for candidates to register in the upcoming Toronto municipal election in October, newly elected Premier Doug Ford decided to change the game in the middle of the election. Ford decided to cut council from 47 wards to 25 wards – a decision that has left city officials scrambling to adjust and has left voters confused.Ford’s reduction of council seats will result in ward populations doubling in size. Communities like ours will feel the squeeze, as the newly elected councillors will struggle to keep up with the needs of the amalgamated neighbourhoods and to speak to residents who desire to contact their councillor.While the federal and provincial layers of government are the decision makers on a broader scale, councillors and city staff handle the day-to-day local services that are the lifeblood of our municipalities. Transit, roads, water, parks, housing and social services are all examples of what falls under the City’s umbrella.The reduction in council has left Toronto with 25 councillors for a population of 2.8 million people – meaning there will be on average 1 councillor for every 112,000 people. For comparison, the city of Ottawa has 23 councillors for a population of 950,000 has on average 1 councillor for every 41,304 people. The difference in representation is staggering – compared to other Ontarian towns and municipalities, Torontonians are going to have the least representation at City Hall.Ford’s decision was an indication of a personal vendetta against our city rather than a way to find real financial efficiencies. The conclusion of studies conducted by the City itself determined that we needed three more wards in order to serve our population appropriately. A growing city requires greater representation, and anything less would be undemocratic.Meddling in the midst of an election period wastes the money of taxpayers and candidates alike. Candidates now have had to adapt to sudden changes that they were not a part of, after all, Ford did not publicly promise to change the size of council during the provincial election.The city clerk’s office was already well underway in terms of planning and paying for the election; the original budget of $17.5 million is now up in the air due to wasted funds and the broadcasted potential spending required to accommodate the changes. Recalculating spending limits and paying to communicate the new boundaries is a weight on the election period. It is not fair for the premier to have interfered in the election without our permission and to waste our hard-earned tax payer dollars.Here in our part of the city, Ward 7, 8 and a portion of Ward 9 will merge to match the provincial boundary lines. This means that two longstanding incumbents are competing against each other for the same ward, which is yet to be officially named. Councillor Anthony Perruzza is known as a hardworking, honest and approachable councillor from Ward 8. George Mammoliti is the infamous councillor from Ward 7 known for his boisterous commentary above all else.In a 25 ward model motions that can be detrimental to marginalized groups and that center profit over people only need 13 votes to pass. This makes it much easier for local interests to be overlooked in the interest of others. It makes city hall a much more easy place to manipulate for those with money and lobbying powers.As residents, we need to do our research and reflect on what is best for our communities and Toronto. We must remember that the decrease in councillors effects how our city is shaped and every vote and voice in council counts twice as much. On October 22nd, let us make sure that Toronto and our community are not left behind.
Editorial ✘Downsview Votes
According to the most recent polls, the Wynne Liberals have lost the confidence of most Ontarians. Instinctively, Ontarians looked to the Progressive Conservatives to end the 15-year-long reign of Liberals at Queen’s Park. However, the abrupt resignation of Patrick Brown and the controversies surrounding his leadership, and the poorly organized PC leadership race that ensued, made Progressive Conservatives look less and less like a viable option for most Ontarians. This sentiment was further reinforced by Doug Ford’s Greenbelt remarks and the Highway 407 data breach controversy which saw the resignation of the PC candidate for Brampton East. Also, Ford’s failure to present Ontario voters with a comprehensive platform makes Ontarians question the aptness of Progressive Conservatives to take charge of the province. The only other option left for Ontarians is Andrea Horwath, the leader of Ontario’s New Democrats, who is seen as the most trustworthy contender in this fierce election season. In contrast to Ford’s PCs, the NDP has presented a fully costed platform that seeks to address some of the greatest challenges faced by Ontarians and aims to make life more affordable for people in the province. This year, the election race in Humber River–Black Creek has proven to be an exciting one with three new and diverse candidates. The candidate that The Downsview Advocate is proud to endorse is Tom Rakocevic. Tom’s rich knowledge of the community and his years of experience advocating for local issues make him a strong voice for Humber River–Black Creek.