Hi Neighbour!
Chag Sukkot Sameach!
Sukkot is a joyful Jewish holiday that celebrates the fall harvest. This weeklong holiday is meant to bring family, friends, and communities together. Wishing our Jewish neighbours a happy Sukkot filled with happiness and the blessings of the harvest. Chag Sameach!
THIS WEEKEND AT MEL LASTMAN SQUARE!
This coming weekend, our neighbourhood will get the chance to celebrate an important festival from India called Diwali which is a Celebration of Lights. North York Diwali Festival is a community-grown festival championed by Rashmi Mishra, a local resident and owner of Rashmi Academy of Performing Arts which teaches traditional and Bollywood dancing. She has worked very hard to pull this together. We have noticed a growing Indian population in our midst and hope it will provide a meaningful opportunity for our Indian neighbours to celebrate an important festival in our community. It will also be a chance for us to enjoy delicious food, and watch incredible performances. We hope you will make time to support this homegrown festival! Click Here to RSVP!
LAST CALL for Newtonbrook East Spaghetti Town Hall!
Join us tonight to dine with neighbours, enjoy musical performances from the Brebeuf Senior Concert Band, and discussion on the following topics:
Update on 175 Cummer Ave.
Agincourt Community Services will share their experiences as outreach workers to the unhoused in our ward
32 Division will share a crime update on the area
Bayview Cummer Neighbourhood Association and Silverview Neighbourhood Association will share how to get involved
Brainstorm how we can work together to improve the community
Share about advocacy for Cummer Station
Updates on park projects and capital improvements in Newtonbrook East
Transportation Services will discuss Traffic Calming and Neighbourhood Streets Plan
We will highlight the importance of participating in the Facilities Master Plan Consultations that are happening next month
Share how we can work together through the Willowdale Action Hub
Click Here to RSVP and hope to see you tonight at 5:30pm!
Gwendolen Park Survey
Many thanks to all who joined us for our chilly Pizza Playdate and Park Consultation. We had over 70 residents come out who provided important feedback for the design team to consider. We always advocate for city staff, who mostly do not live in the areas their decision-making impacts, to come to Willowdale to meet residents personally and see the lay of the land. It was heartwarming for me to see young children, teenagers, and seniors participate in the consultation. This is a great illustration of democracy in action! Little kids who will play in the future redeveloped playscape will be able to say they participated in the decision-making that resulted in the final design!
Please TAKE THE SURVEY whether or not you came to the consultation. The deadline is November 1, 2024. Click Here for the survey.
The Future of Yonge Street
Many people are abuzz at the possibility that our Premier could override the city’s plans for bike lanes that take away car lanes. Some feel that because an Environmental Assessment already passed for Transform Yonge, it would likely move forward. City staff expect details to be released in the legislation expected to come out after October 21.
This is an issue that illustrates the competing interests in our urban/suburban context where a great many residents still need to drive to access our Main Street while others can easily walk or potentially ride to many destinations. Regardless of which side of the issue you are on, I’m sure you can agree that our stretch of Yonge Street which is now due for a once-every-50-year resurfacing, needs a visionary public realm implementation to upgrade our neighbourhood. I do worry that if the bike lanes on Yonge Street were cancelled, we might lose the visionary design and investment this project is supposed to garner from the city.
This past week members of the BIA and I met with members of ReImagining University Avenue, a grassroots group that raised $700K for an artistic light installation in front of the hospital section of University Ave. to bring beauty and hope to those exiting the hospitals late at night. We learned about their fundraising efforts and how they garnered interest in their project. In our research towards a vision for Yonge Street public realm, we also came across the Fund for Park Avenue in New York which funds landscaping, sculptures, and tree lighting. The fund was started by the estate of someone who loved living on the avenue and now provides tax receipts to those who donate towards the beautification of their street.
The BIA alone cannot fund all the pieces of the public realm we envision implementing for a beautiful Yonge Street. This includes street furniture, lighting, and planters that could make our community distinct and grow our cultural and economic opportunities. We hope in the coming year to learn more about how we might work towards a vision and how we could raise the funds necessary to achieve the vision - even if it was a phased implementation. This is very much a seed-planting exercise, one where we may not get to enjoy the shade cast by the trees we plant. However, I believe we have an invaluable opportunity to build something magnificent that could fulfill Mel Lastman’s vision of Willowdale being the downtown of North York, and some might argue the centre of the GTA.
Working towards a beautiful Yonge Street in the present!
Last week, I walked a stretch of Yonge Street with several divisions including:
The goal of this walk was to identify problem areas where there are dead trees, or planters that have been left to grow weeds. Sadly, our stretch of Yonge Street has been featured in the Toronto Star for its lack of investment and beauty. While we wait to implement a visionary public realm plan through Transform Yonge we must still work to make our main street beautiful and liveable.
Urban Forestry informed me that the city will no longer be replacing any dead trees along Yonge Street knowing that anything that is planted would be potentially removed for Transform Yonge, which will see a complete redesign of our main street along with street and sidewalk resurfacing.
Why are there so many trees that have been cut down halfway on Yonge St.?
Generally, Urban Forestry cuts down trees halfway and then has to arrange for equipment to pull tree stumps up from the roots, which is a much more expensive process. Since we will not be replanting in the near term, we have asked Urban Forestry to cut all trees down to soil level moving forward.
Our walk down Yonge Street also revealed that many if not most buildings do not know that they are, responsible for the planters that are in front of their buildings, even though it is on city property. The city is responsible for all trees however building owners are responsible for beautification, including the planting of flowers or plants below the trees and in all planters. We did notice some residents had planted random flowers or even a tomato plant.
My office will be working with the Yonge North York BIA to identify locations where there is a significant gap and create a template of communication that encourages and perhaps inspires boards and owners to invest in making their planters beautiful. Some buildings are doing a wonderful job however they are the minority. I believe this is not necessarily due to intentional negligence. It is likely many building owners simply do not know the role they play. To strengthen our efforts towards a beautiful Yonge Street while we await the implementation of Transform Yonge, we would like to start a Yonge Street Beautification Committee. If you have a passion for gardening, beautification, or logistics please fill out this form as we seek to build a team that can work collaboratively to towards a beautiful young street.
Some planters on the northwest corner of Yonge and Sheppard were identified as the city's responsibility and we will be following up to see how they can be beautified. I look forward to working with the BIA, local community groups, condo boards, and neighbours on upgrading our streetscape.
Yonge Street Tragedy Memorial Location
This week we took a walk with City staff to identify potential locations for the Yonge Street Tragedy Memorial. I’m sure many people are wondering why this process is taking so long. The biggest challenge is the unknown future of Yonge Street in light of Transform Yonge, which will impact which pieces of infrastructure are dismantled, including sidewalks.
During our walk, we identified the cemetery at the northeast corner of Yonge and Sheppard as a potential location however, this too would cause significant delay because there is a process to using any cemetery land that would require some level of excavation to see if there are unmarked graves. As we talked about this corner, we also discussed the potential of Decommissioning this cemetery to make it a more meaningful public space in the future.
There are many questions that must be answered to explore any of these possibilities at this time. The cemetery is maintained by city of Toronto Park staff, and the land is owned by the city. Many of the graves are from people who lived in the 1800s. It would be great to figure out how we could use this space in a meaningful way while still giving a nod to the history of our community. The Yonge Street tragedy Memorial steering committee will have to decide if this is worth the effort to explore it as a location for the memorial. We hope that whatever happens, a memorial is created that commemorates the victims while also uplifting the incredible good that emerged from our community during such a difficult time. We really witnessed #WillowdaleStrong! We look forward to further discussions on this and will keep the community apprised of any new developments.
Some Council Highlights:
Motions Moved: MM22.12 - Back to Basics: Reinstating Service Standard Performance for Toronto Animal Services and Wildlife Cadaver Removal
City Council request the Executive Director, Municipal Licensing and Standards, to report as part of the 2025 Budget process on recommendations that update the service standard for wildlife cadaver removal, including the feasibility of returning to the previous standard of 48 hours.
Many residents have complained about the long wait to have cadavers picked up and we need to ensure we hire enough staff to be able to provide better service. No one wants to see a decomposing cadaver in our public spaces. Hopefully we can address the staffing gaps to meet the growing need for cadaver removals across our city.
EX17.5 - Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport - Runway End Safety Areas.
In the end, the city extended the contract with Billy Bishop Airport to 2045 to provide a longer runway for the airport to secure funding to meet regulatory requirements by the Federal Government. This item took an entire day of discussion at council and I’m not sure anyone is truly happy with the result. Parks not Planes advocates want an opportunity to revisit the decision of placing an airport on the island and this decision results in an extension an added investment which would reduce the chances of an exit for the airport. Those who favour the airport for its role in economic development and tourism, are not necessarily satisfied as they wanted a further extension to justify a greater investment which would have included sound barrier walls and new taxiways. The time extension moved by the Mayor was a compromise.
EX17.1 - Building a Universal Student Food Program in Toronto
There are 220 schools that do not have a food program. Social Planning Toronto reports that “97,000 children in Toronto live in low-income households. That means a child and family poverty rate of more than 20%; an increase of almost 4% between 2020 and 2021. The 2022 statistics were recently released and reveal that this rising trend in child poverty is continuing.” The mayor wants to leverage the federal government’s commitment in Budget 2024 for $1 billion in new funding to establish a national School Food Program to make a universal student food program a reality.
City Council requested staff to report back in November on funding including intergovernmental contributions and operational considerations required to deliver student food programs by January 2025 to every school that has applied, were deemed eligible, but denied due to funding constraints. Additionally, there is a goal to establish a universal lunch program by 2030.
While a few councillor argued the city is overstepping by covering a food program that would also benefit families of children who are not living in poverty, others spoke of the dignity and community that is built by making a food program that is accessible and universal.
A few years ago I chatted with a youth worker from our community who acknowledged that some of the kids they worked with would bring a bag of chips and a bottle of pop to school as their lunch. Undoubtedly, these kids were hungry during the school day. No child should experience hunger in our city and building a plan provides the city an opportunity to maximize the opportunity for federal funding towards this important program and vision.
EX17.17 - Update on the St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts Redevelopment Project
TOLive had a visionary redevelopment plan for St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts to become a multi-use hub that would make arts more accessible for the city to the tune of $421 million. The city’s Chief Financial Officer determined such a project could not proceed given the financial constraints in our city and instead a scaled back version would happen to meet accessibility legislation for $8.8 million. Much of the visioning and design that went into this project happened before I joined the board. I’m sure this change will disappoint many who poured their heart into these plans. However, this is a reminder of the difficult fiscal realities of our city that prevent us from being visionary.
NY17.27 - 461 Sheppard Avenue East - Exclusion of Development from Permit Parking Program
This motion is one I’ve been working on passing at every development that has extremely low numbers of parking. This means that if permit street parking were to be allowed, which it is currently not allowed, that residents of this building will not be eligible. People choosing to purchase homes in buildings with little to no parking availability should know that this is the lifestyle they are committing to and should not look to creating street parking pressures to fulfill their parking needs.
MM22.14 - Solve the Crisis: Support of the Ontario Big City Mayors Call for Action to Address the Growing Mental Health, Addictions and Homelessness Crisis
City Council affirmed our support of a campaign launched by Big City Mayors across Ontario (any city over 100K people). Cities of all sizes have been struggling with mental health, addictions, and homelessness at crisis levels that municipal jurisdiction and property taxes cannot adequately address. The campaign is asking the province to do the following:
Appoint a responsible ministry and Minister with the appropriate funding and powers as a single point of contact to address the full spectrum of housing needs as well as mental health, addictions and wrap around supports.
Have this Minister strike a task force with broad sector representatives including municipalities, healthcare, first responders, community services, the business community and the tourism industry to develop a Made in Ontario Action Plan.
Provide municipalities with the tools and resources to transition those in encampments to more appropriate supports, when deemed necessary
Commit to funding the appropriate services these individuals need, community by community where there are gaps in the system.
Invest in 24/7 Community Hubs / Crisis Centres to relieve pressure on emergency centres and first responders
Here is their call to action:
“We are asking for all Ontarians to join our call by visiting www.solvethecrisis.ca and show their support by signing up and contacting your local MPP to tell them that you want the province to take action now. Together we can do this, but we need your help. To watch our video please visit our YouTube channel here – https://youtu.be/6VRjoEgQm98”
I hope to see you all at Brebeuf College School tonight at 5:30pm for our Newtonbrook East Spaghetti Town Hall! Don’t forget to check your inboxes tomorrow night for our weekly Connected Community e-newsletter!
Warmest Regards,
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