Story about life in TCHC building provokes strong reaction

 No matter how you tell a story, there is no pleasing some people.

The Saturday Fixer kicked off a week of columns about problems in Toronto Community Housing with a story about the abuse that Steven Peacock and his partner, Stephan Premdas, have taken from neighbours in the apartment above them at 200 Wellesley St. E.

Their balcony was showered many time with feces and urine, washed down by bleach, from the balcony of the two-bedroom apartment above, which is occupied by 15 to 20 people, far more than the TCHC allows.

Things that were lit on fire, like rags and toilet paper tubes, were also lobbed onto their balcony  from above, while a stream of verbal abuse was shouted at them and thumping and screaming constantly goes on late into the night.

We offered it as a slice of life in a TCHC building, but some readers responded that they felt  no sympathy for them, or anyone else who lives in community housing.

"What a stupid story to write," said Frederick Moore in an email. "The answer to their problem is called - MOVE.

"What are these two people doing living off taxpayers' money anyway? Move and get a job."

As for the upstairs tenants causing the problem, "well, what do you expect from ignorant immigrants, which I bet is what they are, and I could likely tell you from what country.

"Public housing for the most part in this country is a big joke. Most of the people living there should not be. You cannot expect people used to living in mud huts and filth to all of a sudden know what dirt looks like."

How about that for good 'ol Canadian tolerance?

Carlos A. Coimbra's email said the story "seems to display a xenophobic, racist attitude," because it mentioned "tirades shouted in a foreign tongue," and that a woman in the upstairs apartment "spoke a rapid-fire foreign language to a boy."

"Please note that my comment...concerns itself only with the obvious perception that you,  the writer,  show aversion to any language other than English.

"Shameful words," he said, adding that "There's more than one way to say 'a language not known to the listener,' but here you embarrassed the Star."

By making reference to  foreign language, we were trying to politely convey information about the people in the upstairs apartment without identifying their ethnicity,  but Coimbra sees racism in it.

I wonder what he'd have thought if I been more direct?

 

 

 

 

Whatever happened to Toronto’s police helicopter?

The announcement that Durham Regional Police is the proud new owner of a heavy duty Tactical Rescue Vehicle reminded me that Toronto never did get the police helicopter we were told was an absolute necessity.

Durham was the first police force in Ontario to get its own helicopter, and can now add the seven-tonne TRV, which it describes as “a new tool to deal with dangerous hostage taking and barricaded person calls” to its arsenal.

It was donated by General Dynamic Systems of London, Ont., but is more widely used by armed forces as an armoured personnel carrier, with the ability to withstand the blast of an incendiary explosive device.

I wonder if Toronto police are as envious as they were when Durham got its helicopter in the late 1990s, prompting an angst-ridden campaign by Julian Fantino, Toronto’s police chief from 2000 to 2005, to get one of his own.

Fantino was on the warpath early in his tenure about the need for a helicopter, and managed to get the city to fund a six-month pilot project, which gave police a taste of the high life.

Some people remember Chopper One for incessantly hovering over residential areas late at night, where the noise kept people up and made them uneasy about a constant police presence in the air.

I covered city hall for the Star when he was chief and remember hearing a story about the chopper hovering for hours above a neighbourhood where a prominent local politician lived. He allegedly lost his cool over the noise, got on the phone to police late at night and told them to take their helicopter and flock off.

After city council pulled the plug on the project, Fantino went ratcheted up the offensive, insisting that a major city such as Toronto would be vulnerable without one, especially in the post-911 era.

When it became clear that the police services board would never approve the expenditure, he began courting private donors to pay for it, along with senior levels of government.

Concerns were raised about what donors might want in return, as well as increasing the perception of a police state. Fantino accused the quibblers of being paranoid and questioning the integrity of police (his usual response to questions he found impertinent).

The former Tory government promised him $1 million in temporary funding, but when it lost the 2003 provincial election, the Liberals cancelled it.

That was the last gasp for the helicopter, and with none of the dire consequences Fantino predicted.

I think we’re getting along just fine without it, and I’m not sure  Durham will wear out its TRV any time soon by responding to calls for “dangerous” (is there any other kind?) hostage takings.

 

 

 

   

       

 

 

 

 

            

    

  

         

 

          

  

 

  

 
   

 

   

   

 

Traffic safety is far down the list of reasons for speed traps

 Here’s some advice for Toronto drivers: On a warm spring day, keep a close eye on the speedometer when heading down a long hill.

If the weather is sunny and visibility is good, it’s 50-50 that a Toronto police officer is standing part way up the other side of the hill, with a radar gun trained on your car.

Police like to tell the public that the prime motivation for enforcing speed limits is traffic safety. I am here to tell you they are full of it.

A story in the Star last year noted that of all cities in North America, Toronto is the speed trap capital. I’ve seen a lot of evidence to support that theory, as recently as Sunday.

I was driving east on Ellesmere Ave., starting down the long hill west of Neilson Rd., when I noticed that a friendly bus driver headed my way was flicking his headlights on and off.
Sure enough, as I started up the other side of the hill I saw a cop standing by a utility pole, which partially obscured him from oncoming traffic, pointing a radar gun at traffic coming down the hill behind me.

It was no problem for me; I kept my speed at 60 k/ph, but it was like shooting fish in a barrel for him. Who hasn’t descended a long hill and noticed they were going 15 or 20 k/ph higher than the limit?

That’s more than enough to get a ticket.

I continued east to Morningside Ave. and turned right to go south. A long hill on Morningside bottoms out near Ellesmere then climbs steeply, on the way south to Kingston Rd.

Part way up, I spot another cop pointing a radar gun at traffic coming down the hill. Two speed traps in five minutes, only a couple kilometres apart.

Traffic was light, the weather was clear and sunny and there was no reason for them to be there, except to top up a ticket quota.

I have often seen Toronto police clocking vehicles coming down a long hill, the most likely place for even careful drivers to slightly exceed the limit.

Aren’t there more important things for police to do than fish for speeders in the most likely places for law-abiding drivers to go just fast enough to qualify for a ticket?

Aren’t there a hundred other places where traffic safety might be more of an issue, but the fishing may not be nearly as good?

 

   

     

    

  

         

Hospital parking could break people with no choice but to pay

 Is it just me, or is does anyone else feel like the victim of a stickup when paying for hospital parking?

My mother-in-law, who’s 89, was admitted to Rouge Valley Centenary Hospital a week ago, for injuries suffered when she fell in her apartment.

She’s making a good recovery, due in part to the support of my wife and her two sisters, who’ve been at the hospital every day since she went in.

My son and I decided to pop in on Grandma on Sunday, and pulled up to the machine that dispenses tickets at the entrance to the Centenary parking lot. A sign said $4 for each half hour, up to a maximum of $16.

Now I knew what my wife meant when I heard her talking on the phone to her sisters about car pooling.

Each of them has been driving to the hospital every day and maxing out on the parking charge, a total of $48 daily. One of them has been there twice on the same day, a couple of times.

They’ve paid at least $300 in parking fees so far, and will likely pay nearly as much if their mother stays another week. You can only do so much car pooling.

A one week parking pass is available for $70, or two weeks for $90, but my wife pointed that it isn’t an option for a lot of people, if their situation is uncertain.

Centenary is on Ellesmere Ave., at the bottom of Neilson Rd., a wide-open suburban area, but there is zero on-street parking and nowhere else to go. Hospital visitors who gamble on getting away with parking in a plaza on the north side of Ellesmere are ticketed and towed every day.

I stayed just over an hour and paid $12 to park in a lot only one-third full. It felt extortionate, and had me feeling sorry for people who have to go to the hospital every day, for weeks or months at a time, to be with a sick or dying family member.

It’s the same at hospitals all over the city. Some parking lots are even pricier.

For people on a tight budget and dealing with a family health crisis that involves a long hospital stay, it must be crippling.

             

       

 

  

         

 

          

  

 

  

 
   

 

   

   

 

      

 

 

         

Holt Renfrew lay-by is a bigger problem than Pusateri’s

 If the Pusateri’s lay-by has to go, the Holt Renfrew lay-by on Bloor St. should be right behind it.

Those who shop for fine comestibles at Pusateri’s Yorkville location are accustomed to wheeling into the lay-by near the Bay St. doors and tossing the keys to a valet to park the Mercedes.

It’s safe to assume that Pusateri’s customers are not particularly concerned if the four-car indent in the sidewalk squeezes pedestrian space, but city councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam is, and wants to get rid of it.

Pusateri’s says the future of the store is at stake if its hoity-toity clientele are denied the ease of front door parking, and has hired the Sussex Strategy Group to lobby the city to back down on a plan to eliminate it.

If Pusateri’s puts the squeeze on pedestrians, you’d think Wong-Tam would take a dim view of the traffic bottleneck caused by a similar lay-by in front of the chic Holt Renfrew location on Bloor, between Bay and Yonge St.

Holt Renfrew offers valet parking on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, where customers can also pull into a lay-by and have their auto whisked away by a liveried attendant.

During the afternoon rush on Thursday and Friday, the number of vehicles to be parked sometimes exceeds the spaces in the lay-by, but it is no bother to the Rosedale matrons who shop there; they stop in the curb lane next to cars already in the lay-by, turn on the four-way flashers and wait for the valet.

Rush hour traffic headed west from Yonge is squeezed into the inner lane while Mrs. McBucks awaits the valet. At busy times, several cars are idling in the curb lane until the valets clear the backlog.

Traffic can quickly back up through the Yonge intersection, to ensure that a few special people are not denied the comfort of someone else parking their car.

Anyone who has inched along through the regular gridlock on Bloor during rush hour knows it’s already jammed, without the added obstacle of luxury autos in the curb lane.

I asked Wong-Tam on Monday if she had concerns about the traffic situation caused by the Holt Renfrew lay-by.

Not at all, she said, adding that her office hasn’t had any complaints about it.

Consider this the first, councillor. And hopefully, not the last.

 

          

      

   

Woman tears a strip off school board over tattered Maple Leaf flag

 Wow, do people ever get worked up when an institutional building flies a threadbare Canadian flag.

One of the things readers regularly complain about is a tattered national flag, which is seen as disrespectful and negligent, especially when government or a public agency is responsible for it.

Emails are often charged with outrage, but never have I seen one as smoldering and succinct as Catherine Lake’s note on Monday to the Toronto District School Board, which was copied to The Star.

Lake questions the willful blindness of people who walk in and out of a building every day, on their way to or from work, and never notice the threadbare flag, or can’t be bothered to report it.

She began mentioning to a TDSB official an email she sent to him a few months before, about “Frankland Public School flying our nation’s flag upside down and in disrepair.”

Lake went on to say she was writing this time about a flag at Wilkinson Public School, on Donlands Ave., which had “a large tear through the middle of it.”

He letter is so beautiful and well-crafted that it would be a disservice to not liberally quote from it.

“Over the past few weeks I have twice entered the school to report this. I spoke to the principal over a week ago and he assured me the custodian would replace the flag. I had a conversation with him about how appalling it is to see a torn flag and the message we’re sending to our children when we let our nation’s ensign fly in such terrible disrepair.

“I understand that it is the custodian staff’s responsibility to ensure the flag is not in disrepair.

”What I don’t understand is how TDSB staff can enter the schools every day and not notice the indignity and disrespect on the flagpole.

“I don’t understand how a complaint cannot trigger an immediate correction of the situation.

“I can not understand how the TDSB does not promote nor enforce:

-a daily visual review of the state of our flag.

-an immediate replacement or removal of the flag when it is torn.

“Theses are very simple steps and should be a mandatory check of duties.

“It is inexcusable that the Toronto District School Board allow torn flags to be flown. It is a further affront to neighbours of the school when a complaint does not inspire the appropriate action.”

She goes on to say she wants it dealt with immediately, and that “I would like assurances that this matter be brought forward for formal rectification throughout the TDSB.

“One would think that the schools would be more mindful to not show such visible disdain and disrespect. Really - - we can’t even count on you to fly our flag properly?”

I went to the school on Tuesday and was not surprised to see a new flag fluttering in front of it.

After the lashing from Lake, it would have been more surprising if it hadn’t been replaced.

 

 

 

 

  

         

 

          

  

 

  

 
   

 

   

   

 

      

 

 

         

                

 

Drivers making claims for pothole damage are sure to be disappointed

                                                                                        

Anyone who values their time should forget about making a claim to collect on vehicle damage caused by a pothole.

Potholes are back with a vengeance in this old-fashioned winter, with far more than last year, when unseasonably warm, dry weather kept them in check.

SeeClickFix, which is on The Fixer home page at thestar.com and heavily used by readers to report problems, has been inundated with pothole complaints over the past week or so.

The good news is that SeeClickFix plugs directly into Toronto’s 311 service for pothole complaints. The city acknowledges every report, issues a confirmation number and adds the location to its inventory of holes to be filled.

The bad news is that claims for compensation for vehicle damage caused by a pothole are routinely denied, with the city’s insurance adjuster always ruling there is insufficient proof to support it.

When the insurance adjustor is judge and jury in assessing the validity of a claim, it can just say no, and there is nothing more to be done about it.

Not that people haven’t tried. City ombudsman Fiona Crean (who some politicians and Mayor Rob Ford say should be sent packing) issued a report in late 2011 that found the pothole damage claims process is badly flawed, with most unfairly denied.

Over a five-year period, 95 per cent of pothole claims considered for Crean’s report were tossed out, which she described as “shockingly bad service.”

The city’s adjustor came up with all kinds of measures and standards and allegedly good reasons to support its almost total denial of claims, but nobody in the bureaucracy or on city council clamored for serious change.

Promises were made to be fairer, but since it is in the city’s interest to pay off only the squeakiest of wheels and the most egregious claims, you can bet that the numbers haven’t significantly improved.

The lesson for the poor saps whose cars are damaged by bouncing through a pothole is to consider a claim a losing proposition, and not waste time compiling evidence that will almost certainly be tossed out with little or no consideration.

It will only lead to more frustration.

 

    

TTC stops are no place to pile snow

 You have to wonder why a plow operator would pile up snow at TTC stops, forcing riders to climb over or detour around them.

After another dump of wet, heavy snow this week, snowbanks along the curb were topped up by plows and won’t get any smaller until we have a long spell of warm weather, which could be weeks away.

With so much snow compared to last year, you’d think plow jockeys would know by now that the area where buses and streetcars stop for passengers must be completely cleared, as a matter of safety.

Apparently not.

An email with “a war on TTC riders, or simply negligence and apathy?” in the subject line arrived Thursday from Joe LaFortune, which was also sent to city officials, saying that plows are creating icy obstacles at bus stops.

“It is very obvious that city crews (and) contractors or the TTC do not want riders and are actively prohibiting them from accessing buses, or there is a conspiracy to discourage or injure potential riders,” said LaFortune.

When a bus stop on northbound Dovercourt Rd., at Geary Ave., he says it's “in the middle of the road because it cannot get close to the curb. Riders are supposed to risk their lives trying to walk on huge banks and slabs of ice?”

Much of the sidewalk, including the bus stop area, on the west side of Dovercourt, just south of Davenport Rd., has not been properly cleared because the plow can’t get around the utility poles, he said.

“Is this what we’re paying for? Lazy, negligent, endangering people?”

While his note is long on hyperbole (he later sent a second to city officials, apologizing for the first), he raised a point I’ve often wondered about: “I suggest that sidewalk crews dispense with plows …and maybe use snow blowers or shovels, like the rest of us.”

It sounds like a reasonable solution in places where the confines prevent plows from doing a good job, like some TTC stops. But don’t count on it.

 

         

          

 

  

 

 

 

          

  

 

  

Variety store operators victimized by teenaged thief

It’s hard enough to earn a living at a corner convenience store without having to confront a teenaged shoplifter, or let him steal whatever he wants.

My 13-year-old son just walked in the door with a story that made my blood boil, about one of the more outrageous examples of intimidation-based shoplifting I have heard.

He and a few of his Grade 8 buddies were outside a small variety store after school today when a boy they know who is in Grade 9 came along, a big kid with an air of menace about him.

This kid has a reputation among the neighbourhood boys for often having a cell phone for sale at a really good price, which he always claims to have found.

His good luck at finding cell phones ended recently, when one of his teammates on a house league hockey team discovered that his brand new iPhone 5 had disappeared from the dressing room during a game.

The coach, who knows enough to identify this kid as a suspect, searched the dressing room and found the phone in his jacket pocket, but did nothing about it, other than scolding him. He suited up for the next game.

The boys were standing around outside the store when the cell phone salesman said he was going inside to get a treat, and would be right back.

He returned with a handful of gum, candy, a five-hour energy drink and other junk, boasting that he didn’t pay for any of it.

Believing that the younger boys were impressed, he went back to the store three times in less than 15 minutes, coming back each time with more loot that wasn’t paid for.

 My son says the grinning older boy “called it free food” and thought it was funny.

Our corner store has been operated for many years by a succession of Asian immigrant couples, as their first job in Canada. They’re behind the counter from 8 a.m. until 11 p.m., an incredible grind, especially after a few years, to eke out a living that can’t be much better than minimum wage.

The couple running it arrived from China less than two years ago and often have their daughter, who looks to be about four, behind the counter with them.

Clearly, the boy did not go in into the store four times within a few minutes to fill his pockets without being noticed.

The people behind the counter had to decide whether to confront him, which could have gotten physical, or turn a blind eye.

Given the slim profit margins on stuff sold in corner stores, the value of the loot could have a serious impact on the bottom line of sales on any one day.

The hard working family running the store must be wondering what they got themselves into, and what kind of people we Canadians are.

 

 

       

 

  

 

 

 

          

Sudden playoff exit leaves hockey Dad suffering withdrawal

When you go from first to worst – and out of the playoffs – in three quick games, it can be harder on parents than the kids.

My 13-year-old son has had quite a season on the high rolling Toronto Penguins minor bantam AA team; 29-3, with four ties, good enough to finish first among 14 teams in the GTHL east division and win the Kraft Cup.

Our boys beat every other team in their division, won both tournaments they entered and were by far the highest scoring minor bantam AA outfit among 31 teams in the east and west division of the GTHL.

To say that we expected to roll over the two teams we’d meet on our way to a division final showdown against the North York Knights, a perennial powerhouse that finished two points behind us, would be an understatement.

Our first victim was to be the Willowdale Blackhawks, which squeaked into the playoffs in eighth place. We crushed them 9-3 in our first game of the year, back in September, and easily beat them 4-1 in November.

As the season wore on, our boys developed the maddening tendency of playing down to weaker teams, which they always got away with, except for a few ties.

It became an entrenched habit that we were never able to shake.

Willowdale beat us 3-2 last Tuesday, in the opening game of a first-to-six-points series. They outplayed us and were clearly the hungrier team.

The shocked looks on the faces of us parents had to be amusing to the Willowdale kids and families, who looked like they’d won the lottery.

Well, the boys will have learned their lesson, we figured, and know they had to come out firing in the second game, last Saturday. It might even be good for them to play with their backs to the wall, we thought. Toughen them up.

Instead, they played their worst game of the year. They looked bewildered, hopeless, and totally swarmed. We were down 5-0 before we scored three goals in the last five minutes. The domination was in no way reflected in the final score.

To say it was embarrassing – hell, humiliating - is an understatement.

Most of the players were unperturbed in the dressing room afterward, and that’s putting it nicely. My son said a lot of them acted no different than if they’d won.

The mood among the parents before game three on Sunday was sombre. Some were still confident that the real team would finally show up, throttle Willowdale and come roaring back to win the series.

The preponderance of evidence suggested otherwise.

The Penguins came out flying and kept the play in Willowdale’s end, but still gave up the first goal. Our team tied it, but they again went ahead, even though we rained pucks on the Willowdale goalie and bottled them up.

We tied it again and it looked like it was only a matter of time until we cracked them, but the Penguins could not cash in on their chances. They got a third goal on a breakaway and it was over.

Our boys – the highest scoring team, remember - outshot them 36-16 but could only manage two goals. At no point in the three games did we have a lead. Willowdale was by far the better team and deserved to win.

The parents were stunned at the scale of the collapse, which seemed inconceivable, even after the first lost. I scurried out of the rink before the final buzzer, not wanting to meet the eyes of my fellow sufferers.

It reminded me of some advice given to me by a far more experienced hockey dad: Remember, it is just kids’ hockey. The most consistent thing about boys at this age is inconsistency. The damndest things can and do happen.

After six months of hockey almost every day, and with a tantalizing championship always just over the horizon, it takes a while to get over the disappointment, at least for this hockey dad.