At right, Jeffrey Brodie tries to regain access to what he describes as his residence at 104 Harbord St. The location is know as CAFE, a popular illegal marijuana dispensary where the city has erected concrete barriers to its entrance way. Brodie recently lost his bid to get an Ontario court to order removal of the barrier. READ MORE HERE  Read more

Major Street residents band together to welcome new Canadians

By Leah Borts-Kuperman

At a Christmas party in 2015, ten neighbours living in Harbord Village decided to contribute $1,000 each to help Syrian refugees. The group, which would eventually call themselves the Major Street Refugee Initiative (MSRI), would go on to raise $80,000 and support a family of eight. That support continues today.   Read more

A Holocaust survivor, “he had no bitterness, always looked at the good”

By Ron Csillag, The Canadian Jewish News

Zoltan Zimmerman, whose Zimmerman’s Discount store was among the last of the old Kensington Market shops that sold a bit of everything and was a mainstay of the cacophonous neighbourhood for more than six decades, died in Toronto on Sept. 4. He had turned 93 just a few weeks earlier.  Read more

Conservative candidate absent for climate-dominated debate

By Ahmed Hagar  Read more

In July, the Gleaner reported that once again the illegal pot dispensary operating out of 104 Harbord Street just west of Spadina had been raided by police. Jeff Brodie who claimed to be a legal residential tenant of the premises was evicted because the building was being used as an illegal cannabis store. Police erected concrete barriers to the storefront making access for any purpose impossible.  Read more

Despite the public outcry city staff have still not taken steps to address the concerns of residents about the neglect of Paul Martel Park located on Madison Avenue. City councillor for University-Rosedale Mike Layton has joined the chorus of those advocating for a solution, “I have made repeated requests to parks staff to have the signage replaced and attend to the overall state of the park. With two retirements of parks managers within the south district, maintenance this year was a challenge as the positions were not permanently filled until the end of the summer.  Now that both those positions have been filled, I’m confident the city will be better able to respond to requests from the community.”  Read more

Monica Maitland, who was a student at Central Toronto Academy, has won this year’s safety scholarship from Toronto Police 14 Division. Pictured above from left is Staff Sgt. Tam Bui, Monica Maitland, and Brian Burchell, Scholarship Chair (and publisher of this newspaper). Monica overcame significant family hardships but still managed to make her community a safer more welcoming place. One of the many things she has done is to organize gift bags of essentials for homeless people in her neighbourhood. She approached corporate stores to make donations for these essentials. Thanks to the scholarship, Monica is now enrolled at Seneca College where she intends to study Behavioral Psychology.

As they look to win votes in Ontario, federal Liberal candidates point to Doug Ford as a sort of warning about the dangers of casting a vote in favour of the Conservative Party of Canada. It seems even the Conservatives are buying into this narrative, as party leader Andrew Scheer brought Alberta Premier Jason Kenney to Ontario to give his campaign a boost this month. The distraction does little to veil the similarity between Conservative leaders, particularly when it comes to their climate plans.   Read more

READ MORE ON THE 2019 FEDERAL ELECTION:  Read more

• NEWS: Candidates face-off (Oct. 2019)
• FOCUS: Federal election candidates queried (Oct. 2019)
• FORUM: Vajda makes the NDP case (Oct. 2019)
• GREENINGS: Another election, another round of disappointing platforms(Oct. 2019)
• FORUM: Hold Conservative MPPs to account (Sept. 2019)
• FORUM: “If you work hard, you should be able to buy a home” (Sept. 2019)