It’s time to focus on survival

By Terri Chu

India’s population of 1.3 billion people is in a state of “lockdown” until May 3. One of the initial impacts was a massive wave of migrants, suddenly jobless, walking hundreds of kilometres to their home-communities. In the country’s most populated state, Uttar Pradesh, state officials have instructed village councillors not to allow returning labourers in. In India and around the world, Coronavirus is laying bare a capitalistic hard-truth: the poor are expendable.   Read more

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Annex Helps Group mounts massive outreach to assist

By Nicole Stoffman

The day Toronto announced a soft lockdown in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, Terri Chu dropped 100 flyers in her neighbourhood. “If, for any reason and with no judgement, you need any help, be it running errands, picking up groceries, or childcare, please feel free to reach out,” they read.   Read more

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“Canadians are kind and generous.” The Prime Minsister tells us this in his daily briefings on the COVID-19 crisis. In reality, this statement is part truth and part aspirational. Fortunately in the Annex, and in a great many other parts of our city, this is proving to be true. Many residents are acting as model citizens: staying home, sharing positive messages, and helping each other out.  Read more

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COVID-19 response speaks volumes about those we choose to ignore

By Terri Chu

There’s a China-sized hole in the world’s pollution map thanks to the coronavirus (COVID-19). Flights around the world have decreased, economic activity has gone down substantially, and our air has never been cleaner. Even Venice’s famous canals are running clean, and are once again home to swans and the odd dolphin.  Read more

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Province has no business case for reckless cuts

By Terri Chu

Last year, Premier Ford and friends dropped $231 million of “taxpayer” money on killing wind energy projects. It’s one thing to not build any more but spending money to cancel projects? That’s next level “respecting” taxpayer money (as he likes to say). What this government has shown us is that it cares not one whit for being fiscally responsible and it cares not one whit for the best interests of the citizens.   Read more

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City is caught flat-footed as alarm bells ring

By Terri Chu

I was mildly optimistic when Toronto City Council officially declared a “Climate Emergency”, in October, 2019. How naïve I was to think that an “emergency” meant that something might actually happen. The situation appears to me as though teenagers are dialing 911 and screaming in terror into the phone while the operator on the other end says: Please hold, your call is important to us.  Read more

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TransformTO consultation held to discuss city’s climate plan

By Khyrsten Mieras

The City of Toronto and the Annex Residents’ Association’s (ARA) Parks, Trees and Environment Committee held the latest TransformTO community consultation at the Bata Shoe Museum on November 4.  Read more

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Silence on Hong Kong and climate crisis has parallels

On November 11, Canadian leaders extolled the virtues of soldiers who lost their lives defending the ideals of democracy. On that day, we might have told the story of the nearly 2,000 Canadian soldiers who fought to defend Hong Kong against Japanese invasion in 1941. Five hundred of those soldiers did not come back, and many others returned deeply scarred after living as prisoners of war.   Read more

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Let’s stop celebrating symbols of destruction

Bling bling! Jaws dropped and the media was bedazzled by the newly unveiled Toronto Raptors championship rings on October 23. For the team’s opening game, each player was awarded a golf-ball of 10 karat gold covered in 14 carat diamonds, and the nearly 20,000 fans watching at Scotiabank Arena were given replicas. Instead of being star struck, I feel sick. Instead of celebrating the making and baring of those rings, we should be denouncing them and the culture that clouds the story they really tell.  Read more

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Growth in GDP is antithetical to environmental protection

By Terri Chu

From an environmental point of view, the most disappointing aspect of this election campaign so far is that all parties, even the Greens, are still talking about economic growth like it matters.   Read more

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As we take the drug of economic development, the planet burns

As the Amazon burns, we are reminded of what unfettered capitalism looks like. Greed has literally blotted out the sun in Sao Paulo. Images taken in the mid afternoon appear as dark as midnight, as smoke from the burning Amazon darkens the sky.   Read more

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No unity of purpose from arms of the city

By Terri Chu  Read more

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