Pharmacy drugstore chain says it will respect building’s heritage By Annemarie Brissenden After one last weekend-long blowout, the doors of the Brunswick House closed for good, leaving the neighbourhood eagerly anticipating the site’s next, presumably quieter and more agreeable, incarnation. “Identifying a new tenant is good news,” said Joe Cressy (Ward 20, Trinity-Spadina), after learning […]

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City to break ground later this year By Annemarie Brissenden Do you prefer a tetherball over a maypole? Would you scramble up a high ropy climber, or cling with glee to a lower rotating one? Would you rather sit on a log, dig through a sandbox, or watch the world go by from your perch […]

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Supervised drug injection sites are on their way to Toronto if local councillor Joe Cressy (Ward 20, Trinity-Spadina) gets his way. The rookie member of city council finds himself on many civic bodies, but at the Toronto Board of Health, he is the elected chair. Cressy announced the initiative in late March after the board […]

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Re “Bike lane plan up for debate” (January 2016): As someone who has actively chased better Bloor Street biking for over a decade, I should be very happy that bike safety changes may finally occur, but I’m not fully pleased. By only doing a part of Bloor Street in the already well-served Annex area (where […]

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Bill 165 offers consumer protection, unifies industry By Han Dong On March 3, 2016, Bill 165, Licensed Home Inspectors Act, 2016, my private member’s bill, received unanimous consent in the Ontario Legislature, and was referred to the committee on regulations and private bills. If passed, Bill 165 will regulate the home inspection industry by licensing […]

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Transforming neighbourhoods into open air galleries By Annemarie Brissenden The 416 Project, an ambitious city-wide guerrilla art installation, is set to hit the Annex in the coming weeks. Canadian artist Jorge Molina is installing 416 six inch by six inch canvases on wooden utility poles in 35 neighbourhoods across Toronto. Each canvas depicts what Molina […]

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Relentless OMB stifles creative green projects By Terri Chu Every time someone mentions a great municipal infrastructure project on the other side of the pond (usually in a really progressive nation like Germany or Sweden), I mutter some lame excuse as to the reason why Canadians can’t have equally nice things. “Our population density is […]

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Meet the Bathurst bird babicka By Michael Chachura In the parkette in front of Bathurst Station an elderly lady sits feeding the pigeons and the squirrels. Sun, rain, snow, or sleet, she’s here on the bench with a bag full of bread and some seeds. Why she feeds the animals, she doesn’t know. She’s not […]

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Student athletes launch online petition By Marielle Torrefranca In the latest of a saga of hurdles, construction of Central Technical School’s $7-million sports facility has been stopped until further notice, said Razor Management Inc. (RMI). According to a Razor news release, the work stoppage comes after the company received a three-year retroactive tax bill of […]

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Specialized facility meets urgent need By Summer Reid Homeless lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and two-spirited (LGBTQ2S) youth finally have a place to sleep without intimidation and harassment. YMCA Sprott House (21 Walmer Rd.) this month began providing transitional housing for 25 homeless LGBTQ2S youth, aged 16 to 24. “It’s another step forward for us […]

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Legislation aimed at being more responsive to survivors By Han Dong Recently, the Select Committee on Sexual Violence and Harassment submitted its final report to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. I am privileged to have been a member of this all-party, non-partisan committee of the Legislature. The recommendations that came out of this committee were developed […]

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Razor Management Inc., which operates the existing athletic facility at Monarch Park Collegiate Institute and is installing a similar field at Central Technical School, announced this month that it had received an unexpected retroactive municipal tax bill of $505,000 relating to the Monarch Park facility. It has also been informed that it will face similar […]

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Cancelled car tax could have made up difference for Toronto By Annemarie Brissenden The City of Toronto’s proposed tax-supported operating budget for 2016 rings in at just over $10 billion, but what’s remarkable is what it doesn’t include. Among the things it doesn’t include are much-needed Toronto Community Housing Corporation (TCHC) money, $25 per capita […]

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