Compiled by Emina Gamulin, Mike Radoslav, and Lindsay Tsuji

Click on the links below for more information about Trinity-Spadina and our Q & A with the MPP candidates in the upcoming provincial election on Oct 6.

The Riding
Trin-Spa Statistics

The Candidates

Question 1: Helping families
Question 2: Fossil fuel-based transportation
Question 3: Alternative medicine
Question 4: 40 hours of community service??
Question 5: Amalgamation

Candidate debates this month in Trinity-Spadina

The Riding:

The Trinity-Spadina neighbourhoods include the Annex, Harbord Village, Seaton Village, Chinatown, Koreatown, Little Italy, Little Portugal, parts of the University of Toronto, the harbourfront, and the Toronto Islands.

Trinity-Spadina’s geography. Source: Elections Ontario

Back to top

The statistics:

Population = 115,361 *
Number of electors = 95,363 *
Median income = $50,047 **
Political History:
2007 elections = New Democrat ***
2003 = New Democrat ***
1999 elections = New Democrat ***

* Cited from StatsCan 2006 census data
** Cited from StatsCan 2001 census data
*** Cited from Elections Ontario

Back to top

The candidates:

Rosario Marchese (incumbent, NDP)

Rosario Marchese ( incumbent) was first elected to the Ontario Legislature in 1990. He is the NDP’s critic for Education, Toronto Issues, and Training, Colleges and Universities. Raised in the heart of Trinity-Spadina, he studied at Harbord Collegiate (286 Harbord St.) and graduated from the University of Toronto with bachelor degrees in arts and education. Marchese worked as a teacher and served as a Toronto school board and public library board trustee. He helped local residents organize Ontario’s first condo owners association and has been a vocal defender of condo owners’ rights.

Tim Grant (Ontario Green Party)

Until his nomination, Tim Grant was the chair of the Harbord Village Residents’ Association, where he led numerous tree-planting activities, and helped over 100 downtown households add solar panels to their rooftops. He continues to co-chair Tower Power Toronto, helping condo and co-op residents to green their buildings. Grant has been the co-editor of [Green Teacher ITAL] magazine for the past 20 years. A member of Karma Food Co-operative (739 Palmerston Ave.) and the Huron Community Garden, Grant and his partner Gail were early investors in the wind turbine at the Exhibition. They share their Trinity-Spadina home with a black and white cat who makes them laugh every day.

Sarah Thomson (Ontario Liberal Party)

Sarah Thomson, Trinity-Spadina’s Liberal party candidate, is former CEO and founder of Women’s Post Media, a print and online business magazine for women. She launched studioto.ca, which advocates for excellence in architecture and the protection of heritage buildings in Toronto after spending many years restoring old homes. Thomson ran for mayor of Toronto in 2010 because of her passion for her community and that passion has driven her to run for provincial parliament. She was born in Trinity-Spadina and is the daughter of an architect and an artist. Thomson stands for supporting our hospitals and senior care facilities, better transit in downtown Toronto, the redevelopment of Ontario Place to create local jobs, support for investments in green energy, and protection of our heritage buildings. She is running because she wants help build the foundation for a stronger Ontario for her children. Thomson lives downtown with her husband Greg and their two sons.

Mike Yen (Ontario Progressive Conservative Party)

Born and raised in the GTA, Mike Yen learned first-hand the benefits that strong and diverse cultures offer a city from the lessons passed from his great grandfather who immigrated to Toronto, from China. Yen translated his appreciation for cultural diversity into a Bachelor of Arts from York University—where he majored in History. For the last four years, Yen has called Trinity-Spadina home, where he has developed strong relationships within the community. As a 10-year federal civil servant, Mike has extensive experience working with troubled business and is well aware of the issues and problems that hinder the growth and prosperity of our business community.

Also running in Trinity-Spadina are Guy Fogel for the Socialist Party of Ontario and Silvio Ursomarzo, for the Freedom Party of Ontario. The Gleaner was unable to reach these candidates in time for this story.

Back to top

The Questions:

1. If elected how do you plan to support families with young children and does this plan involve more money for child and family services? BOLD
—Ruth Rosenblood, Children’s Storefront

Marchese: Many community members are profoundly worried about what services are going to be cut that will affect our social infrastructure, so this is a serious concern. I’ve been to The Children’s Storefront and they provide a wonderful service. It’s not a structured kind of environment that they have, but it’s a place where mothers and fathers and grandparents can come bring their children and they can do what they want. For just a little investment, communities have access to a centre like that that provides a creative place for them to be involved as parents grandparents and with children. It’s important to understand what they do and how critical they are to communities. We haven’t specifically said in our platform commitments that this is a program that needs to be funded, but I am a big supporter of that kind of program, and programs for families and children.

Grant: We’re strong supporters of the early childhood initiative, I wish that it involved more schools, but I think that’s a foundation that’s long overdue—especially in downtown neighbourhoods where child care spaces have been scarce. Early childhood education is an important foundation for everything that happens later in life. But there’s also a bunch of other factors involved here. One of the problems we have in Toronto—and especially in Trinity-Spadina—is that housing is unaffordable, and it’s often not available to families. We are asking to have 30 per cent of new condo units be made affordable for people like those needing larger units, instead of forcing them to move out to the suburbs.

Thomson: The Liberals have the early childhood education program—that’s full-day kindergarten and that’s a huge benefit. I have a four and five year old, so as a mother with children that age, it’s a huge asset to be able to put them into full-day kindergarten and it’s so good for their future education. That’s something happening here and now in our riding that I am a huge believer in, as well as more child care. [Premier Dalton] McGuinty had a meeting with our mayor, Rob Ford, and they were discussing more child care. I don’t know the details of that plan, but it sounds that going forward it will be a good plan for families—basically more child care positions. We’ve put in 60,000 child care positions in the last year, so it’s all moving forward.

Yen: The Ontario PC government is looking to give an immediate relief to families by taking the HST retirement charge off their home heating and hydro and making the smart meters optional. It’s too tough to afford the cost of living, and with McGuinty and his tax machines, it’s become more and more difficult in that regard, and families and businesses are really struggling with the high cost of energy. So hopefully this will help her out as well.

Back to top

2. What will you do to help Ontarians reduce their dependence on fossil fuel-based transportation?
—François Villeneuve

Marchese: We have announced that we would share the TTC operating costs 50/50. It’s something we used to do as governments, and we did it when I was a minister in 1990. We’re one of the few cities in the world that gets very little support from the province and/or federal government. It’s absolutely wrong. So the promise of sharing the costs with the cities is critical, and the only commitment we ask of the city is that they don’t increase the fare. We have to build that kind of infrastructure because if we have better access to the TTC system—whether its light rail, and/or subways—assuming that we can commit to federal governments to support us—then people will use it and they will get out of their cars. That doesn’t solve the problem of trucks and pollution, because that in my mind is a big, big problem. We attacked the government because they claimed to be the greenest ever in this province, and yet they were the ones that have allowed diesel trains. We need to commit ourselves to electrifying our rail system across Ontario, and indeed across Canada. People will stop using their cars if they have a better alternative. At the moment, we are not giving them a better alternative.

Grant: Trinity-Spadina is blessed with streetcar lines and subways, although not enough and not everywhere. The TTC itself doesn’t have the funds to provide the kind of service we really need. We need to start shifting monies away from new highway construction to transit, so that the system has the long-term, stable funding both to maintain a state of good repair and expand service. We think one per cent of the current $5.8 billion Ministry of Transportation budget should go to cycling infrastructure, and one per cent to pedestrian infrastructure, to create a fund that municipalities could apply to for projects. The other issue for us in Trinity-Spadina is GO Transit. With the rapid expansion westward of the train lines people will be subjected to a larger number of diesel trains. We believe that electrification of rail lines is not only urgent, but the additional cost of electrification can be paid for by covering over the tracks and selling the real estate above it, which from Dufferin Street all the way to Yonge would be quite valuable.

Thomson: I don’t know if you know this, but I ran for mayor of Toronto in the last election. I was a big subway advocate. I believe in public transit, especially in our downtown core. We’ve got $9 billion coming to Toronto, which is terrific. We’ve got an Eglinton [light rail] line, which will help reduce the reliance on the automobile. That’s one of the big things that I was just so happy about which was announced back in February or March, that it would go to the Eglinton [light rail], as well as the coal plants that we’re shutting down. We will be closing all coal plants by 2014. All of them. My father died of emphysema and pneumonia so it’s a personal issue for me.

Yen: We’re going to close all coal-fueled plants by 2014. The Ontario PC Party believes in green energy, but it has to be at a price that Ontario families can afford. Unfortunately, Dalton McGuinty’s green energy experiment is too much of a strain on families. So, again, it’s about providing immediate relief and getting away from the coal plants. We plan on investing in the city. We’re going to take the gas tax and invest it in transit infrastructure.

Back to top

3. “What does the Ministry of Health do to encourage research on medicines you can’t patent, things that already exist like vitamins, amino acids, metabolic co-factors, etc.? Is it enough? Is it feasible to do more?”
—Jason Skomorowski

Marchese: The fact that you have patents for 20 years, in my mind, has always been a problem. That makes that product very expensive until generics are able to get in. [Drugs] comprise about 15 per cent of our overall health costs, which means its incredibly expensive and it has become a growing expensive problem in this province. That’s something governments have to tackle a little more effectively to bring down the costs. But what kind of research does the government do in non-patent areas? I think we probably don’t do very much. Mainly, I suspect, because it’s a very expensive thing to do, I think there isn’t much research in the non-patent areas. When you are not in [the party that forms the] government you don’t have access to research in terms of what they do. Could more be done? I suspect so. I suspect there are a number of problems, which makes this a very challenging area of study.

Grant: Traditionally the role of the Ministry of Health has largely been dealing with the safety of drugs and the efficacy of drugs, but what we haven’t done is paid enough attention to non-invasive, non-drug treatments that can also be supportive of greater public health. I’m not aware of how much the Ministry of Health currently spends on investigating non-drug treatments, but I would certainly endorse them doing so. One of the ways Trinity-Spadina is different, from my personal experience, is that we have a much greater interest in public health, and in personal health, and people are more knowledgeable and do seek out alternatives. It does behoove us as a government to make sure all non-invasive drug and medical treatments meet the standards of care that we demand of drug treatments, that they don’t cause harm, and when taken in reasonable doses they promote health.

Thomson: I’m a big promoter of naturopathy, I saw it firsthand in my father when he was ill. The Ministry of Health is looking [at it] and they’re actually accepting naturopathic medicine as a credible alternative. That’s something that I’m so proud of that we’ve done. We’re the first government to actually see it as a credible source of healing and a method to reduce reliance on hospitalization and drugs. I think there is so much more we can do to give acceptance to that area of naturopathy that has been overlooked for years and years and years.

Yen: With regards to health, we’re planning on investing $6.1 billion to our health system and we’re going to be investing that into front-line care. Unfortunately under the McGuinty government we’ve seen more and more investment into administration. So with further investment in health care we should be able to increase front-line services.

Back to top

4. “Please comment on the current state of the high school 40 hour community service requirement for students as introduced by the Harris government. What, if anything, would you do differently?”
—David Perlman

Marchese: [The requirement] forces students to think about the larger community because most students don’t think beyond what they need to do in school, and sometimes they think school doesn’t really connect to their real life experiences, or real issues they’re facing at the moment.  It would be good to do a study of all that students have done, like we do with exit polling, to find out how their experience has been and how we can improve it. But overall, I think the idea is a good one and doing 40 hours of community service is good for all of us.

Grant: I think this was a good, tiny first step, but I think our high school system betrays the developmental needs of high school kids. I’m a big advocate of changing the curriculum at the high school level so that kids are much more engaged in community projects and improving the life of their communities. When kids are involved in community projects they themselves develop a greater enthusiasm for the learning they are doing back in the classroom in support of that project, and they start to care about subjects they didn’t previously.  We should start with pilot projects that eventually move to 10 per cent of the curriculum spent outside in the community, not just 40 hours, where teams of teachers would work together to create projects for students.

Thomson: It gives them a chance to get out there in the working environment and I think that’s great. Some students need that; some students already have that because they’re already working. I think it’s a really good plan, [I would] maybe allow some students more hours, so they could get credit for their hours. Because of my background, I left school quite early, in grade 11, and then I had to go back and take it through night courses. I found certain people learn differently and apprenticeship is a great way to learn.

Yen: The Ontario PC government would fully invest in education and we want to give teachers a little bit more freedom in making decision for their classrooms. So it’s about investing in our education and giving a little bit more freedom. I think community services are great for students. It’s great for them to get out there and experience things outside the classroom. I know we have a lot of students who volunteer on my campaign and they’re learning quite a bit and they’re making a lot of great connections in the community. And they may be learning things that they may not be learning in school.

Back to top

5. “Given recent votes and voting patterns at City Hall, do you support reversing the amalgamation foisted upon Toronto by Mike Harris?”
—Hamish Wilson

Marchese: I think Mike Harris destroyed our city. I think amalgamation has made it incredibly complex. We used to have a process where people could go to a city and have much more influence on their city, whether it was East York, Toronto, North York and so on. When you made it into one huge city of 2.6 million it has become complex and difficult, and citizens are not able to influence the City of Toronto as they could in the old days. I would love to break it up again, but I’m not quite sure that it’s easy to do. And if there was a better way we could give more access to citizens by the city to be able to influence policy direction, I would love to be able to study that. But to break it up again would be yet another destructive or hurtful move for the City of Toronto. [Going back] would create problems yet again that would have to be solved once again, so the best thing we could do is improve this structure that has been hoisted upon us.

Grant: I certainly support an honest review of de-amalgamation, but ultimately these are initiatives that must be citizen-driven. We should provide people with a reasoned debate so in the cold light of day, with the facts before them, they can make a decision. This would help to determine whether we go back to six municipalities, or maybe we go back to four. However I think we speak too much about differences, there is a recognition that all corners of Toronto need equal access to services and good transit and need public investment in infrastructure. This would help the people in the corners of Toronto address the same needs as those living downtown.

Thomson: I’m not for going backwards. I think we are still suffering from amalgamation not being transitioned effectively, but I believe that there is still work to be done, and I believe that if we can do it effectively the city could get more benefit from it. I don’t know if you know that we’ve uploaded services such as our drug benefits program. There has been a lot of uploading from the municipalities back to the McGuinty government. That was an agreement that was done in 2009, so it has just come through. And that uploading does help. Services like the drug benefit program, disability support, work benefits program, court security costs. Those things have been uploaded.

Yen: The City of Toronto has a lot of tough decisions to make and the Ontario PC government will work with every municipality including Toronto to make sure that we’re able to deliver services to the best we can working together.

Back to top

Who wants a debate?

Candidates for the provincial Trinity-Spadina seat will have many chances to compel and rally their would be constituents at all-candidates debates and forums this month.

On Sept 14, the Trinity-St. Paul’s Church’s (427 Bloor St. W.) debate will be moderated by Rory Sinclair, chair of the Harbord Village Residents’ Association. It is being co-sponsored by the Annex, Seaton Village, Harbord Village and Huron-Sussex Residents’ Associations, and the Harbord Street and Bloor-Annex BIAs.

On the 15th, the University of Toronto Students Union is hosting their all-candidates debate from 2 to 4 p.m. The debate takes place at Hart House (15 Hart House Circle).

If education issues are your thing, check out the forum at Central Technical School (730 Bathurst St.) on the 20th, which begins at 7 p.m.

The next night, Sept. 21, the Bathurst Quay Neighbourhood Association (BQNA) and the York Quay Neighbourhood Asoociation (YQNA) will host their all-candidate event. Taking place at the Harbourfront Community Centre (627 Queen’s Quay W.), the debate occurs from 7 p.m. to 10  p.m. and will be moderated by local artist Alice Norton.

On Sept. 24, at the Financial Services Building at 290 Adelaide Street East, the Make it Count! Festival will feature live entertainment, voter education, a workshop on Provincial policy 101, and an all-candidates debate. Lunch and snacks will be provided. Event begins at 10 a.m. For more information, visit www.ontarioyouthmatter.ca and www.rockthevotecanada.ca.

On Sept. 27, starting at 8 p.m., Rogers Television will broadcast a Trinity-Spadina debate. Check your TV listings for the correct channel, it varies depending on the cable provider.

Finally, on Sept. 28 from 7 to 9:30 p.m., the Friends of Christie Pits and Christie Pits Residents’ Association will host their debate. It will take place at Bob Abate Recreation Centre (485 Montrose Ave.) at 7 p.m.

Back to top

By Michael Radoslav

Seats are a hot commodity at Simpsons trivia night. Courtesy Mike Wrobel.

Packing in a crowd of hundreds to standing room capacity, with virtually no advertising or promotion, Andrew Ennals and Amanda Factor must feel like the man who single-handedly built the rocket and flew to the moon. What was his name, Apollo Creed?

Ennals and Factor are the creators of the insanely popular Simpson’s trivia night, held the second Tuesday of every month at the Gladstone Hotel.

The two friends are huge fans of the show themselves, so much so that Ennals described their get-togethers as just “throwing Simpson’s quotes at each other in whatever conversation we were having.”

Factor said their emails would turn into “quote-a-thons,” and this led to the idea of starting a trivia challenge.

“It came along at the right time because trivia is so hot right now,” Factor said. “We were on the cusp of the whole explosion.”

The two were shocked that a Simpsons trivia night was not already being held in Toronto, and began one at The Ossington last year. With an unexpectedly high turnout, they quickly moved to the Gladstone two months later.

The new venue has not fared much better. “We thought there would be enough space,” Ennals said with a laugh. “There was for about 15 minutes.”

“It’s awesome,” said Jeremy Vandermeij, the Gladstone’s creative director. “Every single seat in the Melody Bar is taken, and we put in extra seats.”

The night is about entertaining the fans that congregate to bask in the warm glow of their favourite episodes from seasons 1 through 11. The hosts pick three episodes to play throughout the evening; in between each episode, they ask a round of questions.

The winning team receives the highly sought-after prize of a table for their team on the stage—a valuable commodity on a busy night that doesn’t take reservations.

John Semley started coming out last September and has been back every month since. Semley says it’s intense among the teams at the top to the point where it’s almost like a professional league. “I don’t play sports so to be honest it’s nice to have something I’m good at,” he said.

Regardless of the competition, participants revel in watching episodes together, reciting quotes in unison, singing songs from the show, and relaxing in the company of fellow Simpsons nerds.

The lively crowd is also fuelled by alcohol, which Homer Simpson once famously described as the cause of—and solution to—all of life’s problems. For the night, the Gladstone renames one of its regular draughts Duff Beer in honour of the occasion, Vandermeij said.

Due to its overwhelming success, the Gladstone is putting together a Futurama trivia night, a tribute to another Matt Groening creation, which is scheduled to begin Tuesday, September 27.

To find out more about Simpsons trivia night check out their blog or follow them on Twitter.

By Julia Hennessey

Wellbeing Toronto allows the user to select multiple indicators for a neighbourhood at one time. Screenshot courtesy of City of Toronto.

After two years of development, Wellbeing Toronto website launched this summer and received close to 20,000 hits on its first day.

The City of Toronto, along with partners that include the United Way and Toronto’s school boards, have contributed to the development of the online application that allows users to view and compare Toronto neighbourhoods based on personally weighted criteria and create on-the-fly maps.

The tool may change how government funding is allocated, the way nonprofits will operate, and will inform business owners and residents about their neighbourhoods.

“We wanted to create a system that looked at neighbourhood well-being across all of Toronto’s neighbourhoods, not just a certain number or a priority number of neighbourhoods,” said Harvey Low, manager of Social Research and Analysis for the City of Toronto.

Information is provided for 140 neighbourhoods in Toronto and users can select up to 20 indicators for a specific neighbourhood at a time. The weighted indicators allow users to evaluate areas based on the criteria they deem most important.

Options go beyond typical demographic information such as population, to provide data ranging from tree cover to voter turnout, and pinpoint the locations of amenities. Low hopes Wellbeing Toronto will offer new insight into neighbourhoods like the Annex by providing “information that we’ve never reported on before in this format-on cycling and pedestrian traffic, accidents, and access to public transit.”

Criteria were selected to illustrate all aspects of a neighbourhood. “We decided to include indicators that could potentially look at the assets of communities as well as the challenges.”

While Wellbeing Toronto has the potential to serve a wide range of users including academia, NGOs, and government, the site may be especially interesting to businesses when positioning themselves, and residents shopping for a home.

Low said businesses and corporations can use the website to find information about potential clients, including income level and languages most commonly spoken when deciding on a location and how to target their services. “If you’re doing service planning and you want to locate a new convenience store, use Wellbeing Toronto to find out where the existing ones are so you don’t locate right next to an existing one.”

The website also offers information to business operators about community support for their employees. “The Annex has a variety of restaurants, many different retail outlets along Bloor. It would provide not only information about those retail establishments and where they are located, but also the human supports in that community from child care to seniors homes.”

People looking to purchase homes can use Wellbeing to investigate area information including the location of schools and the average annual income of homeowners, says Low. “[People] want to be near public transit, which the Annex is, they want to be near great parks, which the Annex has,” but they may weight these characteristics at different levels of importance. Wellbeing Toronto allows these users to “pick the same indicators but weight them differently.”

However, Low suggests that the application is one of a number of tools that those shopping for a home can use. “In order to really get a feeling of a community like the Annex you need to walk the streets, you need to feel the neighbourhood, you need to smell the air, look at the trees.”

Elden Freeman, Vice President of Freeman Real Estate, agrees that the applications usefulness in the real estate sector is limited. “People buy homes on an emotional basis. If the schools are good and their peer group is buying in the neighbourhood—statistics don’t add anything.”

He says Wellbeing may also stigmatize neighbourhoods whose positive characteristics statistics may not be illustrated by statistics and is concerned the website will increase the divide between neighbourhoods. “It really is creating ghettos of rich and poor, and that’s what this whole map reinforces.”

Renny Cannon, a homeowner who shopped for a home in the Annex in 2006, says he would have tried the website, but is not convinced it would have been useful. “The areas are so large. I mean—when they define the Annex [to include] from Christie Street to Avenue Road—the area surrounding Christie Pits is very different from the area surrounding University Avenue, so I don’t think it provides too much insight into a neighbourhood.”

Visit the Wellbeing Toronto Website at map.toronto.ca/wellbeing.

Performances, including lion dances, have featured prominently in past Chinatown Festivals. Courtesy Chinatown BIA

The Chinatown BIA is getting ready to host the annual Chinatown Festival this weekend, and organizers said that they wanted to make sure that the celebration has mass appeal. “We like to stage a festival that is organized by Chinatown BIA, but we want to share with everyone and get everything on one stage,” said Tonny Louie of the BIA.

With more than 100,000 expected in attendance and attractions that will include cuisine from around the world, cricket, and perhaps even some Kung Fu monks (visas permitting), the free event should have no problem meeting its goals.

The cuisines are one of the most important features of the festival. Louie stresses that there will be “not just Chinese food, but different kinds of food,” from Arabic-styled wraps and barbecue beef, to Taiwanese cultural food and Malaysian murtabak chicken.

Moon cakes, Chinese bubble tea and ice cream will also be available.

This year’s festival will also have both a beer garden and a children’s play area. Mariama Barrie, organizer of the games segment, says that “[we] are planning to have different performances from different community centres across the city, as well as carnival games.”

A bouncing castle and martial arts demonstration and workshop are in  the works for the kids.

Organizers say that a performance by a dozen Shaolin Monks of China is “70 per cent” confirmed. The world famous Shaolin Monastery of China occupies a special place for the Chinese culture and history. “We have had other forms of martial demonstrations in past festivals but not Shaolin style,” said Louie. We’ll keep our fingers crossed.

The Chinatown Festival takes place Sept. 10 and 11 on four blocks of Spadina between College and Dundas.. For more information, please visit www.chinatownbia.com.

We've got one week to auction off these iconic and original hand-painted Honest Ed's signs. All proceeds will go to buying a badly needed new printer. Help us spread the word! Thanks!

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=280735667662#ht_500wt_1093

By Síle Cleary

The Danger Bees. Courtesy Luther Mallory.

They may be new in town, but Daycare Records are showing just how feisty they are by utilizing the tag line “babysitting your stupid band.”

The record label is the brainchild of music journalist Karen Bliss (whose work is published in numerous publications, including the Gleaner, Billboard, RollingStone.com and MSN) and musician/producer Luther Mallory, who say the tag refers to an industry inside joke. “It’s not supposed to offend anyone, but everyone in the music business understands that if you’ve tried to work closely with bands it can be demanding and thankless,” says Bliss. “It can even get to the point where they may ring you up in the middle of the night for something that can clearly wait until morning.”

Daycare Records, which currently runs out of Bliss’s Annex home, launched in July of this year and has already signed two reputable Canadian artists: indie pop band The Danger Bees and renowned Canadian battle rapper Kid Twist.

The Danger Bees, which hail from Nova Scotia, solidified in Toronto in 2010 after Mallory (of the band Crush Luther) heard them and convinced them to relocate to the hub of the Canadian music industry.

Since hooking up with Daycare, their song “Why Won’t You Listen,” appeared in an episode of Degrassi this July, while another of The Danger Bee’s songs, “Awkward Guy,” is in the film Moon Point directed by Sean Cisterna.

The video for their single “Good Year” has received a lot of attention as a result of it being shot in just one take by director Gavin Michael Booth.

The video shows frontman David Macmichael being battered by objects and screamed at by his crazy “girlfriend.”

“They had one try to get it right and luckily they managed to pull it off,” said Bliss.

Kid Twist. Courtesy Luther Mallory

Daycare Records’ other act, Kid Twist, is a phenomenal wordsmith with a huge following in the battle rap scene.

Kid Twist, who has humorously named himself after “a Jewish mobster who stabbed people in the brain with an icepick,” is currently working on his first music release with Mallory which will be more humorous than edgy.

Daycare Records is planning on utilizing online resources to help promote the music on their roster.

“The music business is changing so rapidly and new companies are cropping up all the time that offer creative and inexpensive ways for independent artists to get their music out there,” said Bliss.

“Daycare Records is exploring all those [options], from music licensing to online gigs.”

By Michael Radoslav

Councillor Adam Vaughan leads a Jane’s Walk through CityPlace. Courtesy Gary Pieters.

While condo projects have dotted the Toronto skyline for years, at CityPlace some see more than just construction underway—they see the potential for a great community.

“CityPlace is a great development and that’s what it was before we started here, a development,” said Dean Maher, president of the recently-formed CityPlace Residents’ Association. “Our goal is to make a house a home.”

The residents’ association wants CityPlace—a group of condominium developments located south of the rail corridor between Spadina and Bathurst—officially recognized as a neighbourhood by the City of Toronto, much like Kensington, Chinatown, and other areas. In addition they are working on a host of community-building initiatives.

Maher is a founding member of the association, helping to aid its formation last January after an unsuccessful bid to become a councillor in last fall’s municipal election.

The residents’ association has been working with Councillor Adam Vaughan (Ward 20, Trinity-Spadina) to achieve their goal of obtaining official recognition.

“Very few neighbourhoods are created out of nothing, and that is why this is so exciting,” said Vaughan. “It is a great opportunity to create this new community in the downtown core.”

Community-building initiatives are sprouting organically based on resident feedback said Steve Kee, the association’s vice-president of communications. Such initiatives include declaring a portion of Canoe Landing Park a dog park and starting up neighbourhood sports leagues at the turf field. For a part of town rich in rooming space, but lacking communal facilities, Maher said more restaurants or a community library would help make the area more attractive.

The group has also started hosting public meetings, including a recent one with Metrolinx regarding future projects.

However, the association’s work is not without its challenges. A lack of longevity is a hurdle in growing a community, said Sandeep Agrawal, an urban planning professor at Ryerson University. Downtown condos generally attract young professionals and young couples, groups not known for staying in one place too long. “At the moment what I see is that it’s more of a transitory place,” said Agrawal. “It is families and kids that make a neighbourhood lively and rich and give it more of a sense of permanency.”

Jack Kiatmysack, 26, a CityPlace tenant, reaffirmed that notion. “We’re leasing and we’re leasing on purpose,” he said.

Many of Kiatmysack’s neighbours say they do not see this as a long term destination point, he said, but rather a stop along the way.

“They have to find a way to keep everybody here,” said Korhan Kinazi, 33, a real estate agent who lives at CityPlace. “I think there’s an age aspect of living here, after you get settled and have a baby, I see people moving away.”

Maher said that perception of temporary residence is something the association is fighting to change. “If that’s the mentality we’ll never have people sit down, have a coffee and meet their neighbour.”

Future developments, such as the Toronto Community Housing project slated for the area, will help the area by adding more long-term residents, he added.

In addition to the transient nature of life in CityPlace, the group also has 12 official members that represent the interests of 12,000 people, which may prove to be another challenge. The residents’ association is currently made up of eight board members and four people working on projects, according to Kee. He said the group has “no immediate goals” of seeking mass membership from the greater CityPlace community, saying their focus is currently to “build up, be solid, be consistent, and build infrastructure,” but they want to “continue to make inroads into buildings and talk to people.”

While the group is not currently focused on membership drives, they are happy to work with residents who have suggestions and intend to find a representative from each building to widen their network. “We have to demonstrate that we’re building value, and I believe that we are,” Kee said. “We feel that we’ve made great strides.”

Ultimately to build a neighbourhood people need a reason to come together, Agrawal said, whether out of desire or necessity. In the past, neighbourhoods have united when a large construction project, such as highway, was built nearby, a tragedy has struck, or a group looked to occupy a specific piece of land together. Maher is confident a strong connection can and will be established among residents living at CityPlace.

“We won’t be Little Italy or Little Portugal since we are a condo community,” Maher said, “but we will form a new community.”

By Michael Radoslav

Signage has begun to change over at the Annex Live. Photo by Michael Radoslav/GLEANER NEWS

After a three year hiatus, a legendary Annex hangout is reborn. Dooney’s Café, a once popular destination for artists and politicians in Toronto has returned, replacing the Annex Live.

However, owner Graziano Marchese (brother of Trinity-Spadina MPP Rosario Marchese) has no easy feat returning Dooney’s to its former glory. With a loyal but aging cast of regulars, a new location off highly trafficked Bloor Street, and plenty of seating presently available most afternoons, the café that was once an Annex institution will have to work hard to reclaim its title as community hub.

As the original owner of Dooney’s Café, Marchese left the Bloor Street location in 2008, selling the rights to the Dooney’s name along with it. Under new management Dooney’s ran a short while before becoming the T Café. Marchese opened the Annex Live in the location of the former Poor Alex Theatre.

Originally he intended to cater to an older, more upscale crowd. However, the new establishment struggled to find an identity in the neighbourhood. “The Annex [Live] wasn’t sure what it wanted to be,” Marchese said, “whether it wanted to be a restaurant, or a music venue, or a breakfast place.”

Following more than a year of negotiations, Marchese regained the rights to the name Dooney’s Café. The original Dooney’s was renowned as a popular hangout catering to the local artistic and political community. It famously staved off an attempted takeover by Starbucks in 1995—the words “Save Dooney’s” remain etched in the sidewalk on Bloor, in front of the old establishment. It became a central meeting place for many in the Annex.

As time passed, the crowds began to shrink and, when Dooney’s finally closed its doors, the halcyon days had already passed. Marchese said he wants to recreate that old atmosphere and reconnect with the community in his new location. “[Dooney’s] success wasn’t necessarily the food or the coffee,” he said. “I think it was based on that social part of it.”

“Some left, but the larger community is starting to come back,” said Peter Fawcett, a Dooney’s regular since the early 1990s, who wrote the book Local Matters: A Defence of Dooney’s Café and other non-globalized places, people, and ideas in 2003.

Author and screenwriter Ian Adams has been a loyal Dooney’s patron since day one. “It’s not like its identity is through corporate logos, it was, and still is, about community” he said. “It’s getting to be interesting again.”

“It really means something, something totally different than a [coffee chain], which has the aroma of sitting in an airport watching passengers walk by.”

Unlike its previous location, the new Dooney’s is tucked away on Brunswick Avenue, which will pose some challenges. “Seeing as we’re a bit off the beaten track we’re going to have to work a bit harder,” said Marchese.

Fawcett said the café has lost the “see and be seen” element it once had. There is a small patio out front and a larger one in the back, but it is not the same as the days on Bloor.

There was also a younger crowd that frequented the old Dooney’s at night, Fawcett said, but young customers are few and far between at the new location. New patrons, and in particular younger patrons, will be “necessary in the long run” for the café.

While admitting the importance of drawing a youthful element, Marchese said he has no plans yet to specifically target a young audience.

Regardless of whether Marchese can rekindle the popularity of the original venue or not, Marchese said he is just glad to work under the name Dooney’s again. Ultimately, he said success will depend on how the community embraces this new location.

“I don’t think I can create the culture, I just have two doors. Whoever comes in creates the culture,” he said. “You just leave the doors open for whatever people want.”

By Cara Waterfall

Lucas Lung has the best of both worlds: the amenities of being a downtown lawyer coupled with the gratification of doing public interest work. Photo by Cara Waterfall/GLEANER NEWS

Lucas Lung has an aura of unflappability: he is tall, distinguished, and speaks in a carefully modulated voice. This unruffled persona has served him well in the courtroom, where he has battled Internet hate crimes and elder abuse, among other issues.

But the Seaton Village resident is unsettled by the attention he received for his Young Advocates’ Award for achievement in social justice this summer. “I don’t think what I’ve done in the last several years has been all that extraordinary,” he says. “I think it’s hard to put my record up against other people I know who devote a great deal more of their time and energy to this type of work.”

Lung, 38, sits in an airy boardroom, light flooding through immense windows. The sleek, modern office is one of the perks of being a “downtown lawyer” although his portfolio is anything but ordinary, with about a third dedicated to pro bono files. “Whatever I do, there’s always going to be some public interest component to it,” he says. “I have a very strange practice profile, but Lerners [LLP] has been ridiculously supportive of the work that I do.”

It has been a big year for Lung, who also won a landmark case in immigrant sponsorship this June. The Supreme Court declared that family members who sponsor relatives must support them, regardless of changed circumstances. He modestly describes the outcome as one of “divided success.”

His interest in social justice and strong work ethic stem from his upbringing. After his mother’s marriage “ended quite violently,” she emigrated from China to raise him and his two siblings on her own. Seeing her hard work provided him with the template for how he would conduct his life.

At the time, Vancouver was a city struggling to find its identity amid the influx of Asian immigrants; Lung experienced racism there and his overseas travel exposed him to a host of poverty-related issues.

In 2003, he accepted a three-month internship in Cairo with the Human Rights Commission to produce a report on the insecurities of the Burundian refugee community in that city, who had fled the Rwandan conflict. He was struck by the suffering of a young woman who had been raped by a group of soldiers. “There are things that happen in Canada as well, but certainly not to the extent where there’s an expectation,” he says. “What’s more frightening is that she accepts that that’s just a part of life, and here we would view that as completely extraordinary.”

The Cairenes’ treatment of “foreigners” like the refugees was eye-opening. “[They are] like many other cities in the world that are in countries that don’t have an immigrant history like we do here: they struggle with foreigners.”

It made Lung appreciate Toronto—with its cultural diversity and conveniences—even more. Although his relationship with the city got off to a rough start (as a law student, he stayed at a “dreadful hostel” in Kensington Market where he slept in a chair), he eventually met his future wife in the neighbourhood.

Lung remembers feeling like “a bit of a nomad” in law school compared to his classmates. “A lot of students were very linear in their thinking in terms of their careers,” he says. “There was an expectation that you would end up at a firm, you would keep going, you would become a partner, and you would die, and that’s it.”

Now his focus is “much more community-based.” His calendar has become even more crowded since he became a board member for St. Jude’s Community Homes, a non-profit agency that provides housing to individuals with mental health issues.

He sees all of his files within the context of his practice at the firm. “I don’t really distinguish between my paid clients and my unpaid clients. Your pro bono files have to be viewed as just any other file.”

Lung sees the law primarily as a platform for his public interest work, but it’s also a form of storytelling that fits as organically into his personal life as his professional one. “When I’m standing in court, obviously there’s the legalese, [but] I’m really not saying anything differently than what I would have been saying before I was a lawyer.”

For more information, contact: Mary Ann Freedman, Freedman & Associates Inc. for Lerners LLP

It’s that time again!

The Gleaner is interviewing MPP candidates for Trinity-Spadina and Parkdale-High Park in advance of the Oct. 6 provincial election. We are soliciting questions from our readers that we will compile and pose to candidates on your behalf.

The major party candidates in Trinity-Spadinaare incumbent Rosario Marchese (NDP), Sarah Thomson (Liberal), Mike Yen (PC), and Tim Grant (Green). In Parkdale-High Park the incumbent Cheri DiNovo (NDP) is running against Cortney Pasternak (Liberal), Joe Ganetakos (PC), and Justin Trottier (Green). We are currently trying to track down other candidates, if applicable.

If you have an inquiry for candidates in Trinity-Spadina and Parkdale-High Park please send it to us no later than Friday, August 19 by the stroke of midnight (technically the 20th).

When you send the question, please make sure to include your name (and name of organization, if you are asking the question on behalf of a group or business). Feel free to submit as many questions as you like, though we will likely only publish one. You can send us your questions via Twitter, Facebook, email, snailmail, phone or in person.

Thanks, and we promise we won’t ask you to do this again for another three years!

The Gleaner

(The Gleaner is non-partisan; we do not endorse candidates, and we ask all candidates, including “fringe” candidates, the same questions.)

By Karen Bliss

On BS Fridays, local musicians and artists shoot the breeze. Perry King/Gleaner News

A meeting at a local Starbucks with “Steal My Sunshine” hit maker Marc Costanzo from the pop group Len gave Barbara Sedun, EMI Music Publishing Canada’s senior vice-president, the idea to host a free weekly networking event in the Liberty area.

She dubbed it “BS Fridays,” which stands for her initials and brainstorming. An expletive also comes to mind, but BS Fridays is about exchanging information—not BSing.

“I was having tea with Marc at Starbucks and he needed some information that I felt Erin [Kinghorn, a music marketing expert] could provide to him,” says Sedun, who signed Costanzo many years ago to EMI’s stable of songwriters. Len is returning with a new album after a very lengthy hiatus.

“I called Erin to see if she could join us and I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be a great idea for people to be able to share information like this on a regular basis?’ so I decided to start a little networking group.”

The first meeting was on January 28, held at the very same Starbucks (732 Queen St. W.) and after about a dozen meetings it moved to Atelier Cafe Lounge (510 King St. W.) for another dozen. It then moved to Veritas in the east end, but will return to Atelier for Aug. 5 and 12 (to keep on top of location changes, join BS Fridays’ Facebook Group).

Daniel Maclean, who runs Atelier and also works in film, has designed the space for daytime meetings and has WiFi and even a projector available, both free. He offers BS Fridays participants a 10 per cent discount on their food and beverage orders.

When Sedun, whose job involves signing songwriters, is travelling, Kinghorn and Scott Honsberger, music journalist and consultant, keep up the meetings. A Facebook group and Twitter account keep everybody informed of changes, but to date, it is held consistently from 2 to 4 p.m.

“I feel that I’ve got a lot of information in my head that I’d like to share with people that are beginning to establish themselves,” explains Sedun. “I thought that a lot of musicians and songwriters are afraid to approach the music industry, so it would be a really good opportunity to bridge that gap a little bit, to see that the industry is more easily accessible and nicer than they think they are. And it gives them a really casual atmosphere to come and ask questions and get to know people in the industry.”

That particular Starbucks, Sedun noted, had open-mic nights, so she spoke with the manager, Joe Boyd, about holding these meetings there and giving singer-songwriters the option to bring their guitars and play their songs. “I realized that he was pretty community and music-friendly and I wanted to help support him,” says Sedun, “but I told him if it grew too big, we would move it elsewhere.”

Besides Sedun, Kinghorn, and Honsberger, members of the BS Fridays contingent have included Costanzo; Yvonne Matsell, who books the El Mocambo and is co-founder of North By Northeast; Cam Carpenter, a manager and publicist from Cool Planet; his partner, Todd Arkell; musician/video director Hill Kourkoutis and her manager mom, Terry Delaportas; and singer-songwriter Angela Saini.

“Basically, we get together and socialize. No agenda, no mandate, no formal structure,” says Honsberger. “Each week we go around the table—or tables—and do a quick introduction of what everyone does. We try and make it simple for new folks to come out and help us grow the group. Inevitably, the conversation steers towards the music industry, and ideas tend to get thrown around.”

“Every single week, there’s at least one introduction that’s made—that is, one person in attendance hasn’t met one other person in attendance,” he says. “These are the types of real connections that are happening each and every week.”

By Rebecca Payne

The stretch of Queen Street between Dufferin and Roncesvalles will be under the city’s microscope as a restaurant concentration study begins, a move that may prove to be divisive for the neighbourhood, if a recent community meeting is any indication of things to come.

At a heated meeting on June 28 at May Robinson Auditorium (20 West Lodge Ave.), city planner Dan Nicholson and Councillor Gord Perks (Ward 14, Parkdale-High Park) hosted the first meeting to hear residents’ thoughts about the developments in their neighbourhood in the past few years—namely, a growing number of bars in the area that some residents say has had a negative impact.

Some residents were concerned a concentration study would have a negative impact on the neighbourhood, while others complained about noise and drunken behaviour in relation to bars in the area (the only one specifically referred to by name was Parts & Labour).

Two restaurant owners showed up to the meeting to make the case for their businesses. A man affiliated with Local Kitchen & Wine Bar said he had not been approached by the city, or any residents, before receiving notice of this meeting about “the negative impact of restaurants.” He suggested the city needed to work more closely with those in the restaurant industry.

Another restaurateur, who did not give his name, said the “little guys” might be affected negatively by the results of the study. He felt his business was of benefit to the community, and that he was out there making the community more safe. “Sometimes we’re the only people who are asking drunk [people] to stop and getting people to stop fighting [on the street],” he said.

Some residents agreed that the increase in activity in the area was making it a safer place to be.

“[I’ve been] in the area for the last ten years, and … [it’s a] hell of a lot better now than it was ten years ago, that’s for sure,” said one resident. “And I don’t know one restaurant in Toronto that doesn’t play music when people are eating,” he continued. “Let them dance!”

One Cowan Avenue resident, who has lived in the neighbourhood for 12 years, said “I think it’s a great place to live, [with] people of all different ethnic and economic backgrounds. By and large people get along. It’s becoming posh and they want to throw out dive bars and make it more posh … [I’d like to see] a mix of bars, restaurants, and other stores.”

A similar study was conducted in 2009 for the strip of Queen between Dovercourt and Gladstone, where between 2004 and 2009, 13 new restaurants opened.

In the final report from the 2009 Dovercourt-Gladstone study, several recommendations were made to stop an over-concentration of “late night drinking establishments” in the area, including reducing maximum size of ground floor area for new businesses.

Although members of the working group wanted a new “hybrid” zoning bylaw definition for restaurant/bar establishments, the city did not agree. According to the report, the AGCO “requires at least five entreé items (food) to be available for purchase,” which means these establishments will, in theory, have space dedicated to food preparation, and thus be difficult to distinguish from restaurants. (Although, as noted by Perks, some establishments will merely “have a couple Hungry Man dinners in the freezer” to get around the required food service.)

Perks proposed that a “working group” made up of representatives from interested parties be set up to discuss concerns in detail. This is the same process that was undertaken for the Dovercourt-Gladstone study. Perks’ suggestions for members of the working group included representatives from Toronto Police, the AGCO, MLS, the BIA (one being a restaurant owner and one not), and the Parkdale Residents’ Association.

Some in attendance seemed to feel Perks’ choices for representatives would result in a status quo result. To wit, one attendee suggested they “get a clubber” to participate in the working group. (Perks’ then joked, “I’m so old, no clubber would ever speak to me.”)

The working group will meet at least three times to discuss the issues brought forth at this meeting, and then another public meeting will be held where the group’s findings will be presented.

“Change always prompts concern,” said Nicholson. “A lot of what’s happening on Queen is positive—but there are concerns.”

For more information contact Dan Nicholson at 416-397-4077