Juno News - November 07, 2024


This is Mayor Olivia Chow’s Toronto


Episode Stats


Length

2 minutes

Words per minute

143.49944

Word count

383

Sentence count

26


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Sue Ann Levy talks about the return of homeless campers to Alexandra Park in downtown Toronto, and the new rules allowing them to camp in public parks, even though it's against the law to do so. She also talks about a similar situation at Clarence Park, and asks why the city hasn't cleared out all the homeless encampments in parks yet.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
00:00:00.000 Well, welcome to Alexandra Park in downtown Toronto and the Homeless Encampment 2.0.
00:00:08.260 Three years ago, there was a sizable encampment here and there were all kinds of problems.
00:00:13.680 Fires being set ablaze by propane tanks, violence, drug dealing. The sizable encampment was cleared
00:00:20.800 out three summers ago in July of 2021. The city set about doing $1.1 million in improvements.
00:00:28.900 New pickleball courts, new walkways, new lighting, a new skateboard park, and new playground equipment.
00:00:37.860 Well, guess what folks? It reopened on August 23rd of this year and shortly after that, the tents moved back in.
00:00:46.120 This, my friends, is Olivia Chow's Toronto. You can camp wherever you want, even in a park where city
00:00:54.380 officials have spent $1.1 million to improvement. We even have the standard port-a-potty and the garbage
00:01:01.700 cans and I would venture to say they are probably picking up garbage here. I can't believe that the
00:01:07.460 city officials would allow people to return to this park and camp out, make a mess, ruin the new grass,
00:01:14.420 but under Olivia Chow and council's encampment strategy, which they passed in May, campers are
00:01:21.560 allowed to remain in parks with no enforcement because their human rights are being observed. They
00:01:28.480 have a human right to stay here, even though bylaws say it is illegal to camp here. Behind me is new
00:01:35.940 playground equipment, part of the $1.1 million the city spent on park improvements. But hey, do you see
00:01:43.820 anybody playing on that equipment? Do you see any children, any parents keeping a close eye on their
00:01:49.960 children? No, I guess the tents have scared them all away. But the encampments, despite the fact that
00:01:56.020 it's already November, are increasing in this city. There's one down at Norway Park, which is right on
00:02:01.760 the lakeshore. Talk about location, location, location. There is encampments cropping up everywhere
00:02:08.840 and it's shocking that they haven't cleared out Clarence Park. I just did a piece on that a little
00:02:17.300 over a week or two ago where the residents of Wellington and Spadona area are being totally and
00:02:25.200 completely harassed by drug addicts, violent criminals who have occupied that park for two years.
00:02:31.760 Again, this is Olivia Chow's Toronto. When will it all end? I have no idea. For True North, I'm Sue Ann Levy.