Encampment Update

Earlier this year I wrote about a legal case pertaining to homeless encampments.

Justice M.J. Valente of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice had ruled that the Region of Waterloo couldn’t evict people living in tents from a vacant lot the Region owns. https://whenthemayorsmiles.blogspot.com/2023/03/encampment-precedent.html

At the time I understood that the ruling was precedent setting and would impact other municipalities.   It seems I was overly optimistic.

According to the Advocacy Centre for Tenants of Ontario (ACTO) municipalities are responding to the needs of their residents in different ways. 

Some are using enforcement and displacement as a last resort.

And some are taking a different approach. Take Cambridge, for example.

They are “focusing on clearing and forcibly removing residents, resulting in people being displaced with nowhere else to go,” claims ACTO, an Ontario specialty legal clinic.

"Some of these people were evicted three times in a matter of two months,” Ashley Schuitema, staff lawyer at Waterloo Region Community Legal Services (WRCLS) told Cambridge Today’s Joe McGinty.  https://www.cambridgetoday.ca/local-news/legal-action-in-the-cards-after-cambridge-encampment-evictions-7652134

Up North, Sault Ste Marie looked at other City’s bylaws and figured they could amend theirs.  Just in time for winter they decided to protect their parks. The only Council opposition came from Ward 3’s Angela Caputo according to CBC News. 

"I think it's imperative that we shift our attention to creating and advocating for a system to end homelessness rather than enacting laws to try and police our way out of it," said Ms. Caputo. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/social-services-legal-challenge-poverty-issues-1.6952421

Some cities like Kingston are in court where the arguments revolve around how much housing is available.  There is always lots of debate on such numbers. 

Let’s get real here. It is obvious to anyone that rental rates and availability are beyond the means of increasing numbers of people in the province.

Municipalities are spending taxpayers’ dollars on fighting our fellow citizens in courts.  The Hamilton Spectator reported today that lawyers representing Hamilton tried to recover court costs from those without housing who are in an ongoing human rights battle with the city.  Instead, Justice James Ramsay ruled the City should pay costs of $5,000.  

The last word today goes to ACTO:

“The Charter dictates that unless and until encampment residents are provided with truly accessible accommodation, evictions should not occur. Moreover, encampment residents deserve to be consulted and involved when municipalities are attempting to find solutions for them.”

Looking for the Reports

I have just submitted a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the Ontario government.

This is a first for me.

The origin of the legislation that put FOIs in place goes back many years. It was part of the Accord adopted following the 1985 election when the NDP agreed to support David Peterson’s Liberals for two years. 

The Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) legislates access to information held by public institutions in Ontario subject to specific requirements to safeguard the personal information of individuals

Adapting to Climate Change

All governments brag about transparency.   The current Ontario government is no exception.  In fact, Premier Doug Ford, a chronic embellisher, claims there has never been a government as transparent as his. 

So, you could say that my FOI request is a test of that assertion. My interest is getting information on Ontario’s climate change plans.  With the country burning this summer, people losing their homes, firefighters being killed and extreme weather events now common one has to wonder what government has planned to respond to such conditions in the future.  So that is what my FOI request is about.  How does the government plan to adapt to climate change? 

There is a bit of a story to this.

A group I’m involved with took some initiative.  The Ontario Project of SCAN! (Seniors for Climate Action Now) has members knowledgeable about adaptation strategies.  They were aware that the Ford government had done some work on this matter.

In fact, the Ford government has put together major reports on the urgent task of anticipating and reducing the impacts of climate change. In November 2019, the Ontario government appointed an Advisory Panel on Climate Change led by Paul Kovacs, a professor at Western University and an expert in the field of disaster risk reduction.  The creation of this panel was no secret.  It was announced publicly.

It seems most of the reporting was completed nearly two years ago.  But the reports were kept secret until recently.    One of them is now available likely because of public pressure.

This past January, Jennifer Penny, one of our members who previously worked as a climate change adaptation researcher, submitted a FOI request to find out what had happened to this reporting.

“Ontarians want to see these reports! But even more, we want to know what the government is doing to protect us,” says SCAN!’s Jennifer Penney.

She got a response of sorts.

FIPPA: “What is the name of the report?”
Jennifer: “We don’t know.  It is being kept secret.”
FIPPA: “What was the date of the report?”
Jennifer: “Don’t know that either.  It’s a secret.”

This seems to be how the FOI process works - transparent government in action, much like looking for light through a brick wall. 

So, an open letter and petition entitled Release the Report was prepared and circulated. Over a few weeks in the summer more than 1,300 people signed the petition.

Then on a Friday afternoon in late August with no fanfare the Provincial Climate Change Impact Assessment appeared on the Government of Ontario’s website.

Its 530 pages are filled with what the CBC called “grim details about the expected effects of climate change in Ontario.”  We’ll have a soaring number of days with extreme heat, more extreme flooding and more frequent wildfires. The agriculture sector faces risks of declining productivity, Climate risks will be highest for Ontario's most vulnerable populations and this will “continue to amplify existing disparities and inequities."

In some ways the report tells us what we already suspected.  But such suspicions are confirmed by experts.

The report does "the best job that's been done to date describing the impacts of climate change and extreme weather," Blair Feltmate, head of the Intact Centre on Climate Adaptation at the University of Waterloo told the CBC.

SCAN! had been looking for two reports.  One was released.  Imagine our surprise. Turns out there are actually four reports. Three companion reports, including one on Best Adaptation Practices, are still hidden by the government. 

Those reports are what I’m asking to see in my FOI request. 

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More information on SCAN! can be found at  https://seniorsforclimateactionnow.org/

Listen to the story of the hidden reports on  All in A Day with Alan Neal at https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-92-all-in-a-day/clip/16009552-seniors-climate-action

Through Paphlagonia with a Donkey

Like many others my travel plans have been restricted since the spring of 2020.

Recently however I was able to take a literary trip along with Simcoe writer David Beasley with the re-release of his book Through Paphlagonia with a Donkey. The book, originally published in 1983, documents David’s travels in remote northwestern Turkey in 1958.

He was 27 when he set out with a donkey he named Bobby along a route that ran parallel to the Black Sea through a wild area in modern day Turkey which carries the ancient Greek name Paphlagonia.

Unlike most of us when travelling David “deliberately avoided researching the history of Paphlagonia” as he “did not want to ruin the element of adventure and surprise…”

David believes that to know other peoples you must “enter into the spirits of their ways.” Present day travellers may not subscribe to this view.

Prior to actually hitting the road David was mistaken for an Englishman and had a pistol pointed at him.  A crisis was averted when there was clarification that while he spoke English, he was in fact a Canadian citizen.

“Travelling through a foreign land amongst people who more often than not mistook me for an enemy was not pleasant.  Like a refugee, I fled from one town to the next, always a subject of curiosity, never feeling part of the land or the people.”

Further along the road David was also misidentified as a Russian, a spy, a travelling salesman and a German.  These characterizations typically came from those with some position of authority in the many villages he passed through. On the other hand, ordinary Turks seemed quite accepting of his visits and offered hospitality and generosity that one would not find in western society.

The book also provides insights and background in to the complex history of the region.

“My journey with a donkey into ‘nature was not to escape life but to find it; not to escape self but to find self,” wrote the author.

 A good reason to read an excellent book.

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ON Saturday May 27^th from 2-5 David Richard Beasley will launch his Through Paphlagonia with a Donkey at The Ledge, 31 Norfolk St North, Simcoe.

Copies of his other books, including Sarah’s Journey will be available. Also, a new release Operations of the Army Under General Wolfe by Adjutant-General Buller with Major Richardson’s A Canadian Campaign of the Right Division in the War of 1812 and Richardson’s Recollections of the West Indies will be available.

Still Going On

                                            C'mon talk to me
                                            So you can see
                                            What's going on
                                            (Marvin Gaye - 1971)

Recently I found myself thinking back to the spring/summer of 1970. I was young then, still a student - twenty years old.  

It’s May 4th.  And I have a vague recollection of preparing to leave my parents’ house for a night shift in Hamilton at Stelco’s #2 Rod Mill.  Around 10 p.m. I heard the news. There had been people killed in a shooting earlier that day at Kent State University (KSU).  

What were my thoughts at the time?  Mainly about myself I’m afraid.  Two years earlier I had embraced a rather unrealistic dream of attending Kent State on a track scholarship.  If I had been granted one, I would have been finishing my second year at a small liberal arts school in conservative northeastern Ohio. It was only 275 miles away from home. What would I have been doing when the shots rang out?  Would I have been protesting? Studying? Out for a run? Sleeping in?

Unknown individuals had burned down the campus ROTC building on May 2nd. On this Monday students and other demonstrators had been in their third day of protesting the invasion of Cambodia and escalation of the Vietnam War.  President Nixon had described the military action as an “incursion.” A euphemism, I’d say.

You’ll remember that four students were killed. Perhaps you’ll recall more details - like nine wounded (one permanently paralysed) when twenty-eight National Guardsman fired off about 67 rounds in just 13 seconds.
 

CSU Archives/Everett Collection

A 20-year-old from Youngstown Ohio, speech therapy student Sandra Lee Scheuer,  was one of the four who died that day. Ten years later Canadian Gary Geddes in his poem Sandra Lee Scheuer wrote:
                         

                        She did not throw stones, major in philosophy
                        or set fire to buildings, though acquaintances say
                        she hated war, had heard of Cambodia.

Shortly after the tragedy Neil Young, having come upon a picture of a KSU student “dead on the ground,” documented the event with the song Four Dead in Ohio.  Crosby Stills Nash and Young recorded it.   Almost overnight Four Dead was a hit and became one of the best-known protest songs in history.   It pointed fingers, named names.  

                            “Tin Soldiers and Nixon’s Coming.
                            We’re finally on our own.
                            This summer I hear the drumming.
                            Four Dead in Ohio."

Protests expanded across America; schools closed.  People took to the streets.

The violence spread down south to where Jackson State brothers.  Learned not to say nasty things about southern policemen's mothers. (The Beach Boys - Student Demonstration Time, 1971.)  

Many miles south of my home late on May 14th, more students were shot.  This was at Mississippi’s Jackson State College, a school attended primarily by black students. State and local police fired hundreds of rounds into a women’s dormitory from just 30-50 feet away. Every window was blown out on the street side of the building.  Two young black men were killed. At a minimum twelve were injured as it is likely others were fearful of reporting their injuries.  

Across from the besieged girls’ residence on Lynch Street, a 17-year-old high school senior, a runner who dreamed of attending UCLA, heading home from a part time job, was gunned down.  Later that night family members searched for him.  Incredibly, no one in authority reached out to the family to say Earl Green was dead.  Unbelievably, no one was ever held responsible for his death or that of 21-year-old father and Jackson State honours student Phillip Lafayette Gibbs.

The Jackson College shootings never received the big headlines and media attention that Kent State did.  The uprising that triggered the excessive police response was less about the war and more about that other American bifurcation – racial injustice.

Back Home
 
Later in that summer of 1970 I was part of the Torch Team that carried the ceremonial flame to Flint Michigan for the CANUSA games. The games were, and still are, an annual gathering between Flint and Hamilton Ontario promoting goodwill through amateur athletics.  Twelve of us covered the 250-mile distance through Port Huron arriving in Flint on a Friday evening to officially open the games.

Over that weekend I was privileged to meet other young athletes; Americans my age, with interests similar to mine.   But their obsession, among the men at least, was the recently introduced military draft and whether their birthdate would be drawn and not the many trivial pursuits that engaged me. 

I returned to school in September where among other subjects I studied U.S. and Canada comparative politics. Peace order, good government - that’s us.  Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is what America is built on.  That was the basics back then that I grasped to the extent a young student could.  Today, I wonder if the relative consensus in our political life in Canada contrasted to the extreme polarization down south can be traced to these different guiding principles.

Looking back, I can hear sirens wailing, the shattering of glass, the acrid smell of a burnt armoury, pinging of M1 military rifles. I can sense the fear of an unknown future and try to imagine the frustration felt by those dealing with racism and discrimination.  Plus ca change.

Where I live now is only 17 miles to America.  Somehow it seems farther away.

Encampment Precedent

Here is a longer version of an article I wrote that was published in the Hamilton Spectator on March 25th.  You may find it at https://www.thespec.com/opinion/contributors/2023/03/25/kw-encampment-precedent-could-apply-in-hamilton.html

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Last year in Hamilton a judge ruled that an encampment could be cleared from a city park as there were enough shelter spaces in the system to accommodate those living in the encampment.

It was a different judicial result in Kitchener when a ruling came down in January.
Justice M.J. Valente of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruled that the Region of Waterloo can’t evict people living in tents from a vacant lot the Region owns. It is believed that the ruling is precedent setting.  

You can read Justice Valente’s 51-page decision at https://www.thepublicrecord.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/2023-ONSC-670-Ruling.pdf

The issue revolved around a vacant lot at 100 Victoria Street in Kitchener’s downtown.

The Region wants to use the space for a lay-down area for the construction of a transit  hub. 
Back in December 2021, Waterloo had evicted tenants from an encampment on Stirling Street East using steps they believed “were consistent with the requirements of a by-law.”

They did concede that “the manner in which these actions were carried out did not reflect the dignity of those living at the encampment.”  No kidding!  Staff enlisted the help of a road maintenance crew with heavy equipment to clear the Stirling Encampment. 

As a result, the Region felt the need to clarify how it might enforce its legal rights and so brought an application to seek the direction of the Court.

It was the Region’s opinion that the conditions at the encampment posed a risk to the health and safety of encampment residents as well as to that of others. As a result, the Region determined that the encampment had to be disbanded. 
What is it like in that encampment?  

Every individual will have their own story but one that Justice Valente heard from 32-year-old Kathryn Bulgin, homeless for approximately 6 years, is instructive.   Ms. Bulgin is a victim of both physical and sexual assault and currently suffers from drug addiction.   Before living at the Victoria street encampment, she slept in hotel rooms, shelters, behind dumpsters and couch surfed. 

For her and many others shelter bed accommodation can be “very stressful” because there (is) no certainty if a bed (will) be available.  Ms. Bulgin (does) not have a watch or phone.”  The result is that she can’t always return at a designated time to claim a bed. If evicted from the encampment Ms. Bulgin would simply move to another campsite.

This is an important issue that Justice Valente explores in considerable detail. Shelters don’t work for many people.

Dr. Andrea Sereda is a physician practicing at the London Intercommunity Health Centre in London, Ontario. In testimony, she cited five reasons why encampments have advantages over shelter use.  Encampments decrease isolation and risk of fatality and decrease forced transiency that increases the odds that the unhoused can maintain a connection to outreach services. They give people a sense of community. minimize sleep deprivation and provide physical and mental rest.

Interestingly staff challenged Dr. Sereda’s value as an expert because she had not talked to any residents of the encampment.  Staff’s contact with residents was far from comprehensive.  

As local governments are inclined to do, the Region developed policies and procedures that would apply to the estimated 1,100 individuals considered homeless in Waterloo..  Justice Valente had some praise for their work; he had some criticisms as well. For example, it seems staff presented data in a way that would justify their opinion.  Small actual increases in incidents calculated as part of a risk assessment at the encampment site looked a lot more concerning when presented as percentage increases.  

Advocates have long argued that housing is a basic human right.  In fact, the government of Canada supports the progressive realization of the right to adequate housing as part of their National Housing Strategy.

Section 7 of the Charter states that  “everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.”

Justice Valente took a look at the fairly extensive litigation that has occurred regarding the right to shelter as it relates to Section 7 of the Charter.  His conclusion can be summarized in a few words.  

The individuals encamped at 100 Victoria St. have a right to be there under Section 7. 

“Because the By-Law prohibits the erection of shelter protection that is necessary to protect homeless individuals from risk of serious harm, and there is currently inadequate shelter beds in the Region, I conclude that it violates the Charter protected right to life,” writes Valente.

Shelter Beds

Municipalities have made this argument for years.  It goes like this: “There are vacancies in the shelter system.  So people are able to stay in shelters.”  

But the actual number of shelter beds available or not available is contentious. 
Justice Valente picks this up recognizing “that it is not just the number of available indoor sheltering spaces that frames the right but also whether those spaces are truly accessible to those sheltering in parks.”

The Region made two other arguments that were rejected.

First, they contended that the Charter doesn’t apply because the encampment residents were looking to protect property rights, which are not Charter protected.  Not so, said Justice Valente.  They weren’t making such a claim.  Encampment residents just preferred to be close to services they regularly use.

Another Regional argument was that previous Ontario court decisions supported evictions.  But those decisions dealt with parks, where the broader public had an interest in using, not a vacant lot such as the site in question.

If evicted from the encampment where will residents go, Valente wondered. Likely to live rough or set up camp somewhere else.  What choice do they have?  Creating shelter to protect oneself is, a “matter critical to any individual’s dignity and independence.” By preventing this, the Region interferes with the “choice to protect itself from the elements and is a deprivation of liberty within the scope of section 7.”

Waterloo Region has decided not to appeal the ruling. 

Sharon Crowe, a lawyer involved in the Hamilton case,, is optimistic that the decision will be a catalyst for change.
  
“Not only are they not appealing, they are investing $163 million into housing and homelessness.”

The City of Hamilton is now back at the table talking with advocates. Hopefully, others will follow suit. 

Empty Buses

(Here is a little story on public transit I made up based on my experience as a municipal councillor  many years ago.)  

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One thing I’ve learned in my short career in municipal politics is that municipal politicians know how to problem solve.  It is what they do.

And the elected officials at Clarovista City Hall are no exception.

Take the issue of public transit for example. 

Public opinion is divided on transit in Clarovista.

Some people want it.  And others don’t.

Now the people who want it are mostly those that use it or would use it if the service was any good. 

Those that don’t want it or don’t want much of it or don’t want it on their street mostly have garages and two or three cars in their driveways.

These people with cars and garages worry about buses a lot particularly the matter of empty buses.  And they let their Council members know how they feel.

Councillor Roger Harris is particularly responsive.  Few buses run through Councillor Harris’ ward.  

Those that do certainly look empty to his constituents.

I’ve tried in public and in private conversations to explain empty buses to Harris. They happen routinely in the transit world, I say. They get empty when going in the opposite direction to rush hour peak flows and at the end of routes. Some times of day are less busy and some areas of the municipality have fewer riders. 

Harris himself has not been on a bus since riding a yellow one to day camp back when Diefenbaker was Opposition leader and C.D Howe and the Liberal Party were arrogant and flogging pipelines.

Harris has ideas for transit management to address the empty bus dilemma. Small buses are the way to go. They cost less and the optics would be better.  And, if the route ran every hour instead of every 20 minutes, we could save money.  Councillor Harris puts energy into the sketching out better routes for the buses.  Tricky stuff.  

Tonight, we receive the annual transit review.  It is the only area we review each year.  Questions of staff focus on efficiency, pros and cons of raising fares, decreasing support from the province.  

Councillors have ideas in all of these areas.

But Councillor Harris’ brainwave stops the meeting.

“Why can’t the buses just go back to the garage when they are empty?”

by

Ken Williams

Former Councillor

Ward 5

Clarovista

Truth Has Vanished

Like the passenger pigeon it seems that truth has vanished forever from our political discourse.
 
Not that long ago when Trump was President of the United States and still tweeting he posted a tweet where, in one sentence, he made 4 false claims.  (A tweet is about  two short sentences.)
 
This came as no surprise to those paying attention to the state of today’s politics.

The People's Premier?

In Ontario the Premier, of his self-styled Government for The People makes promises like:
                              

                No one will lose their job, absolutely no one.
                      
                I’ll lower hydro rates by 12 per cent.
                             
                We won’t touch the Greenbelt. of Ontario 
 
It is not enough that the promises are unfulfilled but that such statements are repeated so often that they become assumed authentic.

So what about truth?

Eric Blair, Spanish Civil War Veteran

George Orwell  had something to say on the matter. The English writer argued that history had, in fact, stopped in Spain in 1936. Orwell had seen that reporting in Spain’s newspapers “did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie.”

 

Orwell, then a virtually unheard of English writer known as Eric Blair, worried that the “concept of objective truth (was) fading out of the world and lies would pass into history.”

 Seniors for Climate Action Now (SCAN!)

For the past couple of years I’ve been involved with a group called Seniors for Climate Action Now (SCAN!) https://seniorsforclimateactionnow.org/
 
SCAN volunteers spent a good deal of time and energy prior to the June 2nd provincial election documenting Ford’s crimes against Climate.  New crimes against the environment like the More Homes Built Faster Act are being documented but it is hard to keep up with this repeat offender.   These crimes all seem stem from the kind of thinking that denies objective truth.  A case in point is the rationale recently put forward to open up lands in the Greenbelt  in order to build so-called affordable housing. 
 
Much has been written and said by experts, advocates and citizens regarding Bill 23 the More Homes Built Faster Act (2022).  Here is SCAN!’s view https://seniorsforclimateactionnow.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/SCAN-Climate-Crime-34-2023-01.pdf
 

The Ford government is well aware of the opposition to their measures but has calculated that the public will just accept them because they are passed.  

We can`t give up the fight.  Here are some resources and links you can check out.
          
Resources and Events
 
*You can find Environmental Defence at https://environmentaldefence.ca/
 
*Changes to maps and Official Plans can be found at https://ero.ontario.ca/notice/019-6216#decision-details and https://ero.ontario.ca/notice/019-6217
 
*Alliance for a Livable Ontario is at https://www.liveableontario.ca/
 
*The Land Between, a grassroots non-governmental organization, has materials on the  consequences of the legislation and what you can do at https://www.thelandbetween.ca/bill23-stealingourlegacy/#Solidarity

*The webinar Bill 23 and the Greenbelt – What`s Next? runs about an hour and can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_j49m11Q7w

*Stop Sprawl Halton’s website is at https://www.stopsprawlhalton.org/