A nice example of a defunct condo project, repurposed as (partially) affordable rental

Noel Semple
@noel.semple7

Good news example of a defunct condo project being repurposed as (partially) affordable rental. The kind of public/private cooperation we need!

♬ original sound – Noel Semple

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Transcript:

They say that when one door closes, another one opens, but sometimes it takes government and private sector working together to push that door open.

So the GTA is going through a condo crash right now. Lots of planned condo projects are being cancelled cause the demand is just not there. And obviously that’s bad for a housing supply and also bad for all the folks who could be working building those towers.

But the good news is that some of these condo projects are being converted to purpose-built rental projects, some of which are actually quite affordable.

The Toronto Star reported this week on 511 Kingston Road in Scarborough, which was planned for a luxury condo project that got cancelled due to lack of demand.

And it was a three storey hole in the ground for quite a while. But recently this developer Marcus Tzaferis has found a way to relaunch the project as a rental apartment building in which [30%] of the build units at least will be affordable. City Hall is chipping in with $7.8 million in capital funding as well as a property tax exemption and the local councillor helped coordinate it.

And there’s a non-profit which does affordable supportive housing across the street, which is potentially going to be part of making this happen and get these units going.

But it also required some private sector risk-taking and ingenuity. So the developer has pivoted and this individual Marcus Tzaferis identified in the article as thinking outside of the box, and that’s the kind of entrepreneurship we need: where someone in the private sector identifies a real social need and takes on some risk and meets the need.

Andif they turn a good profit after doing something like that, good for them. But in this case, it was the sort of thing which required cooperation between government and private sector to make something good happen.

An exciting new chance to STOP internet gambling ads in Ontario

Noel Semple
@noel.semple7 An exciting new effort to ban internet gambling ads in Ontario #onPoli ♬ original sound – Noel Semple

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Transcript:

Internet gambling ads are everywhere in Ontario. This one team of researchers watched a single Raptors playoff game and they counted 799 ads and sponsored references to internet gambling during just one game. And of course, it’s not just TV, it’s the billboards, it’s the internet ads. It’s just like saturation marketing. And the reason why these companies spend so much money on the ads is because they work. They are successfully hooking a whole new generation of gamblers, mostly young men. You only have to get someone to download the app and then they’ve got this highly addictive, highly expensive habit which is living in their pocket 24/7. 

And a lot of people in Ontario are gambling money they can’t afford to lose, because it should be supporting their families or saved for the future. Or it could even just be contributing to the Ontario economy. Almost a hundred billion dollars was gambled on the internet in Ontario last year and four billion of that was profit, which was sucked out of people’s pockets into these corporations, most of which are foreign. 

This is a predatory system, and it took root in Ontario and nowhere else in Canada for the same reason we had the green belt scandal and the skills development fund scandal, which is that the Premier and his cabinet are willing to take calls from lobbyists and well-connected millionaires who have plans that will make them very rich and the Ford government’s going to try to make It happen for you if you’ve got the Premier’s phone number and you’re considered a friend of the government, and it doesn’t really matter who suffers or how the public interest is affected. That’s why we ended up with this system with all of these private companies competing to hook as many gamblers as possible and with the right to saturate every airwave, internet site, and sports game with non stop gambling ads. 

But on Monday, someone stood up in the Ontario legislature and took a stand against this and that person is MPP Lee Fairclough who represents Etobicoke Lakeshore for the Ontario Liberal Party. And Lee is a mother of two teenage boys and she’s someone who has run a hospital and has extensive experience in mental health. So she knows as well as anyone in Ontario how dangerous this addictive product is and how much damage we’re doing to our next generation as well as the current generations by letting this advertising free-for-all continue. So she introduced Bill 107 which would simply ban advertising for internet gambling in Ontario. 

So if you agree that it’s time to end this madness, then please visit MPP Fairclough’s site and sign the petition to send a message to the government that things have got to change. So internet gambling, it’s basically like tobacco or marijuana. Some people can use it and it’s just harmless fun but it’s also very addictive. And it’s especially dangerous to young people. So just like tobacco or marijuana, if internet gambling is going to be legal, it should not be advertised. That shouldn’t be something we are exposing our young people to. So, thanks for listening. Check out the website and I hope to talk more about this, over the next couple weeks. 

Does Toronto need “Tree Equity,” or should it just plant trees in neighbourhoods that lack them?

Noel Semple
@noel.semple7 Will “tree equity” uproot progressive government in #TOpoli ♬ original sound – Noel Semple

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Toronto’s having a mayoral election this fall.  Until last week, I thought I’d probably vote to re-elect Olivia Chow.  I’m not so sure any more, after reading about the Mayor’s plan rolled out last week for “Tree Equity.”

Unlike some, when I first heard this phrase I liked it.  More trees in Toronto would make life better: more beautiful streets, more breathable air, more moderate climate.

So I’m glad the Mayor wants to plant more trees on public land, and help the people of Toronto plant them on private land.

As for the “Equity” part of “Tree Equity,” I assumed this means planting trees in parts of the city that don’t have many of them. It is equitable for all Torontonians to share equally in our “urban forest,” and inequitable for some neighbourhoods to miss out.  It’s probably true that disadvantaged neighbourhoods, on average, have fewer trees than wealthier ones and that’s an unfairness the City should address.

But dig down into the City’s page on “Tree Equity,” and you’ll find that something different is going on. 

To decide where to plant trees, the City is giving “Tree Equity scores” to neighbourhoods.  And those scores are based not only on how many trees the neighbourhood has, but also on race and language and age data about the people who live there, along with a bunch of other stuff unrelated to trees.

In other words, the City’s tree-planters, when deciding where to plant, are going to discriminate  between neighbourhoods on the basis of race, languages spoken, and average age of residents.

Suppose you live in a neighbourhood that doesn’t have enough trees.  You see the City’s workers, paid by your property tax, planting trees somewhere else instead, while your street remains treeless and baking in the summer sun.  If you wonder why, the answer might be “because you and your neighbours are of a certain race, or speak a certain language.”

That’s unfair, and also toxic for progressive government.  It’s not a message that the City should be sending to its residents. It’s likely to create resentment, around something that could and should bring us together.

It plays right into the hands of those who don’t want the City using taxpayer money for this sort of thing at all.

That’s a tragedy, because using City resources to plant trees in neighbourhoods that lack them is a policy that most Torontonians can get behind. This isn’t a city of people who care only about their own back and front yards. It’s a city of people who want the whole city to be great for everyone here.

A lot of homeowners voted for Mayor Chow in the last election, knowing full well she would raise taxes, because they thought she was going to improve city services.  And they accepted that she would prioritize the people and places that needed the help most — affordable housing, food in schools for kids who don’t get enough at home, and help for the homeless.  Personally, I have no problem paying taxes for city tree planting, even though none of them will be planted on my street, because my street has plenty of trees already.

Turn tree-planting into this over-complicated, discriminatory project, and all of that support can quickly evaporate.

Mayor Chow, please keep it simple — plant trees, starting in places that have the fewest trees.  That’s the equitable, sensible approach that will plant progressive city government in fertile soil, in October’s election.