News reports are showing that the Toronto Raptors are considering boycotting the first game of their series against the Boston Celtics. This discussion comes as a result of the attempted murder of yet another innocent Black man in Kenosha, Wisconsin, the latest in a seeming unending string of such murders and attempted murders by unaccountable police officers. The pain of seeing such public murders inflicted over and over again must be immense. And it comes with the additional burden of knowing that each time, nothing changes. The Toronto Raptors are more than our basketball team. They are the spirit of Toronto, and they represent our compassionate, progressive nation to the world. And we as fans are part of the team. We want them to know that if they decide to boycott Game 1 in order to shine a spotlight on this injustice and say "no more" to the ongoing police violence, we the fans have their backs and will rise to support them.

Counsellors and psychotherapists are the only mental health professionals required to charge GST/HST! Other providers of psychotherapy include: psychologists, social workers, occupational therapists, doctors, nurses, psychiatrists and psychiatric nurses. All of these professionals are exempt from charging GST/HST. But not counsellors and psychotherapists. This discrepancy is unfair. There are tens of thousands of counsellors and psychotherapists across Canada. Professional help is available. Yet counsellors and psychotherapists are out of reach for many due to the added expense of GST/HST. That expense can mean the difference between getting much-needed support or allowing mental health issues to go untreated. In order to remove GST/HST for counsellors and psychotherapists, the Ministry of Finance required five provinces to regulate the profession. After the fifth province regulated it, however, former Finance Minister, Bill Morneau, rejected the removal of GST/HST, citing differences in regulated titles among the provinces. Some provinces call the service psychotherapy while others call it counselling. But the government had not made these titles a requirement for GST/HST exemption. The goalposts keep moving. Mental health issues used to affect 1 in 5 Canadians. Since the Covid-19 pandemic, this figure has increased to 1 in 4. The pandemic has had a devastating emotional and financial impact on many. Removing this financial barrier to mental health services is needed now more than ever. Let’s create the necessary national change and make mental health and addiction services more accessible - let’s finally get GST/HST on psychotherapy and counselling removed!

The plan put forth by Minister of Education Stephen Lecce and Premier Doug Ford to reopen schools this fall amidst the pandemic is not enough. The underfunded plan leaves everyone in the dark as to how schools will be run, and limits the resources to keep students safe. Elementary schools, in particular, have very little in terms of actual safety measures, with overcrowded classrooms preventing social distancing and masks being non-mandatory for grades three and below. Many faculty are already at a greater risk of infection, especially in a cramped environment such as a classroom. Children are also known to be asymptomatic, which will make doing symptom checks extremely difficult, making it that much harder to detect and control outbreaks if they occur. The government has made promises such as adding 900 new custodians and 500 nurses. But, for nearly 5,000 schools across Ontario, this is not nearly enough. There have also been promises for new HVAC systems, but there is little time to install them before the beginning of the school year. Please sign this petition if you feel students and faculty deserve to be protected at school, and that Lecce and Ford should rethink their current reopening plan, so we can go back to school with confidence that we, our families and our teachers will be safe.

In current classrooms, physical distancing is impossible. If the government does not change course and insists on reopening schools without reducing class sizes, our kids, friends, and family members will contract the virus.

The Ford Government wants to ramp up the greenhouse gas pollution from Ontario’s gas-fired power plants by more than 300% by 2025. (1) If Doug Ford and Ontario Power Generation (OPG) get their way, Ontario will not be able to meet its 2030 Climate Target. We must not let this happen! 1- https://www.cleanairalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/GAS_REPORT_FINAL_WEB_R.pdf 52 groups - and growing - are part of this campaign! AWARE Simcoe Braden Homes Ltd. BurlingtonGreen Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment Canadian Climate Challenge Canadian Environmental Law Association Citizens Climate Lobby Creating Healthy & Sustainable Environments Citizens Environment Alliance of Southwestern Ontario Clean Air Partnership ClimateFast CoEnergy Co-operative David Suzuki Foundation Don Heights Unitarian Congregation, Social Action Committee Ecology Ottawa eMERGE Guelph Sustainability Environmental Defense Environment Hamilton Folkes Construction Inc Fridays for Future Fridays for Future Ottawa Grassshopper Energy Green 13 Green Party of Ontario Hamilton 350 Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation Office of the Sisters of Providence of St. Vincent de Paul Kairos Leadnow Ministry for Social Justice, Peace, and Creation Care of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Toronto. MobilizeTO Mount Dennis ecoNeighbourhood Initiative Ontario Clean Air Alliance Ottawa Renewable Energy Co-operative (OREC) Oxford Community Energy Co-operative Prevent Cancer Now Reep Green Solutions Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario Shift Action for Pension Wealth and Planet Health SolarShare South Riverdale Community Health Centre Sustainable Waterloo Region The Council of Canadians The Lea[ The Roots Collaborative Toronto Environmental Alliance Toronto 350 Trinity St. Paul's United Church - Climate Justice Group University of Toronto Environmental Action (UTEA) Wellington Water Watchers Wilderness Committee Women's Healthy Environments Network York Region Environmental Alliance

TDSB staff have put together a plan that will allow class cohort sizes to decrease to 15-20 students per class, as recommended by Toronto Public Health. The plan costs $20 million dollars for additional teachers - drastically less than other plans or approaches - and it requires a slightly shorter school day. However, the plan cannot proceed unless the Minister of Education gives TDSB permission to shorten the school day by 48 minutes. And Minister Lecce has refused that permission. By refusing permission, the Minister is forcing Toronto schools to cram kids into larger classes where their risk of exposure is much higher due to a lack of physical distancing. There is no justification for such a risk when we have a high-quality, effective plan on the table. Tell the Minister - protect our kids and give TDSB the simple permission it needs to enact this plan. Note: if you'd like to read the full TDSB plan, you can do so here: https://www.tdsb.on.ca/Portals/0/docs/Returning%20to%20School_A%20Guide%20to%20the%20Safe%20Reopening%20of%20the%20TDSB_August%2010.pdf

We need to challenge the power of the military-industrial complex Do you know that the largest lobby group for the fighter jets is a charity - the Global Affairs Institute? We need the $19 billion for housing, child care, the green new deal, and for education, long-term care, etc. Quote: "More for COVID-19 latest hurdle in Canada's long road to buying new fighter jets" Fighter jets are a major polluter, and they are mainly used for air shows.

2020 is not the year that Canadians need to hold a Federal Election! The Bloc Quebequois leader has vowed to trigger a federal election in the fall if the PM and Finance Minister fail to resign over the WE scandal. Is now really the best time to hold a federal election, diverting attention and resources from the critical fight against Covid-19. Disrupting current programs and policies which have proven mostly effective in controlling a global pandemic for partisan political posturing seems like the last thing Canadians need at this time of strife.

CanWhite Sands has applied for a sand processing plant to take out 5.5 CFL football fields squared by 26 stories high of silica sand each year for the next 25 years. The oxygenizing of this silica will produce acid of a pH of 2.44 leaching heavy metals like arsenic. The drainage is to the Brokenhead river where this acid along with a polyacrylamide which breaks down in sunlight and acid to acrylamide a potent neurotoxin. This project will pollute the Brokenhead river contaminate the carbonate aquifer and kill lake Winnipeg. This environmental assessment plan ignores key aspects of the proposal that will lead to this damage. Link to Government EAP: gov.mb.ca/sd/eal/registries/6057canwhite/index.html CWS Proposed Project Impacts to Brokenhead River - Dennis Analysis.pdf https://documentcloud.adobe.com/link/review?uri=urn:aaid:scds:US:f4976d99-cf02-4f89-8814-0505b2f4a1f4 Dennis LeNeveu's Correction of Free Press Article https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=139593417826957&id=115584813561151 Risk Assessment of CanWhite Sands Project “Dangerous to Eastern Watershed” By “Our Line in the Sand”- a local community group https://documentcloud.adobe.com/link/review?uri=urn:aaid:scds:US:d9881975-18b3-45d2-8198-a8f9126fa284

Environmental groups and residents are fearful of the toxic chemicals that are likely to be released into the headwaters of the Oldman River watershed, which would endanger the drinking water of downstream cities such as Lethbridge and many wildlife species, including the threatened cutthroat trout. (Coal is associated with toxic levels of selenium; a similar coal project in Elk River, B.C., owned by Teck Resources, is releasing so much selenium that U.S. officials downstream are concerned.) A mine like this would result in huge habitat loss: area approximately the size of Edmonton would be impacted. Residents invested in the tourism industry in this well-loved part of Alberta are highly concerned about how the mine would negatively affect their businesses. Riverdale Resources say that they have received approval from all Treaty 7 nations, but according to Latasha Calf Robe, a member of the Blood Tribe, “No community-level consultation has been done on the Blood Tribe, and, as far as I know, has not been done with any of the communities in Treaty 7." The project has now gone to a joint provincial and federal review. If approved, it would open the door to other similar open-pit mines throughout the Rocky Mountains. Let's be clear: no matter what Riversdale Resources claims, projects like this will likely lead to poisoned fish, denuded rivers, and toxic drinking water. And burning the coal will sink our climate targets.

When determining our long range plans, unit plans, and individual lesson plans, Ontario’s educators look to the curriculum to inform and guide us. The curriculum is determined by the Ministry of Education, which claims to conduct reviews on a regular basis. The curriculum for each subject area consists of general big ideas, and specific expectations that determine our learning goals and the outcomes of our students. For each subject area and subsequent strand (ie. number sense and numeration in math), there are general and specific expectations that tell us what our students should be able to do after successfully completing the academic year. These expectations shape what we teach every day. As there are no such curriculum expectations about Black identities or race, what requires teachers to include these subjects in their lessons? Nothing. Without Ministry mandated curriculum, Black identities and histories are not being taught in a meaningful way, and ultimately left to the discre​tion of the teacher. This approach will not uproot systemic racism in our schools, and there needs to be change in the curriculum given to teachers.

It has taken decades to establish laws and regulations to protect Ontario’s environment - it’s wildlife, biodiversity, ecosystems and species at risk. Now, the Ford government is taking advantage of its majority government to gut these regulations while ignoring its legal obligations under the existing environmental protection laws. On July 22, 2020 in the last week of Ontario Parliament’s summer session Premier Ford rammed through Bill 197, the COVID-19 Economic Recovery Act on Wednesday and cancelled Thursday sitting. Bill 197 passed after no consideration at committee, and only 50 minutes of debate at Third Reading. It is a giant piece of omnibus legislation with far-reaching changes, including gutting environmental oversight rules. The Ford government was "not compliant" with the law by passing its omnibus economic recovery bill Tuesday without consulting the public on major environmental changes according to auditor general Bonnie Lysyk. Previously the Ford government eliminated the office of the Environmental Commissioner of Ontario and more recently, on July 1, 2020, exempted forestry activities from the requirements of the Environmental Assessment Act.