Doug Ford’s announcement that he’s going to single-handedly slash Toronto city council in half is a massive abuse of power. Ford and his cronies cooked this idea up behind closed doors, without any consultation or even once mentioning it during his election campaign. If Ford wanted to help Toronto then he would be using his powers to support affordable housing, transit, and jobs. Instead, without any consultation, he is dropping this bombshell on Toronto right in the middle of the municipal elections. And it isn’t a coincidence—he’s purposefully meddling in our political system to cause chaos and make it easier to control City Hall from Queen's Park. With fewer councillors, Ford’s banking on ramming his agenda through City Hall, so he and his developer friends can have their way. But we’re not going to let it happen. Leadnow and Progress Toronto are teaming up to stop Ford’s takeover of Toronto. We’re ready to fight back—are you? Sign the petition telling for Ford to keep his hands off Toronto.

The people of Ontario are deeply concerned by Premier Ford's stated intention to divert mental health funding towards policing, in light of a mass shooting carried out by a mentally troubled person. From the beginning of Ford's premiership, his promised investment of $1.9 billion in mental health investments over 10 years already represented a $335 million annual cut in proposed funding to mental health. [1] From this already small proposed investment, Ford proposed shifting some of this mental health funding to policing. [2] This shift in policy perpetuates the long-standing problem of using reactionary measures like criminalization to address mental health issues, when instead, proactive measures like mental health support are needed. [3] The proposed shift in funding will harm the people of Ontario who depend on already scarce mental health resources, while signalling to the public that state force is an appropriate substitute for accessible care. [1] https://www.thestar.com/news/queenspark/2018/07/26/tories-blasted-for-335m-cut-in-planned-spending-on-mental-health.html [2] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ford-to-use-mental-health-money-for-policing-1.4759578 [3] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/J_Wormith/publication/19251180_The_Criminalization_of_Psychiatrically_Ill_People_A_Review_with_a_Canadian_Perspective/links/55b946f108ae092e965b313a/The-Criminalization-of-Psychiatrically-Ill-People-A-Review-with-a-Canadian-Perspective.pdf ---------- Public Advocates in support of strengthening mental health funding: Bhutila Karpoche, MPP for Parkdale-High Park Community Organizations in support of strengthening mental health funding: Warrior Women of Quinte

For many years, our neighbourhood, centred around the parallel 600 blocks of Constance Ave. and Nelson St. has contained one of the highest concentrations of low income rentals in the Greater Victoria area. While a few of us are home owners with Fairfield-perfect families, most of us are tenants, many of whom are on disability. (The shelter portion of a monthly disability cheque is under $400 for a single person.) Some of us are single parents. Some of us are seniors. Some of us have addictions. And some of us lack the social graces. So much so, in fact, that some of you wouldn't want some of us to move into your neighbourhood. We'd rather we stay here too. But we can't: our neighbourhood is being gentrified. Over the last couple of years, developers have descended upon our neighbourhood, buying up buildings and houses in order to demolish them and then put up more expensive housing.The remaining landlords have started the predictable follow up: renovations on vacated suites that price rentals out of the reach of low-income people. The overall effect is a depletion in the stock of low-income housing, in an area where renters already struggle with a 0.7 vacancy rate, one of the lowest in Canada. Unless the Esquimalt Council wants to end up being compared to Vancouver's Council under Mayor Gordon Campbell, it needs to stop treating our neighbourhood the way Campbell treated East Van. The Council needs to push pause on the developments and rent-increasing renos in this neighbourhood and to use the resultant time to come up with a policy requiring developers and renovating landlords to assist displaced tenants to find housing and to ensure that the stock of low-income housing is not further depleted. Vancouver has such a policy now and Victoria is implementing one in September. We can't save our community. We know that we don't have that kind of power. But please sign our petition so that we can at least try to get Esquimalt to help ensure that some of our displaced neighbours don't end up living on the street.

The White Pines is a project to build nine wind turbines in Prince Edward County. Four of these turbines are already complete, with the remainder expected to be installed within the next few weeks and testing scheduled for the following month. Once live, they would have provided enough clean energy to power over 3,000 homes. But Energy Minister Greg Rickford and Doug Ford’s PCs have passed legislation cancelling the project, and as a result, Ontario will now be spending money to uproot and destroy clean energy capacity that’s already been built. Doug Ford ran on a promise to keep Ontario open for business, but his government’s first piece of legislation, "The White Pines Wind Project Termination Act", would terminate this project that has been nearly 10 years in the making, at a cost of over $100 million to taxpayers. [1] At a time when the world is transitioning to renewable energy, this act would kill opportunities for future green energy investment, further put the climate at risk, and cost Ontario taxpayers millions spent destroying a nearly completed project. [2, 3] Doug Ford ran his campaign on the promise that his government is ‘for the people’. Let’s have our voice heard and let his energy minister know that Ontario wants to protect this windfarm and champion the green energies of the future. Please sign this petition to demand the reversal of the White Pines Wind Project Termination Act. Sources: [1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/wind-project-high-price-1.4742850 [2] https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/cancelling-ontario-s-wind-project-could-cost-over-100m-company-warns-1.4009397 [3] https://nationalpost.com/opinion/john-ivison-white-pines-decision-says-doug-fords-ontario-is-closed-for-business

20% of Canadians are reported to have a disability, including 200,000 Canadian children; This is predicted to rise to 25% by 2031; People of all ages have disabilities of many types; There is no building code in Canada mandating that housing be made accessible to people with disabilities; Universal design will accommodate anyone of any age or ability, going beyond mere accessibility, and demonstrating an underlying commitment to including as wide a range of users as possible; and The Canadian Human Rights Code and Charter of Rights and Freedoms forbid discrimination on the basis of disability.

Translink’s lack of affordability measures means that right now thousands of people cannot access the basic service of public transit they need to live, work and thrive. Children, youth and adults who lack access to any other form of transport remain locked out of our transit system. With free transit for children and youth 0-18 and a sliding scale pass based on income, those who are homeless can get to the shelters they need to survive, families will no longer have to make hard choices, folks can get to work without losing the bulk of their hard-earned wages, those seeking jobs can get to interviews and to work, and everyone can access the health care they need, when they need it. In the words of one dad, "I had to choose between transit to get myself to the doctor or buying my daughter milk." We can and must do better. The time is now.

We can't ignore the pollution created by our waste so every little thing counts.

This pilot project is extremely important to all Ontarians, regardless of disability or any other individual or family life circumstance. There is still far too much poverty in this province as it is, and I applaud Miss Wynne for her efforts regarding this invaluable financial plan, one of very few good ideas she proposed during her party's long leadership tenure. As prices continue to rise on everything in our daily lives, this file's urgency is key.

The number one issue for all governments at every level is to stop global warming. The biosphere will collapse if we don't all do everything we can to draw down fossil fuel emissions and prevent more from occurring. The environment is more important than the economy; the environment was chugging along nicely before humans brought the economy on board, but the economy will not chug along nicely when the oceans start to boil. We must rally to save not just your children and grandchildren, but the microbes, the fungi, and the whales with kilograms of plastic in them. Everything in the biosphere is at terrible risk, and we must all change our ways right now if we don't want all living beings to perish.

We are a society based upon "the rule of law." But the volume and complexity of laws makes necessary the services of a lawyer to be able to enforce that rule of law. So, we cannot truthfully say that we are a constitutional democracy when we cannot enforce the rights, freedoms, and declaration of the rule of law in our constitution, i.e., declared in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Our young people are looking at a planet that will be severely compromised without us acting now. I am sick about the me-oriented policies of the Ford government.

Let's make sure that the Clean Energy Act only lets BC Hydro burn clean wood, which is not creosote-soaked rail ties.