#9101 - Feb 1991

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Digital Archiving Completed by the Ethnography Lab, A University of Toronto Anthropology Initiative and Produced in Collaboration with David Perlman/Wholenote Media Inc between July-December 2015. ~·--- ... - 2 NEWS The Kensington Market Drum, February 1991 Dundas Shootout Has People Scared by Colin Puffer Area residents, already made nervous by a recent fire in the heart of the Market, have further cause for concern. On Thursday, Dec 27, there was a fatal shooting at the Kim Bo Restaurant at 546 Dundas. It was executed as a spectacular gangland style hit. Two gunmen entered the restaurant and opened fire, killing Dan Vi Tran and wounding Mau Luy Quach and Hoan Thanh Luc. The killers then made a rapid exit and faded into the crowd. A police search through the Metro area failed to tum up either of the killers who- have possibly crossed into the U.S. At one point police believed that the murder was in retaliation for gang action in New Jersey in which Tran was believed to be involved. This theory has now been discounted. Karaoke Cafuffie Police responded to another gun call in the Market in the early hours of Jan 4 at the Quan Saigon Mekong Restaurant on St. Andrew. What actually occured is not _clear. Certainly there was a shot, or shots, fired and a man ended up with a head wound. But doctors were unable to determine whether the head injury had been caused by the bUllet itself or was self-inflicted as the victim dived for cover. Again on Dundas Sunday, February 3, produced another fatal shooting on Duridas. Deceased is Vinh Due Tat, age 29 of 153 Augusta Ave. The wounded include: My Kuong Thich, age 16, no fixed address (back wound); Kuong Vin Duong, age 25, 423 Crawford Ave. (leg wound); Phaibaim Souydalai, age 27, 36 KenSington Ave. (neck wound). Those firing the shots-there appears to be more than 1 gun involved-made a hasty escape up Kensington Ave. DeteCtive Steve Hulcoop of Metro Homicide Squad will be heading the investigation. When Is A Crime Asian? The Drum first learned of the Asian Crime Unit (ACU) when investigating the fire at 56C Kensington (see December · Drum). The reporter was told that since the arson took place in a Vietnamese restaurant it would be looked into by the ACU. Attempts to contact this unit were at first fruitless-it is apparently a very busy group. Det. Sgt. Elford, head of the ACU said there had been no progress in the fire case. He gave the impression that the investigation of a relatively minor fire was not very high on the list of the unit's priorities. This may be understandable, given the size of his staff and the number of more serious crimes in the past months. The ACU The Asian Crime Unit which works out Of 14 Division is comprised of 5 officers, one of which is a Traffic Control Officer. It is these five who are called upon to deal with crime classified as "Asian". As well as covering Toronto they are called to municipalities outside of Metro. Of the 5 officers, only 2 are fluent in Vietnamese, with one also speaking Cantonese. So, language can be an enormous problem when investigating a crime. Couple this with the Asian community's traditional reticence to deal with police (were the 20 · people in the Kim Bo at the time of · the shooting really all in the bathroom?) and the ACU ofte11 runs into a brick wall in its investigations. The View From 14 · Kensington Market is in many ways a unique community. Residents know each other and talk to each other. But often this informal exchange of information leads -to distortions. The Drum, in its coverage of the two shootings, interviewed a number of people who were all aware of a third shooting in another restaurant. This third assault, it turns out, dido 't take place. Almost every Market resident has heard rumours of massive drug deals, extortion, turf-wars and gambling. How much truth is there in these rumours? Det. Elford doesn't believe that the problems are as wide-spread as some believe. What some people label extortion is often no more than a couple of toughs walking out of a restaurant without paying for a meal. A crime, but certainly not Miami Vice material. And what appears to be a turf-war may be only macho posturing by young roosters. But when contacted after the Kim Bo shooting Elford warned that he feared more serious problems could arise in the future. This concern, sadly, has been born out. Community Based Policing: Who Chooses How by Colin Puffer If the police are here to serve and protect, how does the community tell the police department how it wishes to be served and protected? Jan 22 there was a meeting at the Bob Abate Recreation Centre to address this question. Called by Rob Maxwell, City Councillor for Ward 11, the group assembled to discuss the concept of community based policing. While not a new idea, it is the first time that it there has been an attempt to implemented it in the Metro area. Though community based policing means different things to different people there is a general . agreement that police forces must become better integrated with the groups they serve, to avoid being viewed as an intimidating ·and foreign force. Maxwell says that Also, page 1 0-11 Market Gourmet & Bob The Waiter Superintendent Winter of 14 Division is himself commited to the idea. The meeting covered a fair number of ways in which they felt the "us and them" problem could be avoided: more police on the street instead of in cruisers; hiring policies that reflected the ethnic and languag~ mix of the · community; training pol;ce to respond to people and not just situations; and perhaps most importantly, some type of forum where the community could regularly make its concerns known to police forces. Alexandra Park Meeting -There was another meeting about policing, this time called and chaired by Superintendent Winter, held on Jan. 30 at Alexandra Park Community Centre. Winter explained how the department saw the implementation of a Also, page 12-13 A Union of The Unemployed community based program. Reading from a report issued by the Solicitor General's Office, he outlined a plan that included a formaf consultation group, chaired by a civilian with a police officer as vice-chair and comprised of what he called a "vertical slice" of the community, i.e. a representative from community centres, a high school student, a senior etc. He maintains that the Solicitor General's report is only a blueprint, not the fmal form that program will actually take. The next community based policing meeting will deal with the election of a chairperson, deciding on a consultation process, the name the group shall use, and general organizational work. The meeting takes place at New Horizon's Senior Home, 1140 Bloor St West, at 7pm, February 26. . .Also, page 14 The Nuts at Grossman's Quan Saigon Me Kong, St. Andrew, Jan 4, gun call "shots fired" Women's Detox to Open in April Consultation Continue-s by Masha BueU While plans for a women's detox centre in the Dundas West and Claremont area are developing on schedule, the process of community consultation and public education also continues. A group of concerned community members have been meeting regularly with representatives of the Women's Community Care Cenire since the original public meetings were held. The group is made up mostly of area residents. Aida Vuk, speaking on behalf of the centre, said "they still have their line and we have ours" but indicated that the original standoff seems to be evolving into a situation where both sides are listening and attempting to address the various isSues. The Centre wants people to consider that providing detox facilities will help to clear up a problem rather than create one. Vuk feels that helping people understand where detoxification fits into an overall continuum of care will help breed tolerance. The community~s concerns appear to be two-fold. While they agree that such a facility may be necessary in some other community, they continue to deny the need for it within their own community. And they are afraid of the effect the facility will have on their young people "if they see this (alooholism) perhaps it will make them go that way". Vuk commented that in many cases they find that the young people are more aware of substance abuse in general and in some cases better ' informed than some adults. j ~ ~ ~ < ~ p. The Kensington Bellwoods Community Legal Clinic sent a letter of support for the facility to the Land Use Committee. Mindy Lopes is a community legal worker at the clinic, who spoke with community members who called reacting to the letter. Some considered it controversial. Lopes confirms that some elements of the community are still denying the need, and looking· for a loophole to halt the project. But the City's Land Use Committee heard deputations February 7 and decided not to support the community challege to the building permit. Lopes also commented on the effect of cultural norms regarding the whole issue of substrance abuse and its denial - the "we don't have this problem and you're going to bring it in" attitude. "Alcoholism is socially acceptable when you're born with it and raised with it. No one pays much attention until it gets to a certain point and then someone says: you better cut it out or you're going to die. Then maybe you think twice". And she spoke of another equally complex consideration, the extent to which women are conditioned to hide their problems, particularly if they are in conflict with their husbands. An abused woman often will not speak about the abuse. Instead she will go to a family doctor complaining of "nervousness" in order to get a prescription for antidepressant medication. Or she may turn to the church for help. But it is less likely she will seek out co~nselling, rehabilitation or support services - especially if she has to go far outside per community.
Digital Archiving Completed by the Ethnography Lab, A University of Toronto Anthropology Initiative and Produced in Collaboration with David Perlman/Wholenote Media Inc between July-December 2015. The Kensington Market Drum, February 1991 NEWS 3 Hospital Parking Lot Nassau and Leonard looking south. Plans showed five floors high at this corner rising to eight along Leonard (Three along the Bellevue lot lines.) Co-op Proposed by David Perlman A meeting of the Toronto Western hospital-community liaison group on January 29 heard the latest idea for the Leonard lot-from a developer, the Goldman group. They suggest putting all the parking on the Leonard Street lot. underground, and putting a co-op apartment building on top. This idea is fine with the hospital management who w"ant to expand the amount of parking available on the site. To accommodate all of it, the developer 1 ~ 'lib ~ 0 t will have to go down four levels. To pay for 4 levels of parking underground, there have to be around 190 units in the coop. The developer and hospital were sufficiently encouraged by the response at the meeting to carry the idea further to the next liason group meeting. That next meeting will be Tuesday, March5, at 6:30 pm in the Bathurst Lounge inside the hospital. In addition to seeing more detailed plans, the group will talk about how to keep the community at large informed. For your money, · we really do rate the best. You want the best return on your investment. With a Central Guaranty Trust Company RRSP, we guarantee it. We guarantee that our rates will be equal to or better than the nationally-posted rates . offered by the following major banks and trust companies for comparable 1 ,2,3,4, and 5-year RRSP GIGs: Bank of Montreal, Bank of Nova Scotia, CIBC, Toronto Dominion Bank, Royal Bank, Royal Trust and Canada Trust. Our Customers rate the best, plus 1/4°/o more. You can earn 1/4% extra interest per annum on youf RRSP GIG. There are three ways to qualify: •Invest in a 16-month GIG or, •Have any two of the following Central Guaranty Trust accounts or services: Chequing Account, Savings Account, GIG/Debenture, Mutual Funds, RRIF, Mortgage, Personal ~ine of Credit, Loan (other than an RRSP loan), Wills and Estates, Investment Management Services or, •Have a balance of $20,000 or more in your Centrpl Guaranty Trust RRSP. This offer allows · you to eam · 1/4% extra interest on RRSP GIG/Debenture investments between $500 and $49,999. It applies to contributions, renewals and transfers-in. However, tt cannot be used with any other offer or promotion and the maximum extra interest is 1/4% per annum per certificate: Sixteen month term is subject to change. Donl delay. Offer expires March ·1, 1991. •••••••••••••••••••••••• DISTANT DRUM An open letter .to the minister ~f the environment of Ontario, Ruth Grier, regarding the CN railway lands and the Spadina lrt: Minister, · We are people who have tried to participate in the consultation processes recommended by the environmental assessment act of Ontario (EA). We did so in a consultative committee set up by Metro early in 1987 to try to come to terms with community opposition to the spadina lrt. This LRT was proposed to the community in 1985- 6, around the same time that the Ontario municipal board was awarding development rights to CN real estate in the railway lands at the foot of Spadina Avenue, west of the skydome. The consultation was very drawn out, spanning some four years to this point in time-and we are not yet within sight of a hearing under the act In the meantime, depending on which way you look at it, a much needed transit project is languishing because of stubborn opposition; or a very necessary. provincial environmental assessment of metro's transportation planning policies and priorities is being stalled by planners and engineers who would rather take the route of discrediting the province's environmental assessment act. So, we are writing to say that now the province must prove itself to be the protector of the environment of the province-and that includes the part oHhe environment consisting of. cities. So far as we can see, cities like Toronto and governments like metro are fighting tooth and nail to prevent the environmental assessment acl from being applied to urban development. Either they claim environmental jurisdiction over some place or project themselves or else they take so long in following the act that they make it appear to be unworkable. You should take this as a sign of how good the legislation potentially is. You have called for hearing on the EA itself. So in the near future you'r~ going to hear public opinions on how to make the act work. One answer is, don't count on changes to the act to make it work. Because the mentality of local governments is that all they have to do to keep power is to make the province's environmental legislation unworkable. And they'll be able to make any act not work if that's what they want • It's no wonder they're trying, though, since in.many cases the province has power to prevent the environmental damage that the local governments are doing and allowing. . Take for example the twofold case of the Spadina lrt and the CN railway lands west of SkyDome. At this stage, ttc/metro has constructed an argument for a Spadina lrt bas_ed significantly on the idea that the lrt will get people out of their cars and onto transit-lrt as a weapon in the war against the private automobile. But when you examine their plan you will see that what they are trying to do is to keep attracting as many commuters as possible, by any means, to the Toronto downtown core. So they find themselves taking six years to put in a streetcar line on Spadina because they're trying to find a way of keeping it from interfering with the traffic! They refuse to acknowledge that they are actually protecting the car, by saying that a streetcar only has right of way when there is a physical barricade around it It should be the streetcar itself that has rightcof-way not some segregated part of the road. - The sad truth is that transit planners in metro can't even win a skirmish with the metro roads department, let alone plan a viable transportation strategy for metro. You and your government, on the other hand, can, with a stroke of the pen in the Highway and Traffic Act, give streetcars right-of-way protection on every street in Metro. That could still save your taxpayers $75 million on Spadina Avenue alone. Lots more than Spadina Avenue is at stake here. Consider for a moment: if Toronto had succeeded in our Olympic bid last fall, you would have had only one slim opportunity to have a provincial environmental assessment ofthe Olympic plan. And that would only have beenbecause metro would have argued that the Spadina lrt was necessary for the redevelopment of the Spadina railway lands. We hope you will not let the city and the railway companies come to a deal on the railway lands which allows environmenral assessment of railway lands to remain in city hands. We ask that you treat the upcoming environmental assessment of the proposed Spadina lrt as an assessment of metro's capability to plan transportation to the railway lands. And we ask you treat it also as an assessment of the City of Toronto's claim to be able to protect the environment of Ontario from the City's own plans, policies, and projects. If you do we'll have better news for our environment in some distant DRUM. For Your RRSP we · Rate The. Best. Guaranteed. 1/4% Bonus We rate the best in flexibility. .central. Guaranty Trust gives you more ways to invest in your RRSP including: •Futurlink RRSP Plan -T-Bill Savings Account -GIGs/Debentures -Full range of Mutual Funds •Self Directed RRSP •Instant RRSP Loans. Our Instant RASP Loan rates the best. We make tt easy for you to invest. Central Guaranty Trust can help you make your maximum RRSP contribution with an Instant RRSP loan. If you like, you can defer payments for four montrs - long enough for most tax refunds. Both interest and the four-month deferral period are calculated from the day you get your loan. - CENTRALlrGUARANTY CENTRAL GUARANTY TRUST COMPANY At this rate, investing early in· · your RASP can be yery reward mg. At Central Guaranty Trust, we believe our customers deserve the best rate on their RASP GICs. Without waiting to see if rates go up. Or s1anding in line at the last minute. Just .purchase your RRSP GIG any time between now and February 15, 1991. We'll give you the rate for the term you select on the day you contribute or March 1 , 1991 ~ whichever is higher. You'll get the higher rate, effective all the way back to the day you contributed . . And this offer can be combined with our Guaranteed Best Rate RRSP GIG and 1/4% extra interest offer described earlier. Futurlink: Rates the best in convenience. For maximum control, our Self.;Directed RASPs rate the best. We rate ·the best. - By choosing Central Guaranty Trust for your RRSP GIG, you can avoid the cr()'Mjs ard the line-ups and be assured you're getting the best rate. Convenienijy. And because of our Guaranteed Best Rate, you know you canl do better than Central Guaranty Trust. , 343 College street, Taonto, Ontario MST 155 tel. 961-8247
Page 1: Digital Archiving Completed by the
Page 5 and 6: Digital Archiving Completed by the
Page 7 and 8: The Kensington Market Drum, Februar

#9101 - Feb 1991

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template ?