By Sarah Lazarovic

We were excited when we received the flyer from Deputy Mayor Pants informing us that he’d be singling out our unimposing block of Christie Pits for an evening security walk. What did we do to deserve this honour, TOist wondered? Sadly, we arrived at last night’s walk to learn that our walk would be short Pants. Instead his assistant Rebecca joined three 14 division Officers as we strolled the streets voicing complaints. If the walk was meant to allay fears and worries it did a bit of the opposite – A crack house on our street? pitbulls running wild? thieving? rampant drug dealing? defecation in the shrubbery? gangs? How had we missed it all? How had we never noticed a thing?
“I’ve lived on this street for seventy-eight years and I’ve never had problems like the ones we have now,” said one resident. And this pretty much set the tone for the walk.
For their part, the officers and Pants’ assistant took the complaints to heart, and did come up some solutions – better lighting in the alleyways, better maintenance of sight lines and increased patrolling. But ultimately Constable Dave Hammill’s response to unanswered complaints to the police was disturbing – ‘Don’t tell me about a lack of officers. I know we don’t have enough. Just keep calling.’
Do Councillors in other Wards go on their neighbourhood walks, we wondered? “Pantalone doesn’t really go, he’s the Deputy Mayor,” said Constable Hamill. “But Giambrone goes, cause he’s a young guy!”