Results tagged “cheridinovo”

FILM: Parkdale MPP Cheri DiNovo is presenting a free screening of award-winning documentary Tibet: Cry of the Snow Lion tonight at The Revue Cinema. After the screening, stick around for the feel-good Q & A of the year, featuring panelists from the Tibetan Joint Action Committee. It’s party time. The Revue Cinema (400 Roncesvalles Avenue), 7 p.m., FREE.

Environmental groups including Ecojustice and Earthroots are decrying that golf courses on the Oak Ridges Moraine use billions of litres of water a year. The report they issued points out that groundwater levels in the area are declining sharply. Not in their report but should have been: the fact that golf sucks.

Feeling nutty and proud of it? David Miller has proclaimed July 14 as Mad Pride Day in Toronto, which aims to recognize and empower a much marginalized group: those who have experienced oppression at the hands of the psychiatric system (psychiatric survivors and consumers) and those who generally have been stigmatized by their mental health issues. In the same way that the gay community has reclaimed the word "queer," psychiatric survivors and consumers have empowered themselves by reclaiming the word "mad." Consider it a celebration of the right to be different. We’ll be joining many other cities across the world in this international day to recognize mad people, such as Melbourne, Vancouver, Brussels, London, Chicago, Buffalo and interestingly, Accra (Ghana).

MP Peggy Nash and MPP Cheri DiNovo protest the closing of Toronto's swimming pools.

Health Canada reports that over half of Canadian kids aged five to 17 are not physically active enough for optimal growth and development. The number of overweight boys ballooned from 15 percent in 1981 to 35.4 percent in 1996; the percentage of overweight girls expanded from 15 percent to 29.2 percent. In less than a generation, obesity in children tripled. As anyone who has tried to lose a few kilos knows, it is easier to prevent overweight and obesity than to treat it.

A CN train jumps the tracks in Kingston, delaying rail traffic between Toronto and Montreal/Ottawa. Nobody was hurt, but observers told reporters this in a tone of serious disbelief because thirty-two train cars went off the rails less than a thousand feet from Kingston's passenger station, and apparently it was quite disturbing to see, what with the thousands of tons of out-of-control metal and all.

Parkdale-High Park MPP Cheri DiNovo calls the increase "appalling" after the recent pay hike Toronto MPPs were granted that range between $22,000 and $39,000 per year. DiNovo has been campaigning to raise the minimum wage to $10 an hour to decrease poverty amongst the women, children and immigrants who typically hold minimum wage jobs. Conservatives argue that the dramatic pay increase would hurt smaller independent business and jeopardize employment.

United Church Minister Cheri DiNovo and the NDP have taken Parkdale-High Park away from Sylvia Watson and the Liberals. The NDP won the riding with 41% of the vote, despite the Liberals summoning 11 cabinet ministers and high profile members like Bob Rae and Gerard Kennedy to campaign with former city councillor Sylvia Watson.

Students at Toronto area colleges and high schools are coping with the shootings at Montreal's Dawson College. The murders also has parents of high-school age children worried.

Paramedics dispatched to a house fire in west Toronto ended up on the Danforth because of a duplicate street name. Even worse, the fire may have resulted in the death of a 65-year old woman. This begs raises the question: why hasn't the city fixed the problem? The Star reminds us that the city has actually done a study about this problem (there are about 100 or so duplications around the megacity) and done nothing.

A 12-year old girl who has been missing for two days has been found after an exhaustive search in the city's east end. She had run away after a fight with her parents.