Results tagged “publichousing”

Knitting: it's not just for grandmas anymore, but you already knew that. It's not just for crafty hipsteristas either. A group of teachers at Highland Heights Junior Public School have started a Knitting Club to help keep inner city kids out of trouble. Many of the students come from public housing, so the school relies heavily on fundraising for a extracurricular activities. When the idea of the Knitting Club was first conceived, the teachers didn't imagine that any more than 15 to 20 students would be interested.

When trying to solve the problem of the lack of affordable housing, the thinkers and planners and innovators and design enthusiasts come up with some pretty creative ideas. Like the IKEA House, for example, or the notion of shipping container architecture. A group of Toronto activists are proposing a "use it or lose it" bylaw "that would see vacant and underutilized buildings and spaces expropriated by the City and redeveloped as badly needed affordable housing and social centres."

Welcome to Sponsoronto. This week, MasterCard offered the city money to reopen outdoor ice rinks in December, which were to be closed as part of budget cuts. Though Torontoist will be glad to see the rinks open, accepting corporate donations/sponsorship can be a slippery slope. What’s next—Home Depot Public Housing? Pepsi Public Schools?

The 4th annual Regent Park Film Festival hits tonight, 6pm, at Nelson Mandela Park Public School (440 Shuter Street) with Wrecking Ball Videos, an evening of films made in Regent Park by youth trained at Regent Park Focus, not-for-profit organization that promotes health in vulnerable communities across Ontario. The festival continues until the 12th with a diverse programme that reflects on the lives and experiences of multicultural communities in Canada, based, as it is, in the multicultural Regent Park, Canada’s oldest (and largest) public housing community. Most importantly, though, all the screenings are free!