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Why do we pay so much money in Toronto for so little standards
06/09/2009 - 00:58

I am middle class, with a university degree I pay $1000 a month for a one bedroom apartment at Queen and Dufferin. I have cockroaches, mice, paper thin walls, bad electricity and pumbing, an uncommunicative landlord and I just found out after 6 years of living here that the apartments are illegal (not registered with the City of Toronto) - I guess that explains why the three apartments have one mailbox.

slipping between the cracks
06/01/2009 - 12:10

my sister is blind and developmentally delayed and had been institutionalized all her life. she functioned well enough that when she married, another blind person, they were able to live on their own. her husband, has passed away and now she is on her own. she has a great place to live at first place in hamilton but between the rent and the meals (she cannot cook for herself) she accummulates hundreds of dollars of debt each month. her family is not in a position to help her financially. disability pays her $800/month. rent is $440, meals, 500, phone and bills $100.

Deciding Priorities
05/23/2009 - 17:02

There are three main categories :
(a) Those who own houses,
(b) Those who rent houses,
(c) Those who do not belong to either ( homeless).

(c) is a social shame and has to be dealt with by the whole community ( at all three levels of government ).
(a) for this category, both stability and affordability matter.
(b) this is the category that includes those who can afford and those who cannot. When affordability is not always possible then stability is a dream. This catgory is most critical and hence it requires more attention.

Lead from My Home Poisoned My Children
05/15/2009 - 16:30

I was raised, probably as most people are, with the belief that all behaviour is determined by two processes, that of nature or nurture. We act and think the way we do because we were born that way: male or female, short or tall, brawny or brainy and so forth. Or, we are the way we are because of how our parents taught us, or how we were schooled, or how our culture shaped us, or how our peers influenced us, or how we were molded by our social class standing - this list can go on forever. For the longest time, this is how I thought. And based on this belief, this is how I raised my children.

protection
04/24/2009 - 13:21

I live in a basement suite and the owner (lives upstairs) wants to renovate and sell. Once that happens I guess I will go on a list, although I hear the list is very long. I haven't had a housing worker before but I might need one now as I want to get into something permannent.