Perennial concerns raised at Garden District meeting

By Duncan McAllister –

The garden district—it just looks beautiful. This was the motto for district signs and plaques suggested at a Nov. 29 meeting attended by members of the Garden District residents’ association and ward 27 councillor-elect Kristyn Wong-Tam. The group’s president Eva Curlanis-Bart, took the councillor for a walkabout of the neighbourhood earlier that day.

The number one critical issue for the group is crime. The area has a violent crime rate that is exacerbated by the density of high-risk social services in the neighbourhood.

Area residents are unhappy with the proliferation of half way houses and want the system to be overhauled. It is felt that the system is costly and doesn’t deliver on the most crucial of services. Says Curlanis-Bart, “It’s not extending help to people, it’s warehousing people who are, for one reason or another, unable to look after themselves.”

For example, the residents oppose such facilities as the Salvation Army group home for federal offenders, known as Banton Lodge at 416 Sherbourne St., which houses 56 inmates and is located right next to a school.

The group also targeted social services development without regulatory restrictions. Says Curlanis-Bart, “These are not rooming houses, they’re shelters, and they should be designated as shelters. They should have the regulatory restrictions that apply to shelters and not to rooming houses.”

Also of issue is the neglect and destruction of heritage sites like the property at 102 Shuter St. at Jarvis, site of the former historic Walnut Hall. The group believes there are plans underway “for an inappropriate development and a hotel.” A planning application was made in November 2008 for a residential condominium complex of 18 to 20 storeys and 69 suites, complete with four levels of underground parking, and a hotel to be built on the now-vacant corner.

Mystery surrounds the circumstances of the collapse of the historic building. The OMB held meetings “just to inflate the price of the site and flip it, and this is exactly what happened, so the historical building deteriorated further,” speculates Curlanis-Bart. “If it collapsed on its own or it collapsed with some help, we will never find out.”

Wong-Tam said it “looked pretty sturdy to me.”

Protection of heritage is an area of contention for the group. Although some members maintain they are not anti-development but see the need to preserve all heritage buildings in the neighbourhood, others disagree with protecting run-down, vacant houses and lots with no intrinsic value. One six-year Pembroke St. resident is frustrated with opposition to new development, saying “the only way you’re going to clean this area is to build new stuff.”

The area’s loss of businesses and services was also brought up at the meeting. Residents complain that there is not even a bank or grocery store in the area and they have to travel to Yonge St. or Cabbagetown. “Companies just won’t go there—we need options for groceries and health care,” demands another resident.

Councillor Wong-Tam spoke highly of the vegetable garden in Moss Park. “That is the only community garden in ward 27 and that happened in Moss Park,” she praises. “I will make sure that I profile that in my newsletter so I can help you tell your stories so that you’re not always going to labeled as a stigmatized neighbourhood.”