Million Dollar Housing Incentive
"You've done a mighty fine job, little lady!"
Last night I received a pop up on my phone.
Doug Ford, premier of Ontario, was awarding Olivia Chow, the mayor of Toronto, $114 million dollars towards housing.
Slowly, the federal and provincial governments are addressing our housing shortage.
The incentive was set in 2022 for the Building Faster Better Fund.
Twelve municipalities exceeded the goals for the fund, and seven are on track with their goals.
Toronto met the starts goals by 51% in 2023 by beginning work on 31, 656 new units.
And so, this joyous occasion happened where Ford presented Chow with a giant check.
There were tons of photos taken; I just skimmed through many.
However, the photo that I saw that the CBC chose to announce this joyous occasion on my phone gave me pause.
Why did the CBC choose this picture to share the good news?
Why is this picture the primary “Yay, we did it!” picture?
I have an issue with this picture, as I’m sure some of you do too.
Ford, a big white man, towering over Chow, a small Asian woman.
She looks like she’s bowing in gratefulness, which she may well have been. But why is a mayor bowing for an incentive that she worked hard to make happen?
Ford’s hand is on her shoulder. Yes, he’s a touchy-feely guy, but in this picture, it looks paternal. Like he’s patting the little lady on the shoulder for her cute little womanly attempts. Like she’s his daughter or possession.
Oh, yes, maybe I read too much into all of this. But these days, optics are everything. And as a woman who has lived over sixty years in a patriarchal, misogynist, racist, colonized country, it gives me pause.
Why publish this picture at all?
At any rate, I’m very happy that Toronto is receiving a nice chunk of cash for housing.
Meanwhile, another refugee has died. This time, it was a refugee woman from Africa who arrived at a shelter in Mississauga for shelter but had to wait outside in the cold from 2 pm until 8 pm, six hours in the freezing cold, until she was let in to sleep on the freezing cold floor. The next day, she died. This is apparently the same shelter where a man from Nigeria died that I mentioned here on Substack a few weeks ago.
The shelter in Mississauga said that even though recently there has been some federal money earmarked for them, it hasn’t come in yet.
Shame on Canada for inviting refugees in and then not providing the most basic of shelter from our brutal winters.
At any rate, there are some changes coming this year with regard to housing. Some make people mad, but they have to be done. Some aren’t enough.
Trudeau has been making visits and speeches about housing. Alberta received a huge housing boost the other day. Hopefully, Trudeau’s actions with regard to this aren’t performative but will get some people housed.
The foreign student quota is being examined and reduced. At last, the schools are supposed to show that there’s housing for the students they accept. I think. I hope. At least, that’s the rumblings that I heard.
Other changes are coming.
But today, I’m just wondering why the CBC shows a woman being grateful in a subservient pose to a man.
Here’s a better picture, this one from CTV, to mark the occasion, although I wondered why they published Olivia Chow with an angry face here?
Okay, one more for the road, this one from CP24.com.
At least her face here shows what a lot of us think about Ford and his bluster. I’m not too sure what Ford is doing with his hands, though. Who publishes these pictures anyway?
What are YOUR thoughts about these political pictures?
How do YOU think Canada is doing with responding to our horrific housing crisis?