Our translation of an excerpt from Canadian Tire Fire: The City of Toronto has
experienced several protests over the past month over City Council spending andpriorities, in particular the stark contrast between the funding of the city forthe most vulnerable and the one assigned to its police department. ---- OnFebruary 6, a "die-in" was held at City Hall to demand that the city extendaccess to heat drop-in stations. This week, a motion went to the vote at the citycouncil. She proposed that the city keep heat drop-ins open 24/7 until mid-April,rather than waiting for temperatures to hit -15C before opening them. The motionfailed. Later that month, during a debate on the city council budget, anothermotion was put forward to redirect $900,000 of the police budget (or 0.07% of thepolice budget ) to keep the heat drop-offs open for the rest of the winter. Thismotion also failed. According to the Toronto Star, nearly 100 people ran intoclosed doors at drop-in stations each day.At the same time, city council approved a 2023 budget last week that includednearly $50 million more, or a 4.3% increase, for police. One of the intentionsbehind this increase is to add nearly 200 officers to the police department. Theapproved budget will also reduce public transit hours by 9%. According to theWorld Socialist website, while the total budget for public transport willincrease, a considerable portion of this increase will be used to fund 50 newpositions for transport police officers.On the day of the budget, people demonstrated again outside the city councildemanding that the city fund social services instead of the police. During thisevent, the police intervened to forcibly chase away some demonstrators.Basically, the impression left by the City of Toronto's 2023 budget is of a citywhose homelessness strategy is to let people die and continue to criminalize poverty.Toronto is far from the only city where people are currently resisting increasedpolicing budgets. In Hamilton earlier this month, a large group of peopleinterrupted a city council session that was debating the city's budget proposalwhich included a $10 million increase, a 5.5% increase. of the police budget.Excerpt from a text from Canadian Tire FireTranslation by the Emma Goldman Collective Blogby Emma Goldman Collectivehttp://ucl-saguenay.blogspot.com/2023/03/ontario-des-services-pour-les-besoins.html_________________________________________A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C EBy, For, and About AnarchistsSend news reports to A-infos-en mailing listA-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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