By GURPREET GHAG

A development proposal for 362 Wallace Ave. (at the mouth of the Wallace Avenue Bridge) has raised some concerns and prompted a traffic study to take place.

The plans for 174 new residential townhouse and 25 light-industrial units at the barren site were pre-sented by architect and planner Kregg Fordyce, in part with Fred Ruth of Somerset homes at St. Luigi’s Catholic School (2 Ruskin Ave.) on July 26th and, for the most part, were well received by the approximately 75 in atten-dance.

Beautiful looking, low-rise, two-story units, an abundance of greenery and 7,000 square feet of space dedicated to community use all seemed very fair by most attendees, however a number of locals expressed concern that the neighbourhood streets could not support another 200 or so people coming in and out of the area.

Ruskin Avenue resident Adam...

theBLOORDALEpresshttp://www.thebloordalepress.comAUGUST 2011 vol.1/issue.3

Wallace townhouse proposal prompts

traffic study

I N S I D EFLOWER THEIF

A man is caught stealing plants from the Railpath and his

picture posted online. Page 2

NEW GREEN P PARKING LOTNew parking lot helping re-

leave stress on Dundas St. W. May be permanent.

Page 8

Community News from Ward 18

CARIBBEAN CARNIVAL COSTUME CREATOR

Carnival workshop found right here in Bloordale.

Page 10

see TOWNHOMES, page 3

BIG on BLOOR photo gallerypages 6 and 7

News

By GURPREET GHAG

After an incident of flower theft popularized by a community website, police are saying that plant theft if one of the harder areas of crime to solve.

On June 23 an email was sent to Vic Gedris of http://www.thejunction-traingle.ca, where a resident says he saw what he thought was a volunteer working on plants near the Wallace Avenue Bridge at the West Toronto Railpath.

Upon cycling back to the spot, the resident saw the man pull out three plants and begin walking away. A confrontation took place between the two. The man said that the plants were wild flowers and that they would grow back. The resident said that the plants had been recently planted and that the man was a thief.

According to the letter, the ‘suspect’ then took off and the resident took pictures of him on his iPhone and sent

them in with the letter.Both the letter and picture were

posted and can be found, along with a string of complaints from other victims of plant theft at http://www.junctiontriangle.ca/node/1169.

According to the webpage, the po-lice at 11 division were also contacted.

Unfortunately, Peter Lennox, the of-ficer who the report was filed with was unavailable for contact, but Detective Sergeant Niels Sondergaard was able to provide some insight.

Although not illegal, Sgt. Sonder-

gaard said that posting a picture in a public place of someone who you believe to be at fault is not something that he condones.

“The only way to get justice is to con-tact the police,” he said, “that way our court system can expose all the facts. We don’t condone posting pictures of this person in an effort to embarrass them. Those kinds of things can lead to unnecessary confrontation and disputes.”

Sgt. Sondergaard added that his division receives a lot of these types of calls from High Park, but there is very little they can do.

“Unlike a stereo system that has a serial number and that we can prove came from a person or place, it’s really hard to prove that with a plant.”

“You can always set up a camera system if you are afraid you will be tar-geted (by theft),” he says, “but of course any surveillance system will probably cost a lot more than most flowers.”

Flower Thief seems to be in the clear

The Wallce Avenue bridge, where the incident occured. PHOTO By Gurpreet Ghag

By JUSTIN MILLERSON

About a month and a half after the accused Dong Nguyen alleg-edly hit a baby raccoon with a garden shovel, it was decided by prosecutors that 18 months in prison and a $10,000 fine will be the maximum penalty the Bloor-dale resident could face.

Charges were dropped from a maximum of five years in prison for animal cruelty and 10 years for possession of dangerous weapon on July 13 when Nguyen’s lawyer represented him at a hear-ing – Nguyen did not attend.

Toronto Humane Society board member and Bloordale resident Ken Wood said dropping the charges shows just how serious the system takes animal cruelty.

“I’m concerned that the judicial system takes animal cruelty as serious as littering,” said Wood who spoke against the alleged act when he attended the ‘raccoon rally’ held in early July.

No prison time should be given to Nguyen said Wood, but a larger fine needs to be dished out to set

an example to the public.Wood is adamant saying that

there is a lack of overall educa-tion on raccoons in the city - how to deal with them correctly and what the penalty for a crime such as this are questions that should be answered.

Ward Councilor, Bailao agrees and said there is a lot of informa-tion that is not reaching the To-ronto Public.

“What I say this is not the way to deal with this issue, there is work that we all have to do, but animal cruelty is not the way to deal with it. There is information that needs to be more readily available. The city needs to do a better job mak-ing sure residents are storing gar-bage safety,” said Bailao.

What will actually happen to Nguyen and how the city will respond is unknown at this time, but Wood is eager to see how the alleged act is handled.

“I will be defiantly following this case until the end result,” said Wood.

Nguyen’s case has been ad-journed until August 18.

Alleged ward-18 racoon beater will go up against lesser charges

02 The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

Police say that there isn’t much they can do about Chrysanthemum Crooks

“Unlike a stereo system that has a serial number

and that we can prove came from a person or

place, it’s really hard to prove that with a plant.”

Detective Seargeant Niels Sondergaard, 11 division

Accused fails to appear at hearing, but his maximum possible penalty gets lessened

Clay and Paper Theatre’s ‘The Pedlar’s Wager’‘Clay and Paper’, the exaggerated,

satrical, giant-puppet theatre is currently presenting its first ever bicycle-based mobile play entitled ‘The Pedlar’s Wager’.

The mobile play has three acts which take place in three parks with the intention of spectators biking along with the crew to view

the show in its entirety. The first act of the play takes

place at Dufferin Grove park (just south of Bloor and Dufferin streets), the second act takes place at Fred Hamilton Park (just south of College and Shaw streets) and the final takes place at Trinity Bellwoods Park (Dundas and Grace Streets).

The show runs until August 14th from Wednesday to Sunday at 7 p.m. at Dufferin Grove Park. Matinees are also offered Friday to Sunday at 2 p.m. It is a pay-what-you-can show with a suggested price of $10.

For more information you can visit http://www.clayandpapertheatre.org.

Clay and Paper theatre will be in full swing in the month of August. PHOTO By Gurpreet Ghag

TOWNHOMES, from page 1

Adam Charlesworth believed that the streets would be hard to navi-gate during peak hours.

“We’re looking at 200 people who have to leave when everybody else leaves. Right now, they’re going to exit at Edwin [avenue]. Edwin isn’t wide enough for three lanes and it’s only 25 car lengths long until you get to Dupont, which is already a busy street in the morning,” he said.

He also said that his own street, Ruskin Avenue, which would be used as an artery to Dupont and Bloor streets for those residents, is already tight for space, especially when St. Luigi’s Catholic School is in season.

“[Ruskin Avenue] is very lousy in the morning when school starts. You have cars lined up for fifteen minutes. Minivan, after minivan, after minivan not moving.”

Charlesworth said it would make sense for the development to con-sist of high-rise units, which would bring in more money and allow

the developers to build a tunnel directly to Dundas Street West.

His neighbour, Vitor Ferreira, shared similar views and said that the parking shortage in the area would get much worse.

“I go home and I have to park far from my house,” said the retired Ferreira, “Then at midnight I have to go out and park my car in front of my house. I am an already an old man and this is no good for me.”

The development plans did include 271 parking spots (179 spaces underground, 17 spaces on street and 50 spaces underground and 25 spaces in driveway for the industrial units) however, more

and more residents disagreed that this would be a sufficient amount.

Hearing the same feedback over and over, councilor Ana Bailao felt that a community meeting solely to discuss traffic was in order.

“There is a concern with the en-trance of the garage,” said Bailao, “I’m going to see what the engi-neers [at City Hall] say, but aside from this development, there is a clear issue about traffic in the

community that a lot of people are talking about.”

Bailao said that a steering com-mittee will be formed and dialogue between them, the community and traffic engineers from city hall will take place over things like prohibition to turn right at certain times, turning two way streets into one ways and speed bumps.

Fordyce said he was not surprised by the concerns and it was all very

similar to a number of neighbour-hoods that he has worked in prior.

Fordyce said that it will take a while for all these things to straighten out and predicted that construction would probably be-gin sometime in 2014.

Anyone who was not at the meeting and would still like their opinions heard is advised to con-tact Fred Ruth of Somerset homes at fred@somersethome.ca.

“[Ruskin Avenue] is very lousy in the morn-ing when school starts. You have cars lined up

for fifteen minutes. Mini-van, after minivan, after

minivan not moving.”

Adam Charlesworth Ruskin Avenue Resident

Aerial View

03The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

News

reg. $50, no cash value. Cannot be combined with any other offer. Expires September 15th, 2011. Must be presented at time of bike drop off.

View from Wallace Ave.

View of inbetween the units

About

04

The Bloordale Press is pub-lished monthly and is distrib-uted within ward 18’s bound-aries and in its neighbouring areas. These 5,000 copies were delivered door-to-door in the ward and also at local business-es and other areas of interest. Call or email us with your story leads or inquire about subscrip-tions and our advertising rates.

http://www.thebloordalepress.comTelephone: (647) 869-2531

thebloordalepress@gmail.comtwitter@bloordalepress

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

EXECUTIVE EDITOR

MANAGING EDITOR

COPY EDITORS

SENIOR ADVISOR

CARTOONIST

the BLOORDALE press

GURPREET GHAG

JUSTIN MILLERSON

MATT LOPES

JORDAN MAXWELL

ED OLIVEIRA

ROB LAMBERTI

JONES MILLER

The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

‘THINGS HAPPENING WAY TOO FAST’

There is nothing but the utmost respect and honour between this news team for being the

first reciepients of the late Andrew Prosser’s achievement award on June the 23rd. To recieve

these awards in the name of such a respected young man, who we only had the fortune to meet

once (and only once had the pleasure to showcase his videos (‘A Mayor for Bloordale’)) is by

far the biggest honour any of us have been endowed.

We also thank Ana Bailao for our ‘exemplary citizen’ awards. Personally speaking, I never

thought that my name and exemplary citizen would ever be used in the same sentance, but

there you have it.

As a group, we were planning for a long and slow climb to achieve any sort of recognition.

In fact, we are truly still thrying to organize ourselves; we are a machine that still needs some

fine tuning and oil, and this is all just seems out of left field. I mean we were in a mode where

we still got giddy over the odd email from a reader saying, “hey, I love the issue,” or running

around the room whenever we got a new follower on twitter (by the way that’s @bloordale),

but never did we think that a year and a half later (a year or so online and these few in print),

that we would be this appreciated.

Again, it is truly an honour and we are committed to continue to serve this great community

for a long time to come.

- Gurpreet Ghag on behalf of the press

By ANA BAILAO For the first time since amalgama-

tion, the City of Toronto is undergo-ing a detailed financial analysis of department-by-department spending. Aiding in this Core Service review, is the private-sector consultants KPMG, whose recent report has indicated a number of non-critical City programs being presented as a means of improv-ing the City’s financial position entering 2012 budget discussions.

Among the non-critical areas deemed a source for cost-savings? Childcare, libraries, the Toronto En-vironmental Office and public health programs, to name a few.

Both as a resident and a Councillor I had looked forward to the Service Re-view process. Such reviews are helpful when done correctly, allowing an op-portunity to take inventory of services and programs. I looked forward to the many conversations with City staff and the community about what is working well and what needs to be improved in our City, going as far as passing a mo-tion at Council to increase the level of consultation in this process.

With the recent report by KPMG, however, I have significant concerns with this initial phase of the Service Review and the recommendations sug-gested thus far.

Programs that the City can operate without does not make them non-essential. Areas such as childcare, libraries, and environmental program-ming are absolutely critical, in our Ward especially. With libraries that are over-capacity, and a continual shortage of affordable childcare, these issues are at the forefront, not because of cost, but because of need. These programs should not be considered as sources of savings, but opportunities for invest-ment to build a City we are proud to give to our children.

Of further concern, is the report’s examination of cost appraisals, but not value appraisals, of the City’s services. More than the simple cost of these programs, it is critical to understand the value these programs offer over the long-term, and the value returned ver-sus the cost that is invested. If a library program to promote literacy costs the City $10,000 per year, how much more is saved by our Public School system,

or how much does the City’s HIV prevention program save our Hospitals in long-term treatment? These are the important discussions we must bring to City Hall when preparing the 2012 budget. Only with this information can we make responsible financial decisions while investing in Toronto’s future.

In many cases these programs cannot be quantified for the service that they provide to our community, and I will make sure that this message is heard at City Hall; “simply because you cannot put a price on the value of something, does not mean it has no value.”

While I recognize that the City has a serious shortfall to meet for the next budget, a short-sighted approach of cutting social programs will only pro-vide short-term solutions, solutions that will have a much greater cost in the near future.

Throughout the summer I will be at-tending events, speaking with residents, and reaching out to the community for feedback about the services in our City. I am always interested in your thoughts and opinions, and encourage you to contact my office and become engaged in these important discussions.

05The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

The Councillor’s Corner

Editorial Cartoon

Photo Gallery

06 The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011 07The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

Photo Gallery

News

08

By MATT LOPES

Amidst the construction taking place on Dundas Street West, busi-ness owners can breathe a sigh of relief as a temporary Green P park-ing lot will give their customers a place to park.

In a combined effort from Ward 18 councillor Ana Bailao, the To-ronto Parking Authority and the Toronto Catholic District School Board, the St. Veronica’s staff park-ing lot (South-West of Dundas and Dufferin Streets) on Sheridan Avenue can now be used by the public.

“They were very very pleased to have a Green P,” said Bailao. “On a regular basis this is something that some of the businesses were look-ing forward to having and with the pressures that the construction puts on them they wanted it even more. So they were very pleased that they were able to get it.”

The new lot is just a short dis-tance away for the commercial section of Dundas Street West that has been the focal point of park-ing issues since former councillor Adam Giambrone displaced 70 parking spaces along the strip in

November 2009. Bailao said that in addition to the

benefits the lot brings to business owners, the school board has taken in some income and hockey play-ers from McCormick Recreation Centre (179 Brock Ave.) now have a place to park.

“I always thought that school parking lots are a great way to help us deal with some of these issues so I approached Toronto parking

authority and we approached the school board and its brought in a little bit of income for the school board, and at the same time it helps the businesses and the com-munity,” said Bailao.

The Lot will be available until August 31 which is around the time the construction should be complete. With a permanent Green P location in demand, the Toronto Parking Authority will be

monitoring the temporary lot with the possibility of turning into a permanent parking location.

“This is kind of a pilot project and we’re hoping that it’s a success-ful project and that the Toronto parking authority and the school approve it to continue. That is our goal,” said Bailao.

After construction is complete early next month, as planned, the parking issue on Dundas West

should finally be settled but Bailao said there is still work to be done to help the local businesses.

“I think there’s a next phase af-ter we’re done the construction and we’ve put all the parquets and everything,” said Bailao, “we have to continue to improve the area by promoting it, making sure we have good businesses in the area and make sure that we have people shopping locally.”

New Parking lot to aid

businesses

This way to business salvation. PHOTO By Matt Lopes

The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

By MATT LOPES

With help from the community and Ward 18 city councillor Ana Bailao, Zocalo Bistro (1426 Bloor Street W.) has overcome city by-laws and has been approved for a backyard patio that has been sought after by both owners and customers.

Heather Braaten of Zocalo said an outdoor patio is something that she and co-owner Paul Hardy have wanted since they first opened last summer.

“People like patios, there’s not a lot of patios in this little area and almost everyone who comes in asks if we have one. I think Toronto loves its patios,” said Braaten.

With no room for a patio in the front, Braaten said they hit a snag in March when a city by-law, introduced early in the year stopped them from building a patio in the backyard. Braaten said it was the beginning of a lengthy process with the city of To-ronto.

“We started the process of a variant to that by-law. In the meantime they overturned that by-law but we had to set a variant because of the amount of space we had in the back,” said Braaten.

At the hearing which took place on July 20, Braaten said the patio was approved by the city and she thanks the community and Councillor Ana Bailao for their support.

“We gathered a petition of names from people who supported the idea of having a backyard patio at Zocalo,” said Braaten, “and Ana Bailao has been in support of the expansion of our business and she even gave up her time to come and speak at our hearing.”

Braaten said she expects the patio to be open by late August and said she is very happy with the approval and thinks it will be a great addition to her business.

Zocalo Bistro is located on Bloor Street West, just west of Symington Avenue, and has a 95 per cent “like it” rating on Urbanspoon.com, a popular restaurant review site.

Restaurant gets approval to build patio

09

New in Business

By GURPREET GHAG

After six months of designing and decorating, Niki Tsourounakis unveiled her Café Neon to Bloor-dale on July 7.

Cafe Neion is located at 241 Wal-lace Ave., (just west of Lansdowne Ave.) and Tsourounakis credits a previous catering gig for Ubisoft (across the street) as the inspira-tion for opening up in the neigh-bourhood.

“I was lucky enough to cater the launch party for Ubisoft. So when I came here, I saw the units across the street and said this is re-ally perfect – a blank canvas that I could do whatever I wanted with,” she says.

And with the help of designers Jonathan Sabine and Jessica Na-kanishi, the ‘blank canvas’ slowly turned into a relaxed and polished looking place to grab some food and drink.

Aside from catering, which Tsourounakis says is something that she will be running out of her new location; she says she was also fortunate enough to grow up in a Greek family that was heavily im-

mersed in the food industry.“My family had three businesses

growing up and I was put to work when I was thirteen,” she says.

Her family’s brand (Vlatos) extra-virgin olive oil, imported all the way from Greece, is also avail-able at the Café.

Along with her family’s olive oil, the name of the café also comes from Greek word that means a cof-fee shop or gathering place.

Also offered is the ‘Schoolyard’ brand of textiles, which include greeting cards, organic napkins and blankets. The textiles are de-signed by her partner Katy Chan and Chan’s business partner Hilary Dennis.

As for food, the Cafe offers an assortment of soups, gourmet sandwiches and market salads

amongst other items. The shop also bakes fresh sandwich breads, bagels, croissants, and cookies every morning to go along with its selection of coffees, which include regular North American coffee, Vietnamese Coffee (which

is served cold and with condensed milk) and Greek styled coffee.

The Café’s hours are Monday to Friday from 7:30 to 5 p.m. and Sat-urdays from 9 to 4.

Tsourounakis hopes to start op-erating on Sundays and plans to

open a patio in the front. Plans for dinners and extended hours are also currently being considered and a liquor license is on the way.

For more information, or to book the Café for a function, you can call 647-352 – 8366.

The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

Niki Tsourounakis behind her new cappucino machine. PHOTO By Gurpreet Ghag

By GURPREET GHAG

Artist and local resident Robert Kananaj opened his self-titled gal-lery (1267 Bloor St. W (across the street from Mercer Union Gallery) in Bloordale to a modest crowd on July 9.

“I live here and this is me connecting to my neighbourhood,” said an exhausted Kananaj on opening night, after spending much of the night before busily scrambling to get the final touches of paint and lights in place.

Kananaj, who spent most of his life sculpting, which he enjoyed very much, said that now his calling is to promote art.

His first show was a 2011 collection of paintings by Albanian-born IIir Zefi.

“This is my first showing in Toronto,” said Zefi, who has most of his works showcased in Europe, including two currently on display in Rome and Milan.

Although trained in painting figures and landscapes, Zefi’s collec-tion at this gallery was less traditional.

Zefi said that his paintings were expressions of feelings that he in-curred over the last year.

All of the paintings had no definable, concrete forms and left the viewer to interpret the feeling through the choice of colours and the thickness of brush strokes and splatters.

His works will run until about September in the gallery.Kananaj’s wife, Roberta Laiking, who co-directs the gallery, was

ecstatic with the first night’s turnout and said that she is “looking forward to getting settled and being known in the neighbourhood.”

Kananaj said that he plans to promote art of all different mediums and will also host private shows.

The gallery runs Monday through Saturday from 11-6 and by ap-pointment. For more information, you can visit http://www.robert-kananajgallery.com.

Robert Kananaj at The Robert Kananaj Gallery PHOTO By Gurpreet Ghag

New Gallery Open

Bloordale’s newest Cafe

“I was lucky enough to cater the launch party for

Ubisoft. So when I came here, I saw the units across

the street and said this is really perfect – a blank

canvas that I could do whatever I wanted with.”

News

10

Local warehouse houses colourful, Caribean Carnival creations

The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

By JUSTIN MILLERSON

A vacant garage in Bloordale tucked away at St. Helens Ave. and Dublin St. was the facility that housed long time Caribana contributor, Whitfield Belasco’s costume creation called ‘celebra-tion’ for this year’s Scotiabank Ca-ribbean Carnival.

The garage, which was decorated with colourful costume accesso-ries, was the temporary workplace for Belasco and his team of volun-teers helping with the project for about a month.

“Making costumes is a love of my own and my members, it is a love

of labour,” said Belasco who took a month vacation from his job at the TTC to build his costume theme.

The group of volunteers goes by the name of ‘Concept Costume Creators’ with Belasco serving as director and designer.

Every summer Belasco collects a group of volunteers for his initia-tive and after creating costumes for 44 years Belasco has become a household name for Caribana fol-lowers.

However, all this comes at a price.

The cost for the entire project this year was about $120,000 which covered the rent of their

workplace, costume supplies, travel costs as well as other small expenses.

Belasco urged he did not have the money to pay for all expenses himself (daily costs reach to about $300 a day), so money was raised to try to break even.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), who repre-sents about 180,000 employees in Ontario, acted as his main spon-sor, covering much of the cost. Some members of CUPE even participated in the parade wearing the costumes they have supported.

Belasco also sold his work to some participants, but gave many

of the costumes away. Taking care of all this in just a

month’s time for a few decades has taken a toll on Belasco and he mentioned that his involvement in the summer event could soon be coming to an end.

The 66-year-old said mounting frustrations on a number of things have taken the joy out creating costumes, but the lack of govern-ment funding is perhaps his big-gest frustration.

“No body gives a damn,” said Belasco referring to the money Caribana generates for the city.

Belasco said Caribana generates about five to six hundred million

dollars for the City of Toronto, but gets little funding for their contri-bution, this is a reality he believes to be unacceptable.

Scotiabank however jumped aboard to offer their support to the Caribbean Carnival this year and Belasco was happy for the support.

“We are happy to have them, because Caribana is an expensive thing to do,” said Belasco.

Although Belasco said his years are numbered in the Caribbean Carnival he is not ready to call it quits quite yet.

“Frustrations have built up, but I don’t’ know yet about tomorrow.”

Bloordale Dancer appearing in ‘Dance: Made in Canada’ series

Dancer Heidi Strauss will be performing the duet ‘La Lourdeur des Cendres’ as part of the ‘Baker se-ries’ at the Betty Oliphant Theatre (400 Jarvis St.) from August 11 to 13.

Strauss has been working as an independent dancer and choreographer since 1994 and in 2007, Strauss founded her own choreography company called ‘adelheid’.

Since 2008, Strauss has worked out of the Factory Theatre and created and presented three works.

Her and Darryl Tracy, who she is dancing with at the ‘Made in Canada’ series, have been working to-gether since 1998 and have done nine works prior to this one.

Strauss will be hitting the stage at 7 p.m. on Au-gust 11, 9 p.m. on August 12 and 4 p.m. on the 13.

For more information on the event or to buy tickets and please visit http://www.princesspro-ductions.ca or call 416-504-7529 . Heidi Strauss and Daryll Tracy strike a pose. PHOTO COURTESY Jeremy Mimnagh.

A volunteer fusing feather to a headpiece. PHOTO By Justin Millerson

Nearly finished costumes await the big day. PHOTO By Justin Millerson

11

News

The Bloordale Press AUGUST 2011

By JUSTIN MILLERSON

In an effort to raise money to build a community kitchen at Dovercourt Public School, city councilor Ana Bailao hosted a

community barbecue and yard sale at Dovercourt Park on July 16.

There has been a recent calling for better nutrition for students and community members sur-rounding the Dovercourt area

and Bailao believed the fundraiser would be a good step in the right direction.

“This is our first community yard sale and barbecue,” said Bailao. “It’s a way to bring the community to-

gether; neighbors, organizations in the community, and organizations that want to support our commu-nity.”

Agreeing with the Ward 18 coun-cilor was School Advisory Council member, Karen Craine who was present as a parent and concerned member of the community and she said something needed to be done about the problem of malnourish-ment immediately.

“The aim is to have a community kitchen that will service not just the school community, but the broader community,” said Craine. “We will start small then start reaching out.”

The fundraiser saw the park filled with activities from noon until 3 p.m. with several tents and tables condensed into the middle of the park. Aside from the barbe-cue and yard sale, the community event offered an array of festivities, but none more eye catching than a performance from a class from ‘Capoeira Camara’ (1299 Bloor St. W).

“It’s a pleasure to be here,” said

C.M. Bola, an instructor of capoei-ra and supporter of the cause.

Other organizations showed their support by donating money for the cause including the TTC union who donated $400. Union leader Bob Kinnear was happy to show his support.

“We came out to support this wonderful community effort to ensure that Dovercourt Public School has the resources that they need [to build the kitchen],” said Kinnear. “This is part of the transit workers reaching out to the com-munities letting them know we care about the community, that we are part of the community and we want to contribute to the com-munity.”

The Toronto District School Board will also be contributing as they plan to help turn a caretaker’s cubby into a kitchen. The school persuaded the board to pay for in-stallation of electricity and plumb-ing in the kitchen to come.

The total money raised for the kitchen was $1,000.

Residents enjoying some sun at the BBQ, while Capoeira Camara perform in the background. PHOTO By Justin Millerson

By GURPREET GHAG

You may have noticed a unique sport being played at the ice-rinks at Dufferin Grove this summer.

Bike Polo – a new, exciting take on the normally horse ridden sport has virtually dominated the rinks over the past month and on July 3rd the rinks played host to the ‘North-side’ regional qualifier

in the North American Hardcore Bike Polo Championships.

Thirty two, three-member teams, with players hailaing from Ottawa, Winnipeg, Calgary, Seattle, Vic-toria, Portland, New York, France and Switzerland all came to com-pete and have a crack at the cham-pionships that will take place in Calgary later this year.

The top twelve teams from the

tournament, along with some amazing prizes, would gain entry into the final leg of the champion-ship tour.

As it happened to play out, the top team in the tournament hap-pened to be the team of event or-ganizer Kevin Walsh.

“Yeah, I organized it and we won. It’s not usually supposed to happen like that,” said Toronto’s Walsh after

he and his team, which consisted of another Torontonian and a player from France, were awarded new saddles for their bikes amongst other bike-related prizes.

Although, this year’s qualifying is over, Walsh says that players will continue to use the rink through-out the summer and the fall when-ever the chance may arise.

Anyone wanting more informa-

tion on the sport and the league can get it at htpp://www.bikepolo.com or if you’re just dying to try it out, Walsh says it’s a good idea to come down to the rink on Thurs-days at around 6:30.

Walsh says that a single-speed bike is preferred in the sport, but newcomers can come with any bike they please and extra polo-mallets will be available for use.

Participants of the ‘north-side qualifier’ after the tournament ended. PHOTO By Gurpreet Ghag

The North American Hardcore Bike Polo Championship series

Community BBQ helps stop hunger