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Josh in the Community
My Staff and I are here to assist you with any questions or concerns you may have about your neighbourhood and/or your home. We’re working every day to make our community safer while improving Midtown’s parks, main streets, and the many valued services we rely on including recreation, childcare, and waste collection. I hope to see you out in our community soon!
Josh at City Hall
On your behalf, I am advocating for a more thoughtful, creative, and responsible approach to policy issues at City Hall. I take very seriously the responsibility to make informed decisions that are based on evidence, community consultation, and the merits of arguments – rather than partisanship. I will continue representing our community at Council meetings on transit, tenant concerns, childcare, green space, and other issues that matter most to Midtown residents. Or, you can reach us by phone at 416 392-7906.
Current News Updates
Oriole ParkCommunity Garden, May 2014
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Town Crier: Sharon, Lois and Bram get their playground
Roy George drove all the way from Virginia Beach, Va. to see Sharon Hampson, Lois Lilienstein and Bram Morrison perform together for the hundreds of people gathered in June Rowlands Park, during the May 10 playground naming ceremony in their honour.
In 1999 George was a Make-a-Wish kid living in Syracuse, N.Y. who was battling a terminal illness.
“This is the one time where all three play together,” he said, a child-like smile playing on his lips.
He wasn’t the only one beaming with youthful exuberance, as generations of fans came from around the neighbourhood to help usher in the new name of the playground situated in the southwest corner of the Davisville park.
Ward 22 councillor Josh Matlow, put forward the motion in September to name the playground after the troupe, and the process finally came to fruition on a sunny, fun-filled spring day.
Toronto Star: Shipping dangerous goods: Toronto mulls tougher rules for development along rail corridor
May 20th, 2014
Jessica McDiarmid
Toronto Star
City officials are seeking tighter safety rules for development near railroad tracks that carry thousands of cars loaded with dangerous goods through the heart of Toronto.
The planners who mull applications to build hundreds of residential units along the Canadian Pacific rail line, which runs along Dupont St., have little data about what moves along those tracks — that information is secret.
But a recently released consultants’ report recommended a number of safety measures for new developments, such as setbacks, fences and berms to stop or slow a derailed train before it crashed into buildings.
Neither railway companies nor the federal government will divulge information publicly on dangerous goods moved through communities, arguing it would create a security threat.
Toronto Star: Hoarding a vicious cycle without psychological support
May 18th, 2014
Jane Gerster
Toronto Star
The front porch of Dennis Cibulka’s Davisville home smells faintly of cat urine, the animals winding their way through piles of stacked boxes.
Clad in hazmat suits, fire officials spent days at the home last November, removing overflowing piles of paper, plastic, clothes and boxes.
It had been boarded up by the city, so full it was deemed a fire hazard. Cibulka was living on the porch.
As the number of boxes grows again, neighbours worry history is repeating itself.
In the Beaches, it already has.
Last week, fire officials, again in hazmat suits, cleared out a home on Beech Ave. In September, they had removed more than 50 cats.This time they removed “excess combustibles,” the garbage and household items filling more than one large disposal bin.
