PhD candidate known to some as “that bird guy”, trying to prevent harm, help others and grow reconnections with nature. How should we use what time we have?🆘🌎
By the way, if you or anyone you know is subject to complaints over a naturalized/habitat garden on private land under a property standards bylaw, please share these resources widely. They can help with defending one’s Charter right to expression and with inspiring bylaw reform.
Excited to share the Bylaws for
#Biodiversity
Report: Barriers and Opportunities for Naturalized Gardens, as well as the accompanying solutions-oriented toolkit, produced by a collaboration with
@EcoDesignLabTMU
@DavidSuzukiFDN
Lorraine Johnson and others
Someone complained about my yard again and TWO bylaw officers showed up to investigate, front yard and back. They told me the yard and lot maintenance bylaw applies to grass and weeds over 8 inches. We had a good discussion in which I explained the updated bylaw, and they left.
I asked, can you please identify which grass and which weeds in particular are causing the problem and impacting health or safety? They could not. They did not seem familiar with the new parameters of the bylaw’s height restrictions (e.g., corner visibility triangles).
🚨Ontarians should write to their MPP to ask for an integrity / privacy commissioner investigation: Did
@fordnation
breach the oath of the Premier’s office and conflict of interest rules when he privately told developers he would allow them to develop lands in the greenbelt?
So, two officers show up together in a gas powered pickup truck to inspect my property’s compliance with a bylaw they didn’t seem to understand. I asked them to provide current information, and they could not. IMO this is an expensive waste of municipal resources.
All I wanted for Christmas is a vote of non-confidence in
@fordnation
and another chance for Ontario to choose government that isn’t actively working against public interest
Ontario taxpayers deserve a full inquiry into
@OntarioPCParty
’s plans to promote privatization of health care services in Ontario. Which companies stand to benefit, and what are their individual relationships to
@fordnation
? How is provincial planning and spending falling short?
Last year, when the advisory committee I sit on recommended a review of this bylaw, Council decided to instead direct staff to produce public information materials to support Municipal Law Enforcement Officers in explaining the bylaw to order recipients and complainants.
This is the kind of space where I want to be in a climate emergency, a cool spot among bees and butterflies and people who tolerate each other and respect boundaries. Many of my plants are gifts from other gardeners in the community and bought from local businesses. This is home.
If I was not already informed about the bylaw and able to defend myself, this could have escalated into an order being issued. Had I decided to fight it, pointing to contradictions between enforcement and what the bylaw says, even more resources would be spent. What is the point?
Can someone explain why we can’t have a left-leaning coalition of the Ontario NDP, Liberals and Greens like the bloc who just won the election in France? What is wrong with pursuing a coalition government here? Seems more likely to win a majority and keep itself accountable later
The advisory committee then provided the City with detailed recommendations of content for print and online, to help educate the public about the scope and purpose of the bylaw as well as benefits of naturalized landscaping and strategies for reducing conflicts with neighbours.
Since those education pieces have not materialized several months later, I recently asked for a status update. I was told they are not going ahead, despite the Council direction, because the city is trying to save paper 🤨
Here is what the bylaw itself says, after being updated to be more permissive of naturalized landscaping. It added a definition of lawn as applying to turfgrass, not all grasses. I do not have a lawn in my yard.
Help me understand something… why do we not have laws in Ontario, Canada that apply to governments granting exclusive contracts for public service delivery to private industry? Shouldn’t there be disclosure requirements, procurement processes and competition rules that apply?
Friendly reminder that many of the migratory birds being killed by colliding with glass on buildings (including residences and rural buildings) spend the winter months living on coffee farms and eating pest insects that would otherwise reduce crop yields and raise coffee prices.
The growing threat of climate change is causing the price of coffee beans to soar, and market watchers say that increase will soon trickle down to consumers.
If an officer shows up every time someone complains, even when the complaint is too vague to act on or based on concerns beyond the scope of the bylaw (e.g., “I don’t like how that garden looks”) then they are essentially being sent on a goose chase, wasting valuable paid time.
👀Wow. This poor small business owner got totally screwed by Ford’s privatization of Service Ontario.
“I’ve been a PC my entire life. I was head of the youth Progressive Conservative organization when I was 18 years old, and I’ve stuck by them my whole life. I’m finally done.”
NEW - A ServiceOntario owner who had their business of 23 years closed by the Ford government speaks to CityNews in a broadcast exclusive. Hear why Claudia Savonia feels she’s been “Left high and dry”
WATCH -
In the case of the current complaint about my yard, I asked the officers where I could learn more about the bylaw’s particulars, and was referred to the website. Well, here’s what the website has to say (page last updated in 2020):
A more economical way to enforce a complaint-driven bylaw like this (since a focus of late in London is “strategic opportunities”) would be to have complainants describe the particulars that are the basis of their complaint. e.g., “plant is blocking my driveway”
Maintaining my garden adds so much meaning to my life. It is maybe the closest thing I have to a spiritual practice. It helped me to find community and to understand my being here. Caring for it feels like giving a small apology to nature, considering how we have abused the land.
@fordnation
@MaritStiles
Those are some Big Strong Premier words, but what is your party actually doing to combat antisemitism that is on the rise in Ontario?
Can you please identify the part of this statement calling for a de-escalation of violence that is antisemitic? Asking as a Jewish-Canadian.
@john_e_bones
You would break your mower, then, since there are around a dozen native woody deciduous plants growing here, a rock garden, and a resident family of skunks who might attack you, for good reason. My neighbours on either side are fine with my garden— we have spoken about it.
A final note for the benefit of folks in Canada who might find themselves in the unfortunate position of being forced to defend a habitat garden: if a bylaw’s enforcement is not reproducible — as in, an order is based on subjective interpretation — it can be challenged in court.
My yard might not be everybody’s cup of tea, but I promise it’s perfectly legal. I also rodent-proofed my house and had my foundation and siding inspected recently. There are no property standards issues, but there is a small biodiversity oasis in an urban heat island.
There is also a veggie patch (onions, potatoes, carrots) and numerous edible fruit-bearing plants, most of which are native. We invite friends over to forage. We also eat some of the invasive weeds like garlic mustard, burdock and others.
@derecho_series
I think you're joking, but speculations about property value are very real. I'm not aware of any evidence that naturalized landscaping lowers property value. Actually, the opposite is true: my house is less expensive to cool in summer, I don't need to irrigate and I can grow food
Actually, under Ford, Ontarians have lost many choices. We
can’t choose ranked ballot elections
can’t choose a family doctor
can’t choose to buy a home
can’t choose to avoid COVID with current data
can’t choose to visit the Science Centre
can’t choose the future of Ontario Place
Cheers to choice!
Starting today, nearly 4,200 convenience stores are now selling beer, wine, cider and ready-to-drink beverages, giving you more choice and convenience close to home.
Find out more about what’s available near you at
I have held this species in my hand like this more times than I recall, yet I have never seen one alive in the wild. The owner of the building that killed this bird and countless others broke the law. I grow tired of waiting for that to mean something, so regulation can stop this
So long as
@fordnation
’s mandate letters (instructions provided to his cabinet ministers) are allowed to remain secret despite legal requirement for their disclosure, Ontarians will be trapped in a cycle of reacting to one surprise crisis after the next.
Similarly, if bylaw enforcement is not based on reasonable particulars— as in, providing specificity in definitions and prohibitions, making clear what is required to achieve compliance— it can be challenged for being too vague. According to the courts, “grass and weeds” = vague
Lastly, Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms section 2 b) guarantees individuals’ freedom of expression, which courts have affirmed encompasses expression of environmental values through the landscaping one chooses for their property (barring health or safety conflicts).
Addendum to this thread for context: my yard is managed carefully by my partner and I. It is tended often and problematic weeds are removed. Plants are trimmed and well tended to. It is kept free from garbage or food that could attract rodents, and there is no standing water.
So let me get this straight: to allow a foreign company to build a spa on public land,
@OntarioPCCaucus
has:
- exempted themselves from liability for breaking the law
- given away hundreds of millions in subsidy with a 95-year lease
- issued an MZO to override planning authority
Can we please just normalize silent fireworks already? The technology has existed for awhile. We can spare trauma to domestic and wild animals and avoid harming humans who have trauma or disabilities. Out of respect for folks who don’t want to participate in celebrations. Please?
This is wild! Black-headed Grosbeak was banded, then re-captured 15 years later🤯 It's a new age record for the species & the oldest songbird ever banded at
@IBOatBoiseState
Left: bird in 2008👦
Right: same bird in 2022🧓
More about the "ancient grosbeak":
This account, which has been actively posting info about the Ford administration, was suspended, apparently in response to this thread:
Under the guise of “free speech” this app appears to be censoring criticisms of conservative government officials
Has anyone tried flying a drone over this for surveillance? If mature trees are being removed in secret while an audit is being conducted, the province should have to answer for that
@ONPlace4All
Ontario Place is located in Chris’s electoral district Spadina-Fort York. All of the concerns he has conveyed from constituents about this sketchy project occurring on public land, with public $, have been ignored by the Ford government.
He calls it corruption, and he’s right.
Today, the Conservatives began cutting down trees at
#OntarioPlace
.
This is just the beginning of the destruction planned by the Ford government.
This mega-spa is an attack on taxpayers, the environment, and our democratic rights.
#ONpoli
#OntarioPlaceForAll
I'm sorry, no. The Premier of Ontario should be challenged for casually implying the next federal election is being rigged. Updates to riding boundaries are set by independent commissions, not federal politicians. Disinformation leads to voter suppression.
NEW: Premier Doug Ford says "no" his government won't realign the provincial riding boundaries to match the federal changes.
"Why change something that works," the premier says of Ontario's 124 ridings. He claims the changes made by the feds were "gerryrigged."
#onpoli
Tragedy unfolding in Chicago: an unprecedented number of window collisions. Photos show nearly 1000 birds salvaged from a SINGLE building along the lakefront this morning, including mostly Tennessee, Palm, Myrtle, and Magnolia Warblers.
At what point does this become a crime?
do you ever lay in bed at night thinking about how many crises in the world already have known solutions that we aren't implementing because they would disrupt wealth distribution and require sudden changes to cultural practices built around identity, convenience and extraction
A reminder ahead of
@fordnation
et al.’s yearend brag about reducing Ontario’s deficit: the government paid for much of it with taxpayer $ budgeted for services like education and health care that the public depends on, at a cost of massive human suffering
On Tuesday April 18 the Supreme Court of Canada will hear the case whether to force
@fordnation
's government of Ontario to publish its
#mandateletters
(instructions for cabinet ministers) still being kept secret despite previous court rulings and precedent
Doug Ford is regularly travelling around the province for government business, with his travel and security costs covered by taxpayers, and then hosting partisan fundraisers at his destinations. We are subsidizing PC Party events. This practice should be examined by authorities.
Permanent harms to Ontario Place, including heritage alterations and mature tree removal, begin THIS WEEKEND even though the City of Toronto hasn't completed its review and the public does not know what is in Therme's 95-year lease.
Can we get an injunction ASAP?
@ONPlace4All
@john_e_bones
I’m actually a pretty outstanding neighbour, not that it’s relevant to your position. I hope if you damage someone’s property and wildlife habitat as you describe, that the universe will find a way for you to answer for that poor decision.
A very good morning from the International and Graduate Affairs Building at
@WesternU
where something big and wonderful is finally happening...
How it started How it’s going
So now they want to expand their highway up to 10 lanes wide, paving over 400 acres of Greenbelt and 2,000 acres of farmland, along a route that conveniently aligns with properties owned by major PC Party donors. The cost to taxpayers remains a secret. Seems like another big scam
New: The Ford government has so far pitched Highway 413 as a four-to-six-lane highway. But documents obtained by
@Thetrilliumca
show the province is considering something much bigger.
#onpoli
(2021) “Doug Ford’s ‘Director Of Pandemic Response’ Was a Private Health Lobbyist For Shoppers Drug Mart”
Do we not enforce laws concerning conflicts of interest in Ontario anymore?
It’s a beautiful day to collect documentation of suspected contraventions of federal laws 👀🪺 that I imagine this Ontario provincial administration would prefer nobody knows about
The Ontario Place application has not been approved by the City of Toronto, yet the site is already being marked and torn apart. The path of these locates intersects with mature trees that will be cut down. Which jurisdiction is authorizing pre-construction work to proceed?
It should take many years for
@OntarioPCParty
's credibility to recover from Ford, if it ever does. The public's trust has been broken and profound stink is pouring out. Our work, collectively, is to keep the receipts, sustain pressure for the next 3 years, and vote when ready✌️
@BirdCentralPark
Just gonna leave this here... if folks are interested in phasing out use of rodenticides, I've just completed work on a public education program about this. There's an instructional video and written guide on how to exclude rodents from entering buildings.
To what extent did
@fordnation
’s government plan in advance to ram through all these omnibus bills at once, and underspend on public services? What details are hidden in the secret mandate letters, still undisclosed despite legal requirement? 3.5 yrs to go
I hope
@OntarioAuditor
finds out about where Therme Canada is deriving billions of dollars in foreign capital from. It’s curious that a company facing bankruptcy just a few years ago is now somehow bankrolling humongous international projects
#followthemoney
My 👀 and 👂🏻 work as well as anyone’s in Ontario and I can tell you with certainty, based on empirical evidence: Doug Ford absolutely did tell a group of people, at a *private* campaign event on Feb 12, 2018 that he would open up the greenbelt to developers. Who else did he tell?
🚨Ontarians should write to their MPP to ask for an integrity / privacy commissioner investigation: Did
@fordnation
breach the oath of the Premier’s office and conflict of interest rules when he privately told developers he would allow them to develop lands in the greenbelt?
In Ontario, emergency rooms cannot function, infrastructure is crumbling, municipalities are starved for funding and forced to raise property taxes, people are lined up at food banks...
and
@fordnation
and his mob are spending tax dollars on TV ads during the Oscars 😑
Hey
#ldnont
— did you know that the Sifton Bog wetland in west London, which took nearly 10,000 years to form, is about to lose its protection/classification as Provincially Significant under
#Bill23
? Developers will be allowed to pay into a fund to “put a wetland somewhere else”
Alarmingly little news coverage and public awareness is focussing on the vinyl chloride spill disaster in an Ohio town just south of Lake Erie, a source of drinking water for 40+ million people in the US and Ontario. Is this an international emergency?
One of these MPPs undermined public trust, wasted millions of taxpayer dollars, triggered several resignations and a police investigation, yet they remain in caucus.
The other took an unpopular position on an international conflict, were removed from caucus and censured.
Why?
Community Notes
👥Readers added context they thought people might want to know:
Nobody in Ontario, not even the 18% who voted for Ford, consented to sell off public institutions and wealth to private interests. “Open For Business” is providing cover for a massive ongoing grift.
Let’s start a thread to raise awareness of wetlands in Ontario that recently lost their designation/protection as Provincially Significant under Bill 23 and changes to the Ontario Wetland Evaluation System. Please reply with photos or links related to wetlands wherever you are.
People are angry. Many are calling on the
@OntarioAuditor
to investigate the secretive mega spa deal with Therme, a scheme that seems similar in ethics to the
#GreenbeltScandal
. How much will this cost the people of Ontario? We must act soon or everyone pays a steep price 🌳🆘🚜
Here’s the part about this I don’t understand. For bots to function like this, somebody has to purchase an
@XDevelopers
monthly paid subscription to interface their software with X API. This means X must have records of these purchases. Why don’t authorities follow the $?
It seems
#CdnPoli
, Northern
#Ontario
(every person) converged on Kirkland Lake to see Pierre Poilievre and ALL had the EXACT same opinions & wrote their tweets the exact same ways too.
(There's more variations but I'm bored)
Fix the
#CanadaDisabilityBenefit
NOW
@JustinTrudeau
The Japanese Canadian Centennial Temple Bell was towed away from its home at Ontario Place today by a truck that appeared to be sporting a 2022 convoy sticker. Truly an authentic made-in-FordNation moment
In an open letter
@FLAPCanada
is warning the proposed giant glass spa building at the Ontario Place redevelopment will pose grave danger to migratory birds. We should make every effort to avoid replicating the mass-collisions event that occurred on Chicago's waterfront last week.
We urge the Ontario Government and Therme Canada to address risk factors for birdwindow collisions and light attraction at the Ontario Place redevelopment, and to avoid creating ecological traps that will cause harm to local and migratory birds.
Happy
#EndangeredSpeciesDay
! By popular demand, I put this design up so folks can print it on clothing, stickers, etc. A play on a recent quote by Ontario’s Premier describing the
#Greenbelt
as “a scam”, it features several Species at Risk that live there
It is very telling that Ontario's government is ramming through changes to the greenbelt and associated conservation plans as fast as possible just before the holidays. I hope the investigations will consider decisions underlying this accelerated timeline.
I’ve followed
@FredHahnCUPE
for a couple years and met him last year. I read his deleted post and apology. I appreciate his activism and while I do not agree with all his beliefs, he is free to express them. As a Jewish person, I do not agree with assertions Fred is antisemitic.
What are the political and governance implications of the province proceeding to remove over 800 trees, including ones growing on municipally-owned land, without the City of Toronto granting permits or approval for construction plans to go ahead?
There they are: a list of the Ontario MPPs who sold out to DF and voted Yes on
#Bill23
, who failed to read between the lines and to stand up against raising our taxes, worsening the housing crisis, privately trading our biodiversity and farmland for industry donations and favours
The Cinesphere on the (unassessed) Ontario Place West Island is one of the busiest communal perches for Cliff Swallows and Barn Swallows on the Toronto waterfront. This is their home, where breeding adults return to raise families each year 📸July 9, 2023
Tomorrow the business case for moving the Ontario Science Centre will be published. It won’t explain the coincidental timing of a hefty land purchase beside the current OSC site by a developer with ties to the Ford family, just before the Ontario Line project was announced.
#ONpoli
#TOpoli
With today's reports on Doug Ford's backroom deals for Greenbelt land, should the Ontario Line plans also be investigated?
The same developers bought a massive property across from the Science Centre just days before it was announced as the new transit hub.
Please RT! Sign my petition👇 urging the 🇨🇦 federal government to add a bird friendly building design standard into the National Building Code and require that all new building construction is made safe for
#birds
across
#Canada
🐦
Photo from
@FLAPCanada
Our annual reminder of the work yet to be done. Each of these birds was killed by a collision with a building window in the Greater Toronto Area within the past year. There has never been a greater need or momentum behind us to make windows bird safe!
@FLAPCanada
What if… the Ontario NDP, Ontario Liberals and Ontario Greens formed a coalition in the next election with a platform based on one single promise: to implement electoral reform (shifting to a proportional representation system) and then immediately calling another election?
Video of the Thames River flooding last week in north
#ldnont
near where I live. River banks are totally submerged by stormwater that's likely contaminated by overflow from sewage treatment plants. With most remaining wetlands no longer provincially protected, we are in trouble.
When can Ontarians expect the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision about
@fordnation
’s appeal to withhold his
#mandateletters
, despite rulings by Ontario’s courts and commissioner? The public is left wondering what our government is doing and planning 🆘🔥
Incredible. MPP
@MikeSchreiner
for Guelph asks about how the province will help municipalities after severely slashing their funding for infrastructure to support housing; the premier calls Guelph’s local government a bunch of “left-wing lunatics”
We all deserve so much better⌛️
Apparently disparaging municipalities & using ableist language is okay in
@ONgov
. Perhaps
@fordnation
could fund mental health, instead of using it as an insult as well as make us whole from deficits created by his half baked housing bill so staff can table a reasonable budget?
This deal reeks and everybody smells it👃 Instead of publishing the lease (of public land to a foreign-owned company) the Ford govt CHANGED THE LAW to exempt themselves from being sued over this project. When the truth comes out
@OntarioPCParty
will wear it into the next election
We’re sending a message to the Ontario Government and Therme to Release the Lease! Ontarians deserve to know what our duplicitous government has signed us up for over the next 95 years!
#onpoli
#topoli
#ReleaseTheLease
It was jarring to actually sit in the legislature and listen to
@OntarioPCParty
spew complete falsehoods misrepresented as facts. When reps from other parties ask questions about transparency, housing or climate action, the government jeers and talks over them. It’s disgraceful.
👀 how much are Ontario taxpayers gonna be on the hook for to pay out the developers who bought land in the Greenbelt? Sounds like it’s gonna be expensive
Any goodwill from conservative voters the Ford government thinks they redeemed by apologizing for the Greenbelt will be effectively erased and then some if the 800+ tree removals proceed in the coming weeks, under a sketchy bad deal.
There will be no recovering from the optics📉
By the way, if you think the destruction of Ontario’s natural environment is limited to specific places like the
#Greenbelt
or
#OntarioPlace
, remember that the Ford government has removed protections for provincially significant wetlands and natural heritage province-wide
Every day I wake up bracing to see headlines and photos depicting chainsaws felling mature trees at Ontario Place. The clearcutting and death of places I love are imminent, a reality for too many people living in fear in
#FordNation