Media coverage of the arrival of Syrian refugees reflects our collective excitement, along with fear and uncertainty and anticipation. Yet the history of local refugee resettlement can ground us. Instead of asking, “how will we do it?” we can consider, instead, “how have we been doing it?”
People fled to Canada long before the label “refugee” became a legal way of categorizing those in need. Unless you are indigenous, you or your family arrived and had to integrate in some way. Often, this resettlement work is informally shouldered by those who once made a similar transition. Many of those unofficial settlement workers assisted others simply by being members of a community: by stepping in to translate because they knew the language, by helping find employment, by explaining the bus system, or where to find the best injera.
One in four Canadians spend more than 30 per cent of their income on a place to live. That means a lot of people may be one pay cheque away from losing their home. In Waterloo Region, there are 3,000 people on the waiting list for subsidized rental units. Some people may have to wait six years for a unit to become available.
TCE chats with Tina Riddell, owner of Living Fresh Flower Studio & School and Helena Kwiecinski, owner of StylFrugal, to hear how small, independent businesses are fairing during ION construction.
What started out as a longing for a feminist sex toy store has morphed into the desire to create an intersectional trifecta of support. Plan B will focus on creating a space for all members of the queer community to establish roots in the downtown core.
Like the ventricles of the human brain, the neighbourhood of Forest Heights is a labyrinth of intertwined strips of pavement, lined on both sides with houses built before the plague of modern residential architecture turned homes into clones made of brick, drywall and shingles.