Guest Column/ Toronto Anglican/ Feb. 04

By Murray MacAdam

It was a homecoming that turned out very differently than expected.
After four years, I was eagerly returning to Toronto's Jane-Finch neighbourhood. For many, the words "Jane-Finch" evoke crime, violence and poverty. But as a community development worker, I had experienced a neighbourhood rich in spirit, despite its problems.

I pull into the parking lot of a public housing building off Finch. Inside, Clayton, a Mennonite pastor, greets me and puts on a pot of coffee. Residents trickle into the room and chairs fill up. Floodgates of frustration soon burst forth.

"I don't think Dalton McGuinty could survive on this," says Catherine, an elderly woman in a wheelchair, holding up her monthly cheque for $436. Her rent is $356, leaving $80 for everything else. "It's hard," said Catherine, her eyes welling up with tears. "Lots of times I get upset."

Tina, a single mother of four, tells how her children don't like going to school. Last week her daughter's class enjoyed a trip to see The Nutcracker. That is, everyone but Tina's daughter. The $13 ticket was far beyond her budget.

"My kids aren't getting a proper diet," says Tina. "They're getting junk food, whatever is on sale. I can't afford to buy a nice bunch of grapes or cantaloupe." Poverty is stunting her children's lives. Things that middle-class people take for granted, like going to a movie, don't happen when you don't have money.

Amanda moved from Halifax to Toronto, seeking a better life. She, too, is trapped. "We're living way below the poverty line. Why do they think there's so much violence? The youth don't have a future."

She pauses, and the room goes silent. Looking away, Amanda says: "Maybe one day the system will change. But it won't change in my lifetime."

One woman tells how her husband was offered a part-time job. With serious health problems, he relies on drug benefits under the Ontario Disability Support Program. If he took the job, he'd lose those benefits and be worse off. So he turned it down. It's a theme that keeps coming up: how hard it is to make a change.

"I don't mind working at a low-class place, cleaning toilets, or at McDonald's," says Tina. "But how can I survive on McDonald's wages?"
An alarm pierces the air. Outside our room, the elevator is stuck. With less money for maintenance, buildings like this one are getting run down. Sometimes it takes hours before a broken elevator is fixed.

I'm here with Peter Harris, another Anglican, as part of a "community social audit" held across Ontario. Sponsored by the Interfaith Social Assistance Reform Coalition (ISARC), 1200 people have taken part in 15 community consultations to listen to people living in poverty, and learn how church members, service agencies and others are struggling to meet their needs after years of cutbacks.

I head back down Jane Street and into a meeting of community workers, greeted by familiar faces.

The talk zeroes in on how poverty-level social assistance rates segregate residents from society. How poverty creates an underground economy as people are forced to do whatever they can to survive. How students are pushed through school, without learning, due to a lack of special needs programs.

The picture is painfully clear: community agencies are trying to meet huge needs, with grossly inadequate resources. "It's like we're lost in a forest and waving a hanky," says Lorna, a veteran community worker.

Last stop: the local ministerial association. Barry, a United Church community minister, says anti-poverty groups in Regina won a $15 monthly transit rate for low-income people. "Imagine the difference that would make in Toronto!", he marvels. A simple measure, yet one with enormous potential to brighten the lives of poor people.

It's time to go. For Peter, too, it's been a gut-wrenching episode. He tells me how his parish priest, Rev. Brad Lennon, says that mothers living under this social assistance system deserve the Order of Canada. "I wouldn't be able to put up with their challenges," says Peter. "They show so much courage."

The ISARC coalition, which includes the Anglican Church, is a tireless gadfly, reminding governments that people of faith want action so that people like Tina, Amanda and Catherine live in dignity. A report on these consultations with recommendations will be published in March, with copies going to all MPPs.

The report will be called Lives in the Balance. Because, as my trip to Jane-Finch confirms, that's what it's about: lives that will continue to be stunted and harsh, or lives that reflect a Gospel vision of abundant life. It's up to us.

* Murray MacAdam is Social Justice and Advocacy Consultant for the diocese, and Anglican representative on ISARC. To receive a copy of Lives in the Balance, email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .