Greetings, fellow Scarborough residents.
If you follow SCRO’s work, chances are you are already quite invested in Scarborough civic affairs. And that’s good. Scarborough needs community leaders across the public policy spectrum, advocating for a Scarborough, so our political leaders (and aspiring leaders) at all levels of government pay attention to Scarborough’s needs.
We all have a shared passion for Scarborough and a deep desire for Scarborough to receive the political attention we deserve.
Which brings me to the upcoming election. It’s time for us to get ready!
SCRO’s mayoral debate at U of T Scarborough. Wednesday, October 7 from 7 – 8 pm.
Mark your calendars now.
SCRO will be hosting a Scarborough-focused mayoral debate at UTSC once again. And it’ll be moderated by CityTV, which will be broadcasting it live, just like before.
I encourage you to attend in person. Registration will be through Eventbrite. More about that soon.
The two leading candidates have been invited and have accepted our invitation. We will be monitoring polling figures in the coming weeks to see if any further invitations should be made. More about that soon, too.
We expect there to be considerable media interest in this event, which will bring much-needed political attention to Scarborough at the highest levels.
SCRO is pleased to be working with our community partners once again on this important Scarborough event: Scarborough Business Association, Scarborough Civic Action Network, and Scarborough United Neighbourhoods.
Ward councillor debates are coming too
This is also about electing our six Scarborough ward councillors. Some of our residents associations are already working on this, organizing candidate forums.
Scarborough United Neighbourhoods will also be working with residents associations so we can provide civic engagement opportunities for our residents in as many Scarborough communities as possible.
Data centres in Scarborough’s employment lands. What do you think?
Data centre development applications have become the latest hot button topic in land development circles. You have likely read about this and the community pushback this is generating across the GTA and well beyond, including right here in Scarborough, where an application for a seven-fold expansion of a small data centre at Danforth Avenue & Birchmount Road has generated many community concerns regarding its need for an enormous amount of power and water and other possible environmental impacts, which were passionately expressed during an animated town hall meeting in July.
Council has put this application on pause and has requested that staff conduct a great deal of due diligence and public engagement over the next several months, so that Council can develop a policy framework regarding data centre developments, to guide the City’s decisions regarding current and future applications.
The demand for data centres will continue to grow, given the increasing use of AI in our society, by businesses, government, public institutions, and by many of us. So Council is wise to strive to get out in front of this. So should we.
SCRO will be participating in this process and we encourage other Scarborough leaders and Scarborough-facing organizations to participate as well.
The Scarborough East Rapid Transit project is moving forward, but we need federal and provincial funding.
Design work continues, which is being funded by the City. The City has committed $1.2 billion to this project, so that design work can reach an advanced stage. SCRO is pleased that the City has provided such a large amount of financial support for this project.
But the total project cost is likely to be $5 billion, give or take. So the provincial and federal governments need to come to the table too. Otherwise, we will continue to suffer, with no higher order public transit in the eastern half of Scarborough, which is not acceptable.
I expect we’ll hear more about this from our mayoral and councillor candidates during the upcoming election. Let’s hope our federal and provincial leaders will be paying attention too.
We’ll be chatting more about all this next month. Until then, I wish you all an enjoyable rest of the summer, right here in Scarborough, the place we are proud to call home.
Larry Whatmore
President
Scarborough Community Renewal Organization https://www.scro.ca
Scarborough Walk of Fame https://scarboroughwalkoffame.com/ Larry.Whatmore@rogers.com
(416) 562-2101
