Category: Social & Affordable Housing
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More Than Enough Refugee Blues to Go Around
Refugee Blues was published by writer and poet W.H. Auden in 1939, at the start of World War II. It’s safe to say not much has changed and, perhaps, it never will if war and hatred continue to be our modus operandi. The million dollar question is this: Are we doomed as humans to this destructive cycle of scapegoatism… Read more
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24 Sussex Drive is Falling Down
Contrary to opinions offered by former tenants of the building, reality television stars, CBC listeners, and social media commentators, there is no single right answer to the question: What should become of the Prime Minister’s residence at 24 Sussex Drive? In fact, it doesn’t matter whether the building is razed or retrofitted. Either way, there… Read more
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Willie G. and the Street Poets of New York
Update: Wille G. passed away yesterday, 07 April 2015. May his poetic soul Rest in Peace. Before I met Willi G no one had ever tried to sell poetry to me on the street. Paintings, prints, photography, statuary and every manner of trinket, yes. Poetry, no. Willi approached me as I ascended out of Bethesda Terrace, introduced… Read more
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The Invisible Man and His Dog
I hadn’t thought about him for years, the old man with the three-legged dog. That summer I laid interlock and dug beds in my front yard I saw him regularly. He always walked north to south, across the bridge towards the general store, and back again. I mentally catalogued the possibilities of where he might live… Read more
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re:THINK(ing) Affordable Housing in Vancouver
And on go the thinking hat(s)…… “As part of the work being done by the Mayor’s Task Force on Housing Affordability, re:THINK HOUSING, an open ideas competition, is being launched to generate a broader discussion of possibilities for Vancouver’s affordable housing crisis. Aimed at everyone who has an interest in affordable housing, from the general public, to… Read more
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Walking the Walk
Jane Jacobs (1916-2006) was an urbanist and activist whose writings championed a fresh, community-based approach to city building. She had no formal training as a planner, and yet her 1961 treatise, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, introduced ground-breaking ideas about how cities function, evolve and fail that now seem like common sense to… Read more
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New York’s Flophouse Voyeurism
Maybe I’m just being overly sensitive, but I’m revolted by this article from The New York Times. It’s about the gradual gentrification of an age-old flophouse in The Bowery, where marginalized tenants who pay less than ten dollars per day and live in cage-like accommodation, are used as marketing pawns to attract upscale hipsters to… Read more