Somewhere between the old, but solvent, Toronto of beer parlors and closed-down Sundays and the current Toronto of littered streets, homelessness and a strapped City Hall, there was a Toronto known far-and-wide as “The City that Works.” A city that the late, great raconteur Peter Ustinov called “ New York run by the Swiss.”
In those bygone times tourists swarmed into Toronto for the live theater scene-which was topped only by New York and Los Angles- major league sports and the many other attractions which only Toronto could offer. Then there was the added attraction of experiencing the excitement of the world’s most multicultural city. The tourists returned home with tales of a city so orderly that a New Yorker said, only half in jest: “ There was a case of vandalism in Toronto while I was there, someone scratched a seat on the subway.”
What happened to that Toronto? When did we start littering the streets? Where did all the homeless people come from? Where did the gangs get all those guns? Why were social services cut to the bone? Why did we allow our schools and hospitals to deteriorate? Why is it so difficult to find a family doctor who is willing to take on a new patient?
There are those who say that Toronto needs a tough mayor like the former mayor of New York, Rudi Guliani. But Guliani didn‘t solve New York‘s homeless problem. He merely chased them away from tourist areas like Times Square. He also encouraged the NYPD to act like thugs. All of Toronto’s problems are not of its own making by any means. Ontario itself is being hit by massive lay-offs in the manufacturing sector to such an extent that it‘s being said it will soon become a have-not province eligible for equalization payments. Canadian business tycoons must also share the blame for deciding it was easier to put 80% of their exports in the U.S. basket than to compete in the Global marketplace. Easier it may well have been, but the down-side is whenever the U.S. economy slows - and it’s currently sputtering because of the cost of the Iraq war and a massive trade deficit, especially with China - Canada is the first of its trading partners to feel the chill of recession. And Ontario, being the manufacturing engine that drives the rest of the country, feels the chill first.
It’s being hinted that Montreal or Calgary might replace Toronto as Canada’s keystone city in the future. Well, that’s not going to happen. Montreal will continue to be a special tourist destination because of it’s Gallic flavor. Calgary, with its long, fierce winters, will become Canada’s Dallas or Houston. Vancouver, on the other hand, with its milder winters, beautiful setting and easy access to the huge California market, could, some day, take Toronto’s place as the center of everything. However, for the foreseeable future Toronto will remain the Canadian center of finance, communication., entertainment and multiculturalism, and it will prosper if the federal and provincial governments do the right thing by returning a bigger share of the tax dollars they collect here. Toronto, of course, cannot prosper unless the country prospers, and that won’t happen until Canada decides to trade big-time with the world at large. It’s said that Cuba can’t prosper so long as the U.S. refuses to trade with it. Well, what can the U. S. buy from or sell to Cuba that Canada can’t? Toronto, in spite of its many problems, is still a beautiful, vibrant and relatively safe city that can be brought back to its former status by an infusion of federal money and top leadership. Besides, if Toronto were to fall into second place, the rest of Canada (TROC) would never be the same without old Hogtown to hate.
William Bedford——
Bio and Archives
CFP “Poet in Residence” William Bedford was born in Dublin, Ireland, but has lived in Toronto for most of his life. His poems and articles have been published in many Canadian journals and in some American publications.
