Quote of the week

“Thinking of visiting Alberta, Canada? Think again” —From an ad campaign in the U.S. and, as of next week the U.K., launched by Corporate Ethics International, an American environmental group. The campaign urges tourists to boycott the province because of the tar sands industry, which it compares to the Gulf oil spill.

Haiti’s
long trek

Six months after an earthquake levelled much of Haiti, some members of the Montreal Haitian community say they are still waiting for a reconstruction plan.

The federal government acknowledged on Monday that rebuilding the shattered country was going to be tough and slow—and likely not helped by the dismissal of Canada’s Col. Bernard Ouellette, chief of the UN’s staff in Haiti, for allegedly boinking a civilian female staffer. But what Marjorie Villefranche of the Maison d’Haiti, a Montreal community group serving the immigrant population here, would like to see is a realizable and actionable action plan that will set the country back on the road to stability.

“We always knew it would be slow,” she says. “We’re not disappointed [with reconstruction efforts]. But what we would like is the application of a new reconstruction plan created by the government of Haiti, the diaspora and our friends. What must be addressed are the questions of security regarding food and housing, and for women and girls. It’s urgent.” Canada has upwards of $1-billion committed to Haiti, including $550-million in reconstruction money.

Villefranche says that while “there are small signs of hope—schools and hospitals are starting to reopen,” day-to-day life in Haiti is still far from normal.

PATRICK LEJTENYI

House and
homeless

If, like much of Quebec, you’ve finished moving and your new abode is now a sea of empty boxes and half-built furniture you snagged from the garbage, you may feel reassured that at least you have a wall to nail those ubiquitous cube-shaped Ikea shelves onto. Data released this week reveals homelessness remains steady in the province two weeks after moving day, a sign the Front d’action populaire en réaménagement urbain (FRAPRU) interprets as meaning that government has little interest in solving the problem.

“It’s a question of willingness on the part of the government,” says FRAPRU’s François Saillant. While the group argues that investment in social housing is the only way to end homelessness, Saillant thinks a short-term strategy needs to be implemented right away. “If the government decided to offer financial assistance to these people, regardless of the reason they’ve ended up without housing, the situation could be settled quickly. But that wouldn’t solve the problem.”

According to their numbers, 130 households were left on the street after moving day. The last year also saw an increase in both evictions for non-payment of rent and use of homeless shelters, particularly by women.

For details of the report see frapru.qc.ca.

MATT JONES

AIDS and
the right

As delegates start gearing up for the XVIII International AIDS Conference in Vienna, running from July 18–23, Montrealers can rest assured we’ll be well represented at the affair, with several local AIDS organizations scheduled to be on hand to voice their concerns with respect to the disease and its prevention.

“While a good 80 per cent of the conference will be focused on scientific developments, we still have many other issues we want to bring up, in particular that in the aftermath of the recent G20 and G8 gatherings, it’s become quite clear Canada intends on reducing its support for AIDS initiatives in Asia and Africa, something we obviously contest,” says Michel Morin, associate executive director of Coalition des organismes communautaires québécois de lutte contre le sida [COCQ-SIDA].

Morin says with the election of so many right-wing governments in recent years, Canada among them, “we’re seeing human rights aren’t what they used to be with respect to the epidemic. Harm reduction approaches aren’t even part of the official discourse anymore. Instead of making science-based decisions when approaching the issues, these governments are driven by ideology instead, and we have a big problem with that.”

To view the conference’s official agenda, go to www.aids2010.org.

CHRIS BARRY

Green in
the ’hood

Should you reside in NDG or Plateau Mont-Royal East and have anything you feel like praising or bitching about with respect to your ’hood, transportation issues in particular, the Montreal Urban Ecology Centre would like to hear from you. As part of their ongoing Quartier Vert campaign, the centre has an online questionnaire posted this month at surveymonkey.com/s/WF57YLK where they’re trying to get a handle on what residents feel are the best ways to make their neighbourhoods as green and liveable as possible, with the results to be published and made available to the relevant parties at City Hall and elsewhere next March.

“These two projects are similar to ones we did last year in Park Extension and Mercier East,” says centre director Luc Rabouin. “So anyone curious about the sort of proposals we’ll be recommending can check those reports out at [our website, ecologieurbaine.net/files/planqvertmercierest04Cahier3.pdf]. The primary focus of these projects is to work with the community to find ways we can change streets and sidewalks to encourage active transportation, walking or biking. So we’re asking residents to help us identify the major issues and together we’ll work to present tangible solutions to their concerns.”

For more information, go to ecologieurbaine.net.

CHRIS BARRY

Rear-view mirror

10 YEARS AGO - JULY 13–20, 2000

On the cover: Terry Jones as Mr. Creosote in Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life. Appearing (as himself) at Just for Laughs, Jones discusses fairy tales, the Crusades and the morality of ancient gladiatorial combat. He sums up the Romans succinctly: “Rather weird lot, that bunch!”

• In his second-ever Damn Right, Scott Saxon writes about Pope John Paul II’s denunciation of Rome’s gay pride parade, calling it “an offence to the Christian values.”

• Paul Oakenfold blames the media for shutting down his Spectrum night in London. “There were these undercover reporters who kept coming down to the club… and writing about how everybody was on drugs and Spectrum was just a front for drug dealers and debauchery.”

• “The question that hangs at the end of [Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire] and will no doubt create an even bigger buying frenzy for the next one, is whether or not Potter is on the road towards becoming Harry Skywalker,” reads the review.

• Under the logo: “Let’s redo lunch”

Angel >>Suing the bank On Wednesday, a Quebec Court judge gave the go-ahead for a class-action suit by the 158 victims of convicted fraudster and thief Earl Jones. The suit, for $40-million, alleges that the Royal Bank of Canada’s Beaconsfield branch was insufficiently vigilant when Jones, using forged endorsements, deposited into his account money that was supposedly held in trust. While a few victims have received some money back, most got nothing. Although the Royal Bank’s response was unclear at press time—they didn’t contest the motion to form a class action—knowing banks, it’s hard to believe they’ll sheepishly fess up and dole out the money without a peep, so stay tuned for more legal fireworks. Jones, arrested a year ago, is serving an 11-year sentence.

Insect >> Iggy’s Liberal Express Well, if that wasn’t an apt metaphor, what is? On Tuesday, Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff set off on a cross-country bus tour called the Liberal Express, hoping to raise his profile and appeal among cynical and/or apathetic Canadian voters. Hours after the tour got underway, the Express broke down outside Hawkesbury. Transmission problems, they were told. A back-up was sent and Iggy was able to hold a scheduled rally in Cornwall, but the Liberal-Party-as-a-broken-machine comparisons were inevitable, and why shouldn’t they be? Two years after assuming power, the Liberals still trail the Conservatives and haven’t been able to wipe off the mud—that Ignatieff is an elitist who only cares about himself—slung so effectively.