Shootings and murder is up.

[allhatnocattle]

Toronto has a population of 2.5million and a metro population of 5.2 million. With a population at just over 550,000, Washington DC homicides peaked in 1991 at 482. That's just to put things in a little bit of perspective while considering the Toronto's crime wave of shooting and other homicides. It's still a pretty safe city, however the

Comments

[ghostwes]

Accessibility to handguns does increase the possibility of gun-related violence. That's a simple algebra, certainly. However, it can't be the only cause of this particular effect

[allhatnocattle]

What about gentrifacation? Yorkville was sure gentrified from when Neil Young and Joni Mitchell were there. I lived a few blocks from Rochdale and it was a quiet building. Cabbagetown and the Beaches were sure gentrified out of former roughness. Not sure that Regent Park or Jane/Finch could be gentrified without tearing it down. I mean I just can't see them selling condos in those neighbourhoods. If anything it just moves the problem around, like WashDC's problem went to Maryland

[_social_retard_]

Whats gentrification?
And yeah it seems like there is a lot of crime and violence in the world today but I don't think population control (not that im sure what you mean by that) would be an answer, all it takes it two people to kill someone. what we need is to reverse the attitudes of today's world, change hate into something construstive. How? Fuck if I know.

[allhatnocattle]

How? How about offering hope and opportunity.

Gentrification is where old neighbourhoods, usually in the inner city are remarketed. Usually tax values are reassessed at absurd overvaluations. Then owners can no longer afford to lowrent places, so over time the old rooming houses, old houses, old buildings slowly all get torn down and replaced or dusted off and renovated. Many of the old owners just sell because the market suddenly got hot but the idea of gentrifacation is to keep the area hot. The poor folks generally move out and are replaced with yuppies. Generally it works ouyt rather well as some places don't change hands and you get a mix of income levels in a neighbourhood, therefore an area becomes rather funky.

Population control. Yeah, forget that statement. I'm unhappy that I said that. It sounds cruel and I didn't mean it that way. Dumb choice of words. I just meant we're getting too big for our britches and we should've stayed at a comfortable population.

[velvetpage]

I see two sources of these gangs. The first is racial discrimination and the ghettoization of minorities. We don't have that to the same extent that the U.S. does, but it does happen. The Jane/Finch area, as I understand it, is not just black; it's specifically a high ratio of immigrants from the Carribbean. Gang violence in Hamilton tends to centre around Asian kids. All of this is exacerbated by the fact that so many new-immigrant families live in poverty, crammed into high-rise apartments or subsidized townhouse complexes. Increase the number of bored, undereducated, hopeless kids in an area, and you'll increase the gang violence, too

[rogula]

How do the Asian Gangs in Vancouver fit in the the ghettoization theory? The Asian gangs here seam to stem from generally middle class (of not upper-middle to downrigh rich). In the Indian community they have a huge problem with gang violence and most of the members seam to come from very well of families.

I like your idea about spreading out the subsidized housing and mixing economic classes. It might be hard though (in vancouver) to stick a subsidized houseing unit in Shaughnesy or the British Properties. But I suppose you dont need to, as long as it's evenly spaced thought an area.

[binro33]

Mixed economic neighbourhoods is a good idea.
Unfortunately, our population density is going to go up not go down, and we have to plan for that in a way in which folks won't feel ghetto-ised.

[velvetpage]

The gang violence in Toronto, and in Hamilton, stems largely from the ghettoization I mentioned. Middle-class or rich-kid gangs are a different story; they stem from too much freedom and not enough empathy for those around them. As such, they're harder to combat. However, those gangs don't appear to be shooting people at random in the streets - unless, of course, I'm just not hearing about it because I live a long way away from it.

[allhatnocattle]

Isn't that just wild? That's an awesome book.

[thanks4thefish]

I appreciate this post. It is well-reasoned and avoids the partisanship that has become common in this community recently

[rogula]

1) Banning guns will just push them to use other weapons...

On the Radio driving into work today I heard an interesting statistic. 95% of all handguns that police "interdict" (the Inspecters word) are smuggled over the Can/US border. That statistic is for Vancouver, but I would think the rest of Canada is pretty close to that. If that is the case then banning the legal sale and ownership of handguns will have almot no effect on gang gun violence.

I have never owned a gun, never will (when my dad passes away I will turn his gun into the police as I have no desire to own one). It just seams to me that banning them is a Politically easy thing to suggest and will have no real impact on gang gun violence.

[binro33]

Please do.
Urban planning/renewal is fascinating to me.

[caernarvon]

I do agree with you that both parties listed seem to be addressing the symptoms (guns) rather than the disease (while not all homicide can be related back to urban decay, I would wager that a majority could be)

However, we get back to the problem of federal vs provincial authority...wouldn't fixing the problem of urban decay in the cities be a provincial rather than federal matter?

[allhatnocattle]

As I understand it, it falls on both levels of government. Federally it's under the authority of Infastructure Canada and Paul Martin's much touted "New Deal for Cities and Communities". And I would think most provinces have authoritative departments for urban centres (although Sasky probablely just has a Dept of Towns, Hamlets and Parking Lots)

[caernarvon]

Hey now, you start the Sask bashing and Im going to have to start the Alta bashing and before we know it, I'll have you agreeing with me about how much better the Roughriders are than either of the Alberta teams and we'll go out for a night of drinking....

And Im just too tired to do that right now :)

[allhatnocattle]

Hey, I'ld never bash Sasky. I'ld pick the Riders over the Eskimos any day. There's nothing to bash, literally. Sask is the only place still selling Calgary (buffalohead) Beer. They now have indoor plumbing, paved roads, and a diversified economy. But if you find yourself with the energy to make an argument, it's a good excuse for us to go out drinking.