Two transit activists, Jamie and Herman, join host Jessa McLean to dish on the fight for public transit in Toronto. With service cuts the norm, fares rising and a Mayor's race to influence, the volunteers at TTC Riders have a lot of work to do.

The guests talk about their favourite tactics, which levers of power they need to pull and why the fight for more accessible, free transit is critical to the movement for equality and climate justice.

More on TTC Riders:

• TTC Riders on Twitter
• "Toronto activists install temporary bus lane in scheme to call out John Tory" | News
• TTC Riders Website

[Jessa]: 00:00:01

Welcome, Jamie and Herman. Starting with Jamie, can you both introduce yourselves

[Jessa]: 00:00:07

to the audience?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:00:09

Yeah, hello, I'm Jamie. I'm a transit enthusiast and transit advocate with

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:00:14

TTC riders and I ride transit normally like four times a day, so I noticed

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:00:21

a lot of the issues that transit riders are facing and Yeah, especially like

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:00:26

reliability frequency and safety are all issues that TTC riders is hoping to

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:00:30

fix

[Jessa]: 00:00:33

Thanks Jamie. Herman, what about you?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:00:36

Yeah, my name is Herman Rosenfeld. I'm a retired union staff person.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:00:42

I used to work for the Canadian Auto Workers. I've been with TTC Riders since

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:00:49

they began, about 15 years ago, 10 years. It's hard to remember exactly

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:00:52

when. And I take public transit. Often when I travel across the city,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:00:59

I often cycle and very rarely I drive. But yeah, and I think public transit

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:01:06

is an absolutely essential component of challenging climate change and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:01:11

also dealing with livable cities, livable country.

[Jessa]: 00:01:18

Perfect. So one of my first questions right out the bat is, you know, why public

[Jessa]: 00:01:24

transit? There are a lot of causes that people get behind these days, right? There's

[Jessa]: 00:01:29

actual, you know, climate activism, you know, you name it. You know, there's all

[Jessa]: 00:01:35

sorts of areas you can get into. What made each of you decide you would put some

[Jessa]: 00:01:40

efforts towards securing public transit and improving public transit in Toronto?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:01:50

So on a personal note, I'm just I'm a big transit enthusiast so it's something

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:01:54

I love and I want to see it be better But I also think that it's something

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:00

that affects so many people and it's much better for the environment than Driving

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:07

and is obviously like faster for long distances than walking or cycling

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:11

which are also great options but yeah, so I think it's something that should

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:16

be a service for everyone and when we cut back service or when we make affairs

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:22

inaccessible to people, those are big issues that we shouldn't be seeing.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:27

And so yeah, I like to see it be better for everyone.

[Jessa]: 00:02:33

So you see it as a key to improving quality of life at the same time as fighting

[Jessa]: 00:02:37

climate change.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:38

Yeah, exactly. And yeah, it helps all sorts of people get to jobs and friends

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:02:44

and family.

[Jessa]: 00:02:47

Perfect. Herman, why is this like one of your niches? I'm sure it's not all that

[Jessa]: 00:02:51

you do, you know, not implying that but you know, what makes your passion in transit

[Jessa]: 00:02:55

particularly?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:02:56

Well, partly similar things that Jamie was saying, you know, which I share.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:01

I started out with, I'm a socialist, I was involved in a number of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:05

these different projects and one of them was around building a movement

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:08

for fair free transit. And the idea was transit should be like going to

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:13

the library, like Medicare should be, it should be a non-commodified right.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:20

One of the components of... building a different kind of a society of like,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:24

you know, like housing shouldn't be commodified either. But, and that, we started

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:32

this little group and Free Transit Toronto, and then I... one of the activists

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:41

who wanted to transform TTC Riders, which was mostly a paper organization

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:45

at the time, into an activist organization and membership, Jessica Bell,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:50

and she asked me, would you like to help me do this? So I did. And

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:03:56

I think a lot of the reasons are similar. It's, I think particularly, it's

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:01

a central way of addressing climate change. And in particular, if you look

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:05

at the debates that are going on now about investments in personal

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:09

vehicles that are electrically driven, instead of all that investment there,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:16

it should be in public transit. For jobs, for the structure of how we move

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:20

around, and for doing a, transforming the society to do that both in

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:26

terms of decommodifying components of our life and also in terms of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:31

addressing the climate emergency because it isn't just something that's out

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:35

there.

[Jessa]: 00:04:36

We were talking about that the other day that, you know,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:39

We

[Jessa]: 00:04:39

electrical

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:39

were.

[Jessa]: 00:04:39

vehicles are often pushed as a big solution, but that's a real kind of classist

[Jessa]: 00:04:44

approach. Even with the rebates that we used to have, most people can't afford an

[Jessa]: 00:04:48

electric vehicle, but the idea I guess is to make transit absolutely affordable. You

[Jessa]: 00:04:53

say the demodification, sorry,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:57

T-commer.

[Jessa]: 00:04:57

you say the decommodification

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:04:58

Yes.

[Jessa]: 00:04:59

of transit.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:00

Yeah.

[Jessa]: 00:05:01

I hear free transit. I know you were part of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:03

Yeah.

[Jessa]: 00:05:03

the free transit movement or are.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:05

Yeah.

[Jessa]: 00:05:05

Is that incorporated into TTC riders?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:08

Well, the TTC riders would like to move in that direction. We've talked

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:12

about it. And the strategy we've looked at would be increasing the population

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:19

that doesn't have to pay for transit. We're a part of this movement

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:23

towards low income fares. But the bottom line for that was that people

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:29

on social assistance. who in fact organized, demanded that it be free

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:34

for them. And that would be one of the ways of cutting in the direction

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:41

of both lowering fares, but of increasing the amount of people, the

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:45

numbers of people that in the demographics, that would have free transit.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:50

So eventually we would do that. There's always been this debate in, not

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:05:55

in TTC writers, but in... in the transit universe about how you pay for

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:02

transit, because you have to pay. And traditionally in Toronto, it's

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:06

a very conservative city in terms of its elite, or its political elite

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:11

in particular. And this whole, you see some of the people like Holliday

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:15

or Rob Ford and stuff, they come from that tradition, that, well, you should

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:20

pay for this. We're customers and all that kind of stuff. And we challenge

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:24

that. It's not that TTC writers raise that as an immediate demand because

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:30

it's something we're not going to win tomorrow, but something we work

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:33

towards. And though some of us are, you know, think about this more

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:37

than others, but fundamentally the organization moves in that direction. Would

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:41

you agree, Jamie? Sort

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:06:43

Yeah,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:43

of, yeah,

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:06:43

I think so.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:06:44

yeah, yeah.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:06:45

Yeah, I think it's difficult to nest like the debates about how you're going

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:06:50

to pay for transit if no one's actually paying a fare. But I do think especially

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:06:56

for lower income people and people like who are younger and also like older and

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:07:03

unemployed, it is an extremely important thing to push for.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:07

If you do that, you know, and it becomes, you know, then... it's easier

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:12

to argue this be for everybody. Because fundamentally, public transit isn't

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:16

just something for the poorest people. Although poorest people absolutely

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:21

depend upon transit for everything. But it's something that should

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:26

be the way we travel, the way cities are structured, and not just relegated

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:32

for the people who are at the lower end of the economic ladder. In fact,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:38

we want to change that. you know, about people being at the lower end

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:07:42

of the economic ladder.

[Jessa]: 00:07:46

I hear that. Sorry, excuse me. You talked about demands, you know, free transit

[Jessa]: 00:07:51

is not one of your demands, but a vision, but you folks have a lot of demands and I don't

[Jessa]: 00:07:56

mean that as a criticism. What I am getting at is there's so many moving parts

[Jessa]: 00:08:03

when it comes to just Toronto's transit. You know, I have a list here. You know, you

[Jessa]: 00:08:09

have to keep track of the service cuts and their impact. You know, you got a mayor's

[Jessa]: 00:08:14

race that you have to analyze the budget to keep on top of and inform people of the

[Jessa]: 00:08:20

policing narrative that's going on in response to, you know, safety concerns,

[Jessa]: 00:08:25

fare hikes, you know, pushing back against that as well as moving towards, you

[Jessa]: 00:08:31

know, free, free transit. And then keeping folks accountable. We're talking about

[Jessa]: 00:08:37

like rapid T.O. and the Scarborough solutions and like reminding people that promises

[Jessa]: 00:08:42

aren't being made, you know, realizing that promises aren't being made. This is a

[Jessa]: 00:08:47

lot of information to keep on top of. It's a lot to keep your supporters on top of.

[Jessa]: 00:08:54

Like, how do you fight on so many fronts and how do you stay on top of so many moving

[Jessa]: 00:09:00

parts? What's your secret?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:05

I think Herman can probably answer this better than me because he's been with

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:08

DDC writers a lot longer. But from what I've seen over the past year or so

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:15

is that we have a lot of dedicated people who are very passionate about the advocacy

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:20

and they stay on top of so many different topics. It's very impressive really.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:25

And then there are, we work with other advocacy groups who have more niche focuses

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:31

that sort of intersect with some of our projects and so they're also able to

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:36

keep track on things. But yeah, I'm not sure if Herman has more to add about

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:40

it.

[Jessa]: 00:09:41

For Whom and Go's, do you want to shout out any of those organizations who do kind

[Jessa]: 00:09:46

of lean on sometimes?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:48

Um, sorry, I gotta think about their names for a second. I know like, I think

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:54

Jane and Finch Action Against Poverty is one of them. We've worked with them

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:09:59

a lot for the safety report. And I know there are so many others, but I

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:10:04

can't remember their exact names right now. I'm so sorry.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:07

No, look at the job centers, their community hubs. And I think Jamie basically

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:14

summarized it, except I would add one more thing, that we have an executive

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:18

director who isn't paid in a CEO's wages. And she is incredible in

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:28

terms of making sure that her name is Sheila Pisialen, that she keeps

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:33

up on all of this, and that plugs in. the sort of the clops of the clumps

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:40

of young people in some places, older people in different communities,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:44

and actually as a spark plug for keeping this thing going. And there's

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:51

a young person that she has working with her, Monica's doing that stuff

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:10:55

now, and Holzer is other people, the person who's very active around

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:00

the... disability issues and there's people that work a lot around this.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:11

And there's a whole sort of a new layer of younger people that I think

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:15

Jamie is part of that, that cohort sort of, that in different communities

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:22

that, but we were never, we were mostly downtown for a long time in

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:26

terms of advocating important issues and going and trying to organize people

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:30

to go to City Hall and all that sort of stuff. city council meetings,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:33

those are important things, but we didn't have like a base in different

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:37

other, in other parts of the city. And that base is being built around,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:41

you know, younger people from different communities who live in those

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:45

places. And a lot of them are really young, even high school kids. And

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:11:50

that's pretty special.

[Jessa]: 00:11:52

Is that you, Jamie? Are you in high school?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:11:55

Yeah, grade 10, halfway through. And yeah, I completely agree with Herman.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:12:01

Eh.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:12:01

Sheila and Monica and a lot of other people at GTC riders do so much heavy

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:12:06

lifting. It's incredible.

[Jessa]: 00:12:10

I didn't mean to ask you this, but I wonder if you can lend some insight into

[Jessa]: 00:12:15

what I consider some a bit of a phenomenon. When I was in high school and in grade 10,

[Jessa]: 00:12:20

and that wasn't too long ago, but I'm probably older than you think, and I'm sure

[Jessa]: 00:12:26

I don't know, maybe Herman can relate as well. I don't remember being that politicized.

[Jessa]: 00:12:33

And I came from a very political family, so I was aware of politics. But the drive to

[Jessa]: 00:12:39

act. in this way. And the bravery to come on a podcast honestly was not something

[Jessa]: 00:12:45

I would have possessed at that age. But I'm seeing so much of it, especially on

[Jessa]: 00:12:50

the climate front. And I think like a lot of people can agree with that. What's

[Jessa]: 00:12:55

happening here? Like, what drives you and your friends? Like, how come you're not

[Jessa]: 00:13:00

hanging out at the mall and like parking lots and like what we used to waste our time

[Jessa]: 00:13:04

with? How are you motivated? Like, and I'm so happy that you are like Just maybe

[Jessa]: 00:13:10

you can help our audience who might be a little bit on the older scale understand

[Jessa]: 00:13:13

this.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:15

Yeah, so I can't speak for everyone, but for me personally, like sort of what I

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:21

said earlier, I just want to see things improving. So specifically with

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:26

transit. And I'd like to do that now in ways I can help. And I think it also

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:32

just gives me better knowledge about the topics that I'm interested in. But

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:37

also transit, but more I think with climate activism. People are also just

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:44

like... really scared about the future. I'm not sure what my life or other

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:48

people's lives are going to look like in even 10 years because we're not doing

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:53

enough to solve the climate crisis. And so, yeah, if you don't act now, then yeah,

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:13:59

who knows what's going to happen later. But I assure you, there is definitely

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:14:03

still a lot of going to the mall and the parking lot.

[Jessa]: 00:14:07

good it's

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:14:07

Yeah.

[Jessa]: 00:14:08

deserved as part of being young there's no judgment errors thank you and yeah you don't

[Jessa]: 00:14:14

I know you're not answering for it everybody but I'm grateful that you use your

[Jessa]: 00:14:19

free time this way and because the reason we have this show is because not a lot

[Jessa]: 00:14:24

of not everybody does more and more people are but almost all of us recognize that

[Jessa]: 00:14:29

there's a problem we just don't know what to do about it and I'm glad you folks

[Jessa]: 00:14:35

are finding avenues or creating them. What is it about TTC writers though, that keeps

[Jessa]: 00:14:44

you engaged? You know, a lot of our audience does organizing, they want more young

[Jessa]: 00:14:49

people on board. They want growth like they see in other organizations. Like I see

[Jessa]: 00:14:56

a lot of committee work that goes on with your group. A lot of press releases that

[Jessa]: 00:15:02

are hitting the right marks. direct actions. What's your kind of favorite part

[Jessa]: 00:15:08

about TTC riders that they do that makes you want to put your time in there other

[Jessa]: 00:15:14

than your love for transit? Like about the actions or the structure.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:22

I think from what I've seen there's sort of something for everyone to do. Like

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:28

for me recently I did like some graphic design work for an upcoming safety

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:34

report that we're doing. And so that was a way I could help without like

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:38

having the time to do like heavy research and like writing of a report. And

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:44

it was something I was already interested in beforehand. So and then if you

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:48

want to go like engage with the community. We have. a lot of those sorts of

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:52

activities too. So I think that's one way that we keep people engaged. And my

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:15:58

favorite thing so far that TTC Riders has done was painting like temporary

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:02

bus lanes on Dufferin because the city delayed that indefinitely. And

[Jessa]: 00:16:09

Tell us more. Did you do that? Were you part of that?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:12

I was unfortunately not part of

[Jessa]: 00:16:14

Okay.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:15

that,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:16:16

I was. Ha ha.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:19

but when I saw it the morning it happened, I was so amazed. I went over to

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:23

see it before it got, I believe the city removed it. And it just shows

[Jessa]: 00:16:27

course

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:28

that

[Jessa]: 00:16:28

they did.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:29

you don't need to take years to make transit riders experience better. You

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:34

can do it so soon. Yeah, so that was probably my favorite thing they've done

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:39

so far.

[Jessa]: 00:16:41

love that you weren't even involved with it but it brought you a sense of joy right

[Jessa]: 00:16:44

and

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:16:45

This is...

[Jessa]: 00:16:46

it probably even people who weren't involved at all saw it and were inspired or

[Jessa]: 00:16:51

at least you know driven by it at some point Herman tell me a little bit more of that

[Jessa]: 00:16:57

can you legally

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:16:59

Well,

[Jessa]: 00:16:59

allowed

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:00

for me, the reason why the TTC riders is going is because of the issue.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:05

And we're trying to take on those issues. That's the issue. Cause you

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:08

know, movements, they come and go, all of them, without an ongoing political,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:14

uh, you know, uh, permanent political, uh, or larger political, uh, organization

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:18

of some kind. These movements, they come and they go, but transit is such

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:23

a central thing. And, uh, and also TTC riders. has links to the labor

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:30

movement and also to some of the longer term, like the Toronto Environmental

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:38

Alliance that have been around. But also the things that Jamie was

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:43

saying, these are the climate crisis is the kind of issue that's touching

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:48

a lot of younger people right now. When I was in high school, I wasn't

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:51

that politicized, but there was, I went to school in the 60s, okay, in

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:17:56

Newark, New Jersey, so it's different. But they had, it was mostly against

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:00

the Vietnam War and fighting against poverty. But, you know, this is a critical

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:06

front in the fight against public transit. You read the papers today.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:11

you know, about how... the federal government is in the pre-infringement

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:15

are looking to how much money to give to these American companies and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:19

international companies to build battery plants, right, instead of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:23

using 13 billion dollars to rebuild the public transit infrastructure

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:27

in cities, which could mean the same amount of jobs. So those kinds of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:32

things, I think, inspire us to do these things, the bigger things. And,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:37

but you know, the movement is really doing all kinds of stuff now and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:41

it has a lot to do with the stuff there's a lot of shit to do. A lot

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:44

of around transit, it's important. And, you know, for, you remember

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:48

every, every one Friday a month, there was a strike by students that

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:53

stopped by COVID, you know, but I think a lot of that energy is the kind

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:18:57

of energy that is getting some of the young people involved in something

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:01

like TTC riders. I've seen transit movements in some other cities and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:04

they're often, since the transit, public transit is only for the poor

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:09

in say, I remember it was Edmonton and Regina. and stuff, or in Niagara.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:15

In other words, it's not something that's seen as a class issue of working

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:20

people or something that's bigger because around the climate changes,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:26

you need lots of people. So TTC writers has that attitude, and it's

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:31

good. So that's why I'm still involved, and I've been involved for

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:36

15 years or so. But it's not all I do, but I think it's absolutely central.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:40

And also, once again, somebody like who actually is able to plug into groups

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:50

of young people, like high school students, and I think that's really

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:19:53

critical.

[Jessa]: 00:19:57

Sorry, can you tell us a little bit about the painting of the Lansan Dauphrine?

[Jessa]: 00:20:04

Just cause, you know,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:05

Yes,

[Jessa]: 00:20:05

Jamie

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:05

you want to

[Jessa]: 00:20:05

got

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:06

hear about

[Jessa]: 00:20:06

a real

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:06

it?

[Jessa]: 00:20:06

kick out of it and I saw a look on your face. I do want to hear about it. How

[Jessa]: 00:20:10

do you folks

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:10

I was

[Jessa]: 00:20:10

pull

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:10

there.

[Jessa]: 00:20:10

that

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:10

Well,

[Jessa]: 00:20:10

off?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:11

what it was is that the city, it keeps on saying there will be bus

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:16

lanes, but they won't pay for it. And they won't really get to do it.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:21

So we figured, well, we're going to show them how to do it. And we're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:23

going to do we got kids paint so it rub off easily with wash off. And

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:29

we went to near Dufferin Station and people sess it out to space. We

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:34

got there early. We sess out the space the night before and then early

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:38

in the morning the next day. We drove people there and materials, and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:43

we just went out and painted it. And then we went back after, we went just

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:48

as if it never happened. So, and it got in the news and it excites,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:52

that kind of thing is exciting. It's not, it's low risk. It's not something

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:57

that's confrontational. Well, there are places for confrontational

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:20:59

stuff. And it gets a message out. That's a lot of the kind of stuff in that

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:05

kind of vein that TTC Writers has done. Like this, I remember once we had

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:13

this, much more called the sardine cans, because there was soaps, the

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:20

packaging. So we all made up these pretend sardine cans. And we went

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:24

to

[Jessa]: 00:21:25

Because people

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:25

the head

[Jessa]: 00:21:25

are packed

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:26

That's it.

[Jessa]: 00:21:26

into subways?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:27

Yes,

[Jessa]: 00:21:27

Okay,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:28

the probably

[Jessa]: 00:21:28

okay.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:29

in buses in particular. So

[Jessa]: 00:21:30

Yeah.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:30

he went to the head of the TTC at the time and gave them an award as I

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:35

forget, you know, like as a sardine king, as with that kind of stuff.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:40

And there's other analogs to that. So the kinds of things that people

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:44

have done. So I mean, you know, but around the even around the low income

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:48

fairs, we had these made this is before COVID. We'd have hundreds of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:51

people go to TTC meetings, or executive board meetings, as That was before

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:21:58

the you know sort of people stopped coming out as people are starting to

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:01

do that again and we'd interrupt meetings and you know, basically make points

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:06

or Shout slogans or that sort of stuff, but also post questions like

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:11

we do it now, you know, like when you can Depute but in those days

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:17

that there was a very pointed questions and very deep struggles and people

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:21

like Doug Ford Who's now the prime premier used to say well used to

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:26

ask going to do to make efficiencies? You know, he's asked the same

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:29

stupid question about cuts. But anyway, so there's a lot of creative things.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:22:35

And yes, that creating, painting that thing was pretty fun anyway.

[Jessa]: 00:22:41

Yeah, no, it's nice to hear those because it also speaks to what Jamie was talking about

[Jessa]: 00:22:45

there being a real range of activities for folks to partake in. You know, not everyone

[Jessa]: 00:22:51

is comfortable with going out and, you know, painting city roads. But, you know,

[Jessa]: 00:22:57

it takes a range of tactics, too, to get where you guys need to go. So it's nice

[Jessa]: 00:23:02

to hear that, because, again, you've got a really good comms strategy. from an outsider's

[Jessa]: 00:23:08

perspective anyway, going through the amount of times you folks get featured, not

[Jessa]: 00:23:14

just your direct actions, but your voices, right? Your perspectives, your questions

[Jessa]: 00:23:18

to the mayor and demands of the mayoral candidates. And that's sometimes not easy to

[Jessa]: 00:23:25

do from a grassroots perspective. And I imagine, or maybe I'll ask you, I won't surmise.

[Jessa]: 00:23:34

Who are you speaking to mostly when you do your work? Are you trying to speak to

[Jessa]: 00:23:40

politicians to make better choices? Or are you trying to mobilize the communities

[Jessa]: 00:23:48

around you to create that political pressure? I mean, maybe you're doing both,

[Jessa]: 00:23:53

but the bulk of your work, who do you think it's aimed at? Jamie, do you want to

[Jessa]: 00:23:59

take that one?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:01

Um, yeah, I can try to. I think it is definitely both. Like, when we were sort

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:08

of planning the early stages of our safety report, which I was working on

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:14

a lot, there was a big question of whether we should write it for the politicians

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:20

and be very technical, or whether we should have a more simplified version towards

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:25

just the general public so that they can understand it and... understand also

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:30

how they can get involved to help. So yeah, I think it sort of depends on

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:37

the project and you need to mobilize the community to get change to happen. If no

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:43

one else is asking for the change, it's not going to happen. But you do also need

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:48

to force politicians to make the changes. Otherwise it's just not going

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:52

to happen either. They do go hand in hand and I think we do a bit of both.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:24:56

Yeah.

[Jessa]: 00:24:58

Herman, like this is, that's a great answer from someone. And I hate to bring up

[Jessa]: 00:25:03

your age again, but I'm just in awe because Jamie, what you're gonna do with that

[Jessa]: 00:25:08

kind of knowledge to understand that there's different levers of pressure when you

[Jessa]: 00:25:12

want political change is like you're light years ahead of where most of us were,

[Jessa]: 00:25:18

you know, like a lot of us know to make noise, but you know, starting to learn

[Jessa]: 00:25:22

where to direct that noise and who's likely to aid in. you know, your mission, that's,

[Jessa]: 00:25:31

you know, sometimes that has to come with a lot of trial and error. So it hearing

[Jessa]: 00:25:36

that come from the both of you and just like, I'm already impressed with the organization

[Jessa]: 00:25:42

and just the knowledge base it seems to be building as well in its members and in

[Jessa]: 00:25:47

the public.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:25:49

See, there's a mutual dependence about what Jamie was saying. You know, you

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:25:55

can't get politicians particularly in a nominally depoliticized, nominally, because

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:01

they don't have parties in Toronto. But even so, the political parties

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:05

aren't, there's very little difference between the liberals and the NDP

[Jessa]: 00:26:08

Here, here.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:08

on the one hand, and certainly and the conservatives, there are differences.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:11

But you... You want exactly what Jamie said. You build a mass base and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:19

you presser these people to do some of the things you need them to do.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:23

If you stop that pressure, they will not do anything. And whatever they

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:27

do, unfortunately, has to articulate with the needs of business, which

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:32

is a problem. Nobody's challenging the domination that business has in the province,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:37

in the country, and the city, which is the biggest hub of the economy.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:46

And so that relationship is always important. But for an organization

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:51

like ours, which also wants important short-term reforms and has them.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:26:57

Like for example, the two hour time you can get off the subway and in

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:03

the bus and do things and not have to pay again. That's something that

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:06

TTC Riders was one of the leaders in pushing. And also this thing right

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:11

now about the busway, a dedicated busway, replacing the RT in Scarborough.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:16

There are others, but these things, they require that you do both things,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:20

that you build a base and that you pressure politicians. But for me,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:24

the critical point is always the base and having an organization, which

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:28

is not just, you know, the difference between organizing and mobilizing

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:32

in the sense that a relatively small number, even though we have a lot more

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:36

people that mobilize other people and get. things done. That's where we're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:41

at at this stage, but you want to have an organization eventually which

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:44

has a big, that's a big meeting, has big meetings, big mass space,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:48

not just names on that you call up. and the people who call it, they're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:52

an increasing number. And Jamie is an example of describing that. But

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:27:58

you want to be able to build in the communities a transit movement, which

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:02

isn't natural necessarily. You can't look at the last 40 years and say

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:06

there's been all these transit movements. It's something that we have to build.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:12

And we are starting to build in a particular way. But those of us who are

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:16

more skeptical about the politicians also realize that we want them

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:20

to make certain kinds of decisions. Unless you study who they are, what

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:24

their perspectives are, how to pressure them, and that sort of thing,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:28

then we'll be around getting people. We won't get any results. But we've

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:32

got some results because that balance, that contradiction is always

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:28:35

gonna be there. So.

[Jessa]: 00:28:38

I wanted to ask you a little bit about that struggle that you mentioned in having

[Jessa]: 00:28:44

a strong transit movement, especially in the past, when so many people rely on it,

[Jessa]: 00:28:51

but maybe not the right people. And you mentioned it earlier. There's quite a few

[Jessa]: 00:28:59

issues that typically resonate more with low income folks. than they do with workers,

[Jessa]: 00:29:06

even though we have plenty of workers that are low income, right? But I'm talking

[Jessa]: 00:29:10

mostly folks in legislated poverty that just don't get prioritized or just don't

[Jessa]: 00:29:16

gain the momentum that they need for change, you know, and that's typically because.

[Jessa]: 00:29:23

It's hard to build larger alliances around that that don't involve specifically

[Jessa]: 00:29:28

workers, worker issues, even though you've made the case that, you know, transit

[Jessa]: 00:29:31

isn't everybody issue. It's just not typically seen that way. Do you think that

[Jessa]: 00:29:37

plays into the difficulty in creating a larger mass transit movement? And if I'm

[Jessa]: 00:29:46

completely wrong, like where are your areas of resistance? You know, who's fighting

[Jessa]: 00:29:52

you on keeping transit public or moving towards a free transit scenario?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:01

Well, there's a difference between vested interests. and wealthy interests

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:06

around things like public-private partnerships, about serving these, you know,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:13

like these condo areas and that sort of stuff, how to build gentrification,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:17

that kind of stuff. And also, there's a difference in terms of getting

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:20

people some confidence to be able to do things. Because people who are,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:26

when I say working class issue, I don't just mean an employment issue

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:30

or in workplaces. Class strat, you know, exists in social reproduction

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:37

and housing and communities. And components of the working class who are

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:41

less organized because they don't have the economic power, right? They're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:46

going to be weaker in a lot of ways, which means that the form of organization

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:50

needs to be powerful. And they need to be organized in ways that are

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:54

in articulated with with other workers who are indifferent, like, for

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:30:59

example, transit workers or workers who people have to get across town.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:04

you know, who rely on transit. And also workers who drive, which is probably

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:11

one of the contradictions, you know. But you wanna be able to organize

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:16

all of those people. And the barriers are partly, you know, for the

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:20

elites, they don't want transit movements, or they want a transit movement

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:25

that fits in with their vision of where the city should be built. And

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:30

also the notion, the reality that amongst lower income communities, there's

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:34

less public transit. Right? Even that the buses are, you know, that services

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:39

being cut. There's, you know, like this whole LRT network that was

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:44

supposed to be built and paid for by the conference of the province,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:47

Ford, next Rob Ford next. And so on, you know, like in communities with

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:54

food deserts. You know, with, you know, those kinds of things, there's

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:31:59

transit deserts as well. And that's why we find really hard to organize

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:03

people in places like parts of Scarborough, in parts of North York, and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:09

all kinds of places in alliance with other people who are doing this. I mean,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:13

this woman who was a housing activist, Pata Vanni was her name. She just,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:19

she lost by 94 votes to one of the most conservative politicians in,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:26

in part of Toronto. And we helped working with them. We're not a non,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:34

we don't work for any particular political organization, but we're raising certain

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:38

issues that's pretty obvious to the kind of people we wanna do. So I mean,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:42

the obstacles are from the people who don't want the kind of transit we

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:47

do. don't necessarily want to build and don't particularly care about

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:53

whether there's whether transit fares are low or not. And the other

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:32:58

obstacle is that people aren't used to being organized, particularly

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:33:01

people in communities that you know that have never organized around public

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:33:05

transit, around transit. It's not as if there's a 70 year old history

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:33:11

of these movements, there isn't. And this is part of what TTC Writers

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:33:16

is a part of a generation of building this kind of a movement. And it's

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:33:21

within different stratum of the working class that we're working with.

[Jessa]: 00:33:27

Jamie, what about you? What are the biggest barriers, even if they're personal,

[Jessa]: 00:33:31

to kind of getting this work done?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:33:36

Um, yeah, so personally I'm very busy with school and sports and all that. So

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:33:43

I struggle to find time and I think advocacy is a very time demanding thing

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:33:49

to do. But more so on the larger scale, I think just finding ways to mobilize

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:33:59

and convince people of making these changes is very difficult. Funding is

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:06

something that I find, especially in government, is very iffy,

[Jessa]: 00:34:12

funding

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:12

even rapid.

[Jessa]: 00:34:13

for transit or funding for your organization like the work you do.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:17

Funding for transit.

[Jessa]: 00:34:19

Okay, yeah.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:20

Yeah, like so with RapidTO,

[Jessa]: 00:34:21

Probably both.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:22

probably both, yeah.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:34:23

Good questions, you always ask.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:27

But yeah, like with RapidTO, for example, I think the whole network was

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:32

supposed to be finished by now. And then they were like, okay, actually, maybe

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:37

we're not going to fund this. And there are so many more examples and it

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:40

just... It's a lot. It's not very much money. And like Herman's been saying

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:45

earlier too, with like EV rebates and stuff, that money could also just be better

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:34:49

spent on improving public transit.

[Jessa]: 00:34:53

Do you think, Jamie, this question's for you. Do you think folks rely on, when I

[Jessa]: 00:35:00

say folks, I mean the people in power that make promises and don't keep them. Do

[Jessa]: 00:35:04

you think they rely on people being too busy to pay attention or too busy to do

[Jessa]: 00:35:11

anything about it? A lot of your work seems to be holding people accountable to promises

[Jessa]: 00:35:16

they've already made. I mean, it's a lot of work getting a policy passed or advocating

[Jessa]: 00:35:19

for it. You get it passed and then they just... don't do it. So how do you think

[Jessa]: 00:35:25

they think they can get away with that?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:35:28

Um, honestly, I'm not really sure. Uh, like, I'm not sure about the general

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:35:36

public and, like, the majority, but for transit advocates, we notice when politicians

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:35:42

don't do things,

[Jessa]: 00:35:42

good.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:35:42

and we definitely try to keep them accountable. Uh, so I don't think it's

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:35:46

a very good strategy. In the short term, it can make them look good supporting

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:35:50

something, but in the long term, it definitely makes... them seem very untrustworthy

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:35:58

and just politicians who aren't very accountable for improving services. So

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:36:05

it's... Sorry Herman,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:07

They're

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:36:07

go

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:07

saying,

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:36:07

ahead.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:08

no, I'm going to say they're saying a lot now that the public mood is more

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:13

towards moving towards more activists, more progressive, at least in Toronto

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:18

for now. You know, and it's in line, I think, with what Jamie just said.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:22

But, you know, these, most of the politicians who are not coming up from

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:27

the activist communities are business types, or they basically, they're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:33

funded by developers.

[Jessa]: 00:36:36

Yes.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:36

And we know what we're talking about. They're funded

[Jessa]: 00:36:38

Almost

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:38

by

[Jessa]: 00:36:38

all

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:38

the,

[Jessa]: 00:36:38

of them.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:40

or by the financial capital, which basically makes huge decisions. And they're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:45

intimately tied up with other kinds of capitalist elites. And they're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:50

tied to political parties like the provincial conservatives, which are,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:36:56

you know, like sort of have a handle on the main... groupings of capital

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:04

in our cities, in our city. And that's what these people serve. Even if

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:07

they want to be able to spend money on public transit, they're subservient

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:13

to other kinds of interests. And I don't mean just in a sneaky way in terms

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:17

of, that's how they look at the world.

[Jessa]: 00:37:19

those two.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:21

I think it's mostly how they work at the world. because it's a lazy

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:25

populist analysis to say, oh, just because they're crooks or they're

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:30

bought off. There's reasons why they take money from them. They look at

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:34

the world a particular way. And that's what we need to challenge. You know,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:40

the fact that people in workplaces don't have enough time to organize

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:45

themselves into unions, or the fact that people in community, working

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:48

people in communities have trouble being able to sit down and, you know,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:51

analyze and what, how can I be proactive in these kinds of movements,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:37:55

is conscious. This is, there's a, the ruling stratum of our society disorganizes

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:00

the potential of working-class people to be able to become, you know, you

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:05

know, proactive and... and all that kind of stuff. And that's part of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:11

what we're fighting against, in ourselves and our families and everything,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:15

all this kind of stuff.

[Jessa]: 00:38:16

Yeah, life.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:16

So I think that you...

[Jessa]: 00:38:18

Yeah, in Ontario, it's particularly difficult now under Ford. There's just so many

[Jessa]: 00:38:24

fronts to be fighting on. So although you do have networks, you know, they've got

[Jessa]: 00:38:28

their hands full to a specific legislation that they've got to push back on. And, you

[Jessa]: 00:38:33

know, that might be related to transit, might not be. But and then, yeah, you look

[Jessa]: 00:38:38

to the person next to you and they're fighting a completely different battle, maybe

[Jessa]: 00:38:41

on a school board level. And

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:44

A lot

[Jessa]: 00:38:44

yeah.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:44

of the funding for cities and public transit is based upon, used to be

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:48

50% of the operations that was funded by the provincial government. That

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:53

changed with Harris. And when the liberals got elected, they didn't

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:38:56

change it back. So, I mean, the cities are so much, it's interesting, are

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:01

so much of the tool of the more powerful province and, you know, look,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:09

they transformed the city council. They had this powerful mayor, a whole

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:14

series of things. They have this thing where they can actually step in

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:18

and prevent, say, a non-market solution to housing by simply saying what they

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:24

call a ministerial order. We can build this. and they're not funding

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:28

public transit that way. So, I mean, it means that cities, doesn't mean

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:32

cities can't do anything. And a lot of our work is around the city. We

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:37

can, from what Jamie was saying, in terms of building, putting pressure

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:40

on, and we get things, we've won things that way. But you also have the

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:44

fact that, you know, the worst kind of elites are backed by the conservative,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:49

you know, the Ontario conservative, PC's they call themselves, in Ontario. And

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:54

part of that means to change the provincial government That's part of the

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:39:59

constraints that TTC Writers works under. You know?

[Jessa]: 00:40:05

big, we've waded into politics pretty deeply at this point. So, you know, I've got

[Jessa]: 00:40:11

to ask about the Toronto mayoral race. I'm sure you folks have very specific demands

[Jessa]: 00:40:18

or questions, concerns that you have coming out of these campaigns. Um, are, is

[Jessa]: 00:40:27

TTC riders backing a candidate? What's their, how's, what's their approach here during

[Jessa]: 00:40:33

this very important race? Jamie.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:40:38

Yeah, so as far as I'm aware, and Herman, please clarify for me, we're not

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:40:44

backing any candidates, but I think TTC writers certainly wants to see whoever

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:40:54

is elected be very supportive of funding transit, increasing service and

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:00

reversing the service cuts, and looking at non-confrontational... ways of solving

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:06

safety issues, so not just police, but finding ways to also fix the underlying

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:13

issues that are causing the safety concerns, but also having better support systems

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:19

on the system, like on the subway system, to fix safety concerns when they arise.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:26

Yeah, I think those are the major points, and of course bus lanes and other issues

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:30

that TTC riders has been advocating for.

[Jessa]: 00:41:34

It's a little harder to get bus lanes, you know, debated on, right? They

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:39

Oh

[Jessa]: 00:41:39

like

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:41:39

yeah.

[Jessa]: 00:41:39

to talk about taxes and this law and order narrative is pretty heavy and it centers

[Jessa]: 00:41:46

pretty much on transit. Herman, you know, how are you feeling about this race?

[Jessa]: 00:41:52

You know, you talk about, Jamie talks about, you know, funding and wanting someone

[Jessa]: 00:41:57

who would adequately fund transit. You know, you guys spend $33 million a day

[Jessa]: 00:42:02

on police. Does that pretty much exclude any current counselors running? Because they've

[Jessa]: 00:42:08

not done a great job funding you so far.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:11

We don't, Jamie basically summarized and Jamie was very active in a very,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:18

very, the safety stuff that we've done around the way we responded to that,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:23

that onslaught that came, you know, that ideological onslaught was, I

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:27

think, was very reasonable. And Jamie sort of summarized what we've been

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:32

seeing around it. But no, the law and order thing is not been the main

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:36

topic in the election. the right wing, some people have tried to make

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:40

it such, but it hasn't had the resonance that it had made a couple of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:44

months ago, if you've noticed. And our issues are, what we did is, as Jamie

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:50

was saying, we basically had this scorecard, you know, a questionnaire.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:55

We asked, I think there are 23 questions, and we interviewed some of

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:42:58

the candidates around critical issues that Jamie mentioned, including like,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:04

you know, like this... commercial parking levies that would help to fund.

[Jessa]: 00:43:11

as a revenue tool, right?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:13

as a revenue tool. We don't have huge revenue tools, you know, and also,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:18

you know, some of them are talking about raising taxes on the wealthy.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:22

And even property tax increases that would be progressive in the sense that

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:28

they would only affect, say, people with houses worth of $3 million

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:32

or more of that sort of stuff. But no, we can't take a position on

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:37

a particular candidate. But it's pretty obvious what those who articulate

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:44

what we're interested in and have our particular points of view. And

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:48

that's what we're doing. And we also have something we're gonna do around

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:51

it, around getting people to vote. Because part of the problem is that

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:55

a lot of the people who are affected by the issues that we're concerned

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:43:58

about don't necessarily get out and vote. Particularly, this is like

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:44:03

a by-election, although, and so this is part of what we're trying to

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:44:07

do in terms of getting people to understand this and come out, so.

[Jessa]: 00:44:13

Well, we'll link people to the scores on your report cards. They can see for themselves

[Jessa]: 00:44:19

where people were answering. Is there anything else that you want our audience to

[Jessa]: 00:44:26

know? You got anything else up your sleeve that we should know about, get excited

[Jessa]: 00:44:31

about?

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:44:37

Yes.

[Jessa]: 00:44:38

You guys are tight lips. It must be good

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:44:43

Well, it's not as if we have some kind of bomb to drop.

[Jessa]: 00:44:45

Okay

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:44:47

I think it covered a lot of things we're doing. And I guess one of the

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:44:52

issues that is really important is to replace the Scarborough RT, which a lot

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:44:58

of people didn't even know was gonna be closed down with a dedicated busway,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:02

which

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:07

would replace this broken down technology. And it also would allow people

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:11

to walk, to bike, and it also would be dedicated as we possibly can

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:17

and it needs to be funded. It's like the stuff that Jamie was mentioning

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:20

that the colleges promise, you know, well, they'll build bus lanes or

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:24

they'll build a busway but they won't fund it. We want these things funded.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:29

And yeah, maybe some of the money that's going into policing, increasing

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:34

policing, doesn't mean that, you know. police are necessarily bad, but increasing

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:38

the, you know, dealing with safety as a way of sort of militarizing the

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:42

subways isn't necessarily what we want. We can take that funding and

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:46

use it partly for resources that, you know, to deal with people who have

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:50

issues. But there's reasons why there's more of it because it has to do

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:45:54

with the cutstop been made and use it to fund things like public transit.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:46:00

We basically don't want the austerity agenda our city council for years.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:46:10

Remember when I talked about how Ford Ocean said, oh what about efficiencies?

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:46:14

It's all about cutting, you know. He's saying if you want, even now

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:46:17

he's saying you want more money for the province, you have to have proof

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:46:20

that you can efficiencies, which means cuts. So it's that kind of a thing

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:46:26

that we're hoping people talk more about during this election and transit

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:46:31

is the critical part about that.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:46:36

Adding on to what Herman was saying at the beginning there, yeah, a lot

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:46:41

of people don't know about the changes happening to transit in Toronto, and

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:46:47

especially the Scarborough RT. A lot of people don't know that that's going

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:46:49

to be closing in November of this year. So if you have the time and are

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:46:55

interested, I would definitely recommend just going out and going to one of

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:46:59

our canvassing and flyering events. It educates people who use the line and that

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:47:04

helps them, but it also mobilizes more people to advocate for better transit.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:47:09

And that pushes the politicians to make change.

[Jessa]: 00:47:14

Jamie, it's almost like you knew what my last question was going to be and I was

[Jessa]: 00:47:17

going to throw it to you. You know, what do you want from the audience? You know,

[Jessa]: 00:47:21

what would you ask of them? And you did it. So

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:47:24

Hehehe

[Jessa]: 00:47:25

I'm just going to thank you folks so much for taking the time to come on because

[Jessa]: 00:47:28

I, you know, I can hear that you're busy people, even just with TTC writers on

[Jessa]: 00:47:34

your plate. There's just so much work there to do. We will try to amplify your work

[Jessa]: 00:47:39

through the show. And again, we'll share as many links back to your work as we

[Jessa]: 00:47:43

can. Again, thank you for your advocacy and your work. Not everybody does this and

[Jessa]: 00:47:50

the show hopes to aim to bolster your ranks a bit, you know, maybe not directly with

[Jessa]: 00:47:55

your organization, but you know, we're all working towards that same kind of vision

[Jessa]: 00:48:01

of equity. So thank you, Jamie, and thank you, Herman. Enjoy

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:05

Yeah,

[Jessa]: 00:48:05

your Friday

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:05

my pleasure.

[Jessa]: 00:48:06

night.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:07

Thank you for

[Jessa]: 00:48:07

Thank

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:07

having

[Jessa]: 00:48:07

you.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:07

us on.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:48:09

Yeah, thank you for doing this and thank you for persevering with this

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:48:12

considering that the one thing didn't work, but that's great. It's good.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:48:16

Thanks a lot.

[Jessa]: 00:48:17

Thank you. I had audience members that said you better get them on and talk to them.

[Jessa]: 00:48:20

So I wasn't going to let them down. Take it easy, folks.

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:48:24

It's nice to be in a huge dream,

[Jessa]: 00:48:25

Oh,

[Herman Rosenfeld]: 00:48:25

yeah, but it's good.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:26

Oh yes,

[Jessa]: 00:48:26

sorry.

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:26

it was nice meeting you as well.

[Jessa]: 00:48:28

Are you just too bad? Sorry. I'm going

[Jamie Kauri]: 00:48:29

Yeah.

[Jessa]: 00:48:29

to stop recording here, but just hang on two seconds because your file will upload.

[Jessa]: 00:48:34

It'll take like two.