Anti-poverty demonstrators gathered outside of city hall at the human rights memorial to unveil its platform for the upcoming municipal election Tuesday morning.
The group, called ACORN, is demanding that the city’s next council adopt a comprehensive poverty reduction strategy that would include a living wage for city employees, including employees that work for companies contracted by the city.
Almost sixty people turned up to support the platform and picketed along Elgin Street to demand the city take poverty reduction seriously.
One ACORN member, who has been with the group for four year, Nadia Willard said that the reason the group is raising poverty issues in the campaign is because for the first time in years the city can afford to do something about it.
The provincial government has agreed to resume responsibility for a host of social services that it downloaded to municipalities during the Mike Harris government.
This decision will free up almost $18 million of municipal money.
“We want this money to stay in the social domain, it would be wrong just to add it to the capital budget,” said Willard.
She emphasized the importance of the city adopting a living wage, despite the fact that most of the city’s minimum wage earners don’t work for the city.
“The city needs to take a leadership role, we need to lead by example and make decisions based on what we would want for ourselves and neighbours,” said Willard.
She said that there needs to be a change on council because in her opinion personal agendas often trump the collective good. She cited the recent increase in bus fares as an example of the current council’s disregard of the city’s poorest residents.
ACORN will endorse candidates who support its platform and Willard said they will keep working to make sure poverty issues remain a priority throughout the election.