Category: Uncategorized

As students across Toronto continued their modest little gatherings to complain that they are being short-changed, the head of the elementary teachers union was explaining why it’s all the school board’s fault there will be no report cards. “There is no clear explanation as to why school boards like Toronto, Peel and York Region can’t issue report cards as other boards are doing,” says a straight-faced Professor Hammond. “These boards may be larger but they have proportionately as many administrators within their system to handle the task of issuing report cards,” he added in a written statement Friday. Actually there is a reason. It’s money. The school boards, including the huge Toronto and District School Board, say it would cost millions to bring in the trained staff to curate all the information necessary for a proper report card. That’s the work that the teachers are paid to do. They also get paid for not doing it at Sam Hammond’s nutty job-action university. Says the prof: “All school boards have known for more than a month that (the union’s) work-to-rule action would affect the formal report card process. They have had ample time to prepare.” Right, that’s why the union decided not to supply report cards. It would have so little impact. After all, the teacher’s aren’t working to rule to disrupt anything. Welcome to Sam Hammond University

Rachel Dolezal’s parents have outed their daughter, in a sense, by making it public that she is white, not black. Ms. Dolezal is the head of the Spokane NAACP.  It an absolutely absorbing tale as told by CNN’s Suzanne Malveaux

Dozens of pictures at #Honda Indy 

In July, Twitter is set to permit 10,000 character “direct messages”. The old 140 character limit will still apply to regular tweets. This word comes as the company’s much maligned president Dick Costello steps down and a former Twitter boss Jack Dorsey moves in temporarily. The problem? Twitter can’t seem to make money even though it is enormously popular. It must be said that Twitter for all its appeal is a rather quirky concept that tends to attract users who are more tech than Facebook users. Over its seven or eight year history, some investors have said the service is too complicated. A re-make of the its format in April did not seem to help much.

SEARCHES FOR SEASIDE INSTEAD OF LEASIDE

It does things like search  for “Seaside” instead of “Leaside” and then asks in small type: “Search for Leaside instead” The new categories of “Top” and “Live” tweets are a mystery to most people. “Why?” is a common reaction.

And yet for those who use it, Twitter is a superb tool permitting direct access to all sorts of people unknown or pals. Twitter handles are public on  Google unlike other information. The whole “Trend” phenomenon was created by Twitter and continues to be a source of rapid entertainment and information. Many news stories appear on Twitter in searchable detail before the media writes a word. Just how the 10,000 character move will change the Twitter application remains an unknown.

Hydro One continues the extensive replacement of concrete hydro poles in residential areas. Here the work goes on at the corner of Hudson Drive and Rose Park Drive where the 35-foot Cedars are going in beside concrete poles that have 40 or more years of cracks and salt damage on them. The new poles are buried five feet deep leaving a 30-foot height, as much as six-feet over the concrete units.

Sharon Lee Thomas will discuss and autograph her new novel Watchdogz at Sleuth of Baker Street this Saturday (June 13, 2015) She will be at Sleuth between 2 and 4 p.m. This interesting Torontonian is a retired lawyer who has worked as both an advocate for refugees in a poverty law clinic and as a prosecutor for Canada Border Services. At Canada Border Services she intervened in hearings for asylum where individuals had identity or criminality issues. About Watchdogz, Ms Thomas says “This book is a fictional story about a claim for asylum in British Columbia, Canada, border security and a horrific terrorist plot against the United States.” Sounds good. Sleuth of Baker Street is at 907 Millwood Road at Sutherland Drive.

 

A woman who was in charge of organizing and labeling chicken at the Cericola Farms facility in Bradford says the company routinely labelled ordinary chicken as organic. The mislabeled chicken was shipped to well-known retailers like Loblaws, Costco, Sobey’s and others. says Vashti Dalipsingh. The Cericola firm has issued a statement tonight which accuses Dalipsingh of seeking money but does not deny that such things occurred. She said she discovered the practice in January but after reviewing the company’s records learned that it had been going on for eight months. Dalipsingh alleged the products were mislabeled to fill orders and ship on schedule. Dorian Persaud, a lawyer for Dalipsingh, says records were falsified and code stickers changed to read that chicken arriving at the plant for processing was organic when it was not. Persaud told the CBC that  a Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) inspector was stationed at the Bradford plant “and it was this person’s job to catch exactly the kind of fraud that Vashti is now blowing the whistle on. How that inspector did not catch the fraud is a mystery.” In a statement, Dalipsingh said she confronted her employers between January and April of this year, “and became more forceful” when she cancelled two shipments that she says were “deliberately and falsely labelled as organic.”

Mayor John Tory has won a vote which paves the way for a so-called hybrid version of the Gardiner Expressway. Council was deeply split and the final division of 24 to 21 appears to reveal a downtown vs suburban split. The hybrid road requires a realignment of the roadway east of Jarvis Street to re-join the eastern portion of the expressway which leads to Scarborough. Most of the opposition to a Hybrid was in favour of removing the eastern piece of the Gardiner and building a “boulevard” and developed amenities. The version generally summoned up by this was gentrified commercial activity. This was the option favored by City Planner Jennifer Keesmaat. a vote on the boulevard  option failed 26 to 19. Analysis suggests that some supporters of the hybrid were not keen about but it voted to prevent further congestion — a  fearsome word at City Hall. There is nothing imminent about any of this. It may quite a few years before work begins on any option.