Onrait and O’Toole score big at Fox Sports

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Jay Onrait and Dan O’Toole

Popular SportsCentre anchors Jay Onrait and Dan O’Toole are leaving TSN, according to a release from the sports network. The duo will be taking their quirky brand of humour south of the border where they will join Fox Sports. “Every single day I went into work at TSN, I knew I was going to have fun. It’s a unique and rare work environment that I never took for granted. I am forever indebted to TSN for letting me be a part of it for the past 10 years,” said O’Toole, who worked as a news anchor at Citytv Vancouver in the late ’90s. O’Toole and Onrait’s unique chemistry has earned them a nationwide following. After their departure from TSN was announced, Prime Minister Stephen Harper tweeted a photo of himself with Onrait and O’Toole, saying “Worst play of the day: Jay & Dan leaving TSN. Best of luck in the US, gents.” Onrait and O’Toole are expected to leave TSN in late June.

St. Clair station platform “gap” dangerous for kids

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The gap between the platform and the subway car floor can be as much as 15 centimeters (or six inches) at the St. Clair station. This revelation comes as a 4-year-old child, Ava Buckareff, fell through the gap to her hips  while boarding a train on Wednesday. Fortunately the girl’s aunt Esther Buckareff, quickly tugged Ava  out of the gap and placed her on the train. The harrowing incident is only diminished by the terrifying prospect of what might have happened if the train had started to move with Ava still stuck between the platform and the subway car. The TTC has explained that the size of the gap in this case is related to the curvature of the northbound tracks at St Clair station. The station is offset to the east of Yonge street and the tracks swing east into the station. The last cars in the train sometimes stop while they are still on the curve, leaving a wider than usual gap. It’s another reminder of just how old our Yonge subway has become.

Kids learn from the Youth Police Initiative

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Samira Mohamed

Grade 12 student Samira Mohamed is among 440 young persons to gain the experience of the Youth in Policing Initiative (YIPI) program designed for kids from challenged neighborhoods. Samira has now graduated from the four month program and feels she has learned things about policing she never guessed at. Although she liked the idea of getting paid $10.90 an hour the C.W Jefferys Collegiate Institute student now says she it was an extraordinary experience for her and the other YIPIs. In response to the deadly Danzig Street shooting that claimed two young lives last July, the provincial government rolled out a youth action plan, with $20 million in new annual funding to improve the lives of young people in the city and the rest of the province. With Toronto Police Service news. 

“All Welcome” at Radford family Hanna Road Leaf Shack

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Hanna Road Maple Leaf fans Doug and Elizabeth Radford have re-launched a family tradition to celebrate their favorite team making it to the Stanley Cup finals. Here we see Elizabeth and daughter Jessica flanking the Radfords prominent neighborhood invitation for friends and neighbors to join them in the family’s Leaf Shack. For the first game on Wednesday night, the Radfords entertained 20 guests in their backyard under a tent cover that Doug has rigged there. Inside, a large TV screen permits close up and congenial hockey watching. Better than a sports bar, we say. The Leaf Shack dates from the days when Jessica and her sister, Sarah, were quite young — and the Leaf’s were contenders. The family used to watch games in a Leaf Shack in their tent trailer. The tent trailer having long since died, Doug struck upon the idea of his current backyard entertainment centre. The next game is Saturday and, as the signs over Hanna Road (near Millwood) proclaim,  “All Welcome”.

Talbot units owned by Manitoba pension fund

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No doubt about it. The Investment Committee of the Manitoba public employees pension fund has put a lot of space between its members and any possible irate public opinion in Toronto. In Winnipeg, they frequently don’t worry much about what people in Toronto think anyway. The nine-member committee is chaired by Peter G. Munro and includes the Manitoba Deputy Minister of Finance, John Clarkson. It’s unlikely the serene tone of the fund’s offices on the 12th floor of 444 St. Mary’s Avenue felt even a ripple of the shock that ran through the Kelvingrove and Glen Leven Apartments on Bayview Ave. in Leaside Monday. That’s when residents of the 140 units found out that their landlord, HPI Realty Management was telling them to get out of their apartments by September 1.  Just go. The sooner the better.  HPI is the lowest name on the hierarchy ladder which leads to the pension fund. Tonight the tenants of the low-rise and reasonable rental buildings are still trying to figure out where they stand. Their modest apartments were built by Howard Talbot, a one-time mayor of Leaside, and have been designated as heritage buildings by the City. In 2010, Kelvingrove ADMNS (the next name up the ladder) fought a long and bitter battle to demolish the units and build condominiums and townhouses. In the end, the Ontario Municipal Board ruled against this plan. The decision is considered by the Leaside Property Owners to be among its most important successes. But clearly the Investment Committee of the Manitoba public employees had more to say. The company has told tenants it is going to rip out everything. It will be impossible for tenants to stay. HPI carefully invokes the law and tells tenants that if they don’t agree to go it will have to file an application to the Landlord and Tenant Board to end the tenancy by August 31, 2013. The notices are carefully worded. Margaret Randall, whose mother Joan lives in the building at 1345 Bayview, says her mom was told when she leased the space about a year ago that if there were, by chance, renovations, she would be accommodated elsewhere in the buildings. But the Investment Committee’s strategy is now in over-drive. Get the buildings vacant, updated, increased in value and rented to people who can pay more. And then maybe sell Kelvingrove and Glen-Leven, or embark on another marathon battle this time to convert them to condominiums. They would no longer be low-rent accommodation. More like expensive luxury rentals. You could see how the new tenants might like that idea.    

Manor Road United Rummage Sale on Saturday

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The women of Manor Road  United Church, 240 Manor Road, will hold their annual Spring Rummage Sale this Saturday (May 4, 2013). It will run from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the church. This important fundraising sale will feature a variety of items including jewellery, children’s toys, clothing, books, CDs, tapes, kitchenware, household linens, small appliances in working order, furniture etc. There will be refreshments including homemade muffins, tea and coffee available at the impromptu “snack bar”. Items not sold are picked up by the Scott Mission for distribution. Thanks to reader Susan J. for this reminder. 

Tories committed to voting down today’s budget

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This is budget day and the proceedings from the Legislature can be seen live by clicking the link at the left at 4 p.m. The Premier has defied convention a bit by sharing some of the details: There will be a $260-million investment in home care, a 15 per cent cut to auto insurance rates, new funding for northern roads and bridges and some sort of social assistance reform. The Conservatives however are unimpressed. Leader Tim Hudak says the party will vote against the budget for certain.

Loblaws commits to making factories secure

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Loblaws has committed to a policy of verifying the structural safety of buildings where its goods are produced in Bangladesh and elsewhere. Galen G. Weston, executive chairman of Loblaws, said he has been  appalled by the silence of the garment industry to the collapse of a factory in that country last month.  Mr.Weston said that  Loblaws will take the lead to try to secure the structural integrity of factories.   This will involve having Loblaws personnel on the ground as monitors. Mr.Weston spoke at the Mattamy Athletic Centre and was accompanied by Joe Mimrand, the creator of the Joe Fresh brand owned by Loblaws. At the news conference, one reporter questioned whether there was anything that foreign companies could do because the Bangladeshi government is so untrustworthy. Mr Mimrand noted that a major reason that Joe Fresh is manufactured in Bangladesh is the reciprocity treaty the country has with Canada and Ottawa’s encouragement of firms to take advantage of this for the purpose of helping the Bangladesh economy.  

Tenants given eviction notices at Talbot units

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Tenants of the Kelvingrove and Glen-Leven rental apartments on Bayview Ave. report that they have all received eviction notices, ordering them out of their units by September 1, 2013. There are some 140 units in the buildings. Owner of the historic apartments, ADMNS Kelvingrove Investment Corporation is part of a Manitoba pension fund, They say they intend to renovate the apartment units and to do so the buildings must be vacant. The tenants have been told they will receive a total of three months free rent if they agree with the terms of departure. The notices were served  Monday April 29, 2013 and the nature of a tenants rights in this situation is unclear. Margaret Randall, of Leacrest Road, said that documents tendered to her mother, a resident of the apartment for a year, suggest that she can return to her apartment in a year, or more, quite likely at higher rent. The Kelvingrove, Glen-Leven and related properties were the subject of an intense battle between the owner and the Leaside Property Owners Association. The LOPA said the buildings were historic and part of the community’s heritage. The simple red brick buildings between 1351 and 1365 Bayview on the east side were built by Howard Talbot, who served as Mayor of Leaside from 1938 to 1947.  It seems certain that as the details of the eviction are revealed and opposition is formed, there will be much to tell on this matter. 

New Boston suspects car had “Terrorista #1” plate

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Two suspects taken into custody Wednesday in connection with the Boston Marathon bombings drove a car with “Terrorista #1″ license plates. Azamat Tazhayakov and Dias Kadyrbayev were reportedly arrested Wednesday, along with one other person, for allegedly making false statements and obstructing justice during the federal investigation into Boston Marathon bombing suspects Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Tazhayakov and Kadrbayev, who are reportedly in FBI custody, drove around in a black BMW with “Terrorista #1” license plates and were also photographed with Dzhokhar Tsarnaev in Times Square. Daily Caller.