Chinatown, like all areas in Toronto, has issues concerning the community. These issues can be very specific to the area or can stem from bigger issues provincially or federally. When citizens living in Chinatown have a problem they very often show up at the door of Olivia Chow’s, MP in the Trinity-Spadina area, office located just off of Dundas. So like most citizens I called the office to get some answers.
“People come here for help on federal issues and that need our assistance to get in touch with government departments that they can’t get to themselves like income tax, immigration and passports,” explains Susan Kwong, an assistant at Olivia Chow’s bureau. Katheryne Schulz, another assistant at Olivia Chow’s bureau was quick to step in and offer more advice about the issues and break it down to us by area. City issues that Schulz brought to our attention were also outlined in Chow’s platform. The issues that are being circulated around Chinatown currently are head tax, senior services, garbage (in terms of pick-up and the cleanliness of the streets), graffiti, noise (from traffic and construction), traffic, parking, property tax, racism and the environment.
Kwong told a story of a man who lived in Chinatown who desperately was in need of help. A family member had passed away and he needed a coroner. In these situations Chow’s office will either try to direct where the person should go or will tell them there is nothing they can do for them. For bigger problems surrounding immigration or family reunification Chow’s office is the place to be.
The other issues that affect the community but are more provincial issues are affordable housing, health care, senior care, access to services such as multilingual services, government and housing (co-operative housing) and poverty (income security). Federal issues also affecting Chinatown are immigration, family reunification, passports, customs, old age security, deportation and income tax.
One specific issue that has governed a lot of attention and affected Chinatown largely was the head tax. Both Kwong and Schulz repeated the words “head tax” several times in separate interviews. Head tax deals with immigration and racism which both to this day is distressing people. The head tax is part of the history of many Chinese-Canadians. There has been a head tax redress (I think over a year ago now), however racism and the movement of more Chinese people coming into Chinatown will still have an influence on the citizens.
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2 comments:
I wanted to find out the answer to your question of redress. According to CBC News, "on June 22, 2006, Prime Minister Stephen Harper offered an apology and compensation for the head tax once paid by Chinese immigrants. Survivors or their spouses will be paid approximately $20,000 CAD in compensation."
However, since head tax was charged on every Chinese immigrant from 1885 to 1923, it makes sense that not too many of the approximately 4000 men who actually paid the tax are still alive.
It seems that while Harper offered redress to the elderly men and their widows who may still be alive, many in Canada want redress for families who were directly affected. This has led to protests across Canada.
Check out this in depth backgrounder from CBC.
It will be nice to see more people know about the situation with HEAD TAX.
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