“I have seen those posters (attacking you). They are hate. Why aren’t the police doing something?” you asked when you stepped into my home during your election campaign for city councilor.
I replied, “The police are doing what they can. When you get into office you do something. Do not do it for me. Do it for everyone.”
Through Councilor Filion I got word that I had been told by your office there was nothing that could be done.
Neither statement is true. When it comes to bullies there is always something that can be done, should be done and must be done. Additionally, your office has been silent towards myself on this issue. I received nothing from your office.
On September 18, 2017 I was riding in a police car at Bloor and Bathurst showing the officer I was with where the posters were that were smearing me.
As we drove South on Bathurst James Gillis (aka Dr. Jamie) was spotted by myself walking north.
I pointed him out to the officer. She stopped, called for backup and them Gillis was chareged with Criminal Harassment. He was arrested. He was instructed not to possess or post anything related to myself as a condition of his release.
While the posters smearing myself and others have ceased his attacks on myself have not.
He continues not only to ignore the city’s postering bylaws but also to cover up and/or destroy posters placed by myself and others.
All the need be done to end this is to have the city enforce the city postering bylaws. For some reason this is not being done.
For example, commercial posters are not allowed on utility poles. Not only do we find posters for Gillis’s postering service, used bike sales and commercial clients on utility poles we find them placed over posters that are allowed their legitimate (community events, etc.).
Posters are limited in size to 8.5 by 11 inches. Gillis ignores this completely.
This has been going on for nearly twenty years.
I have grown used to the refusal of your office and the office of others to take action. I have grown used to the refusal of the city to take action.
Jane Jacobs’ son James repeatedly tells me when we meet, “Mu mother loved you.”
Laura Lind, in EYE weekly, wrote, “Reg Hartt is everything Jane Jacobs wrote about.”
A large part of what makes me everything Jane Jacobs wrote about is that my programs have been under constant attack in this city since I began them in 1968.
This letter is not to ask you to take action nor is it to ask you to see that the city enforce its bylaws regarding street postering as they affect Mr. Gillis. If that were going to be done it would long ago have been done.
Rather, it is to thank you for making me EVERYTHING Jane Jacobs wrote about.
Jane Jacobs is but one of the many people who have underlined the importance of what I was born knowing. I was born knowing that when we see harm being done and do nothing to stop it we kill a part of our self.
In 2010 when I saw the first poster campaign put up around the city smearing a former employee of James Gillis as a police informant I acted to stop it. I filmed it, put the video on the web (it is still there) and one woman working in the office of then Mayor David Miller contacted me to state that she would act to see it stopped.
It is unfortunate that you do not have in your office one person of her caliber. It is unfortunate for this city that it seems in not one of the offices I have contacted there is not to be found one person of her caliber but then Jane Jacobs’ last book is titled DARK AGE AHEAD. She saw this coming.
P.S. Our police force seems to be constantly under attack. I will say that im all the years I have been in this city I have found our police to be far more caring and intelligent than they are commonly portrayed in the media.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dsZ6zLZOAc
“If I were to remain silent, I’d be guilty of complicity.”― Albert Einstein.
“There doesn’t seem to be much creativity at the top. It seems to me that Toronto has a split personality, a civic schizophrenia. On one level there is the spirit of individuals and small groups who do things…what you might call the vernacular spirit. This is all very informal, ingenious, quite romantic and full of fun, a great deal of fun. It seems to me that the official spirit of Toronto is stamp out fun. It’s pompous, impressed with mediocrity if its very, very big and expensive,”–Jane Jacobs
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