The refugee co-operative in the Junction, La Paz Co-Op and newspapers more local coverage.

News as reported in newspapers has changed from local and coukd be interpreted as mundane for those not Interedted or affected by a event.

Here the The Globe and Mail NEWSPAPER in 1989 covers a new social housing project on St Clair Ave west. The news story is about the seemingly long struggle for a group of new Canadians to establish a new housing coop.

The original article is in italics.

Sod turned for refugee co-operative home

LESLEY SIMPSON The Globe and mail

 Feb 19 1989 The Globe and Mail

pg. A11

Daniel Sanchez is looking forward to his last trip down the elevator. The 30-year-old former refugee does not like the atmosphere in Metro Toronto’s apartment buildings.

“You’re all in the same elevator. You look at each other. And nobody says anything… You can be dying and your neighbor doesn’t care.”

The lack of community for refugees led the Metro hostel supervisor to get together with some friends and form Cocento, an association of Toronto’s Central American refugees, in 1985.

Note the authorsinterview captured the news but also the emotional postion of one of the residents.

Three years later, after approaching the Co-Operative Housing Federation of Toronto, fighting two city halls and two levels of government, the president of La Paz Co-Op finally saw a mound of sod turned Saturday at the St. Clair Avenue excavation site.

Asked what accounted for his spirit of tenacity Mr. Sanchez smiled and shrugged. “I live in an apartment and I don’t know who my neighbors are. I just stuck to my principles. I thought a co-op would be a solution for the community. A kind of brotherhood.”

Located west Keele Street between stockyards and meat packers, the site is on the boundary between the City of Toronto and the City of York. After the building permit has been issued, construction is scheduled to being this month.

In November, La Paz Co-op will open 62 units made up of one- and two-bedroom apartments and three- and four-bedroom townhouses to refugees. Four units will be set aside to provide permanent housing for battered women. The co-op will set up a committee to review applications.

While the project will provide housing for 62 families, Ontario New Democratic Party Leader Bob Rae questioned the government’s commitment to affordable housing. “The government is way behind target. When I hear the Minister (of Housing) talking, I get confused. Is it 3,000 units over 30 years or 30,000 units over three years?” Mr. Rae said as an audience gathered to watch the sod-turning ceremony [source unreadable]

La Paz C-op is part of a federal and provincial cost-sharing program. The total cost will be more than $8-million. The province will supply rental assistance geared to income for about half of the units.