All posts by Chloe Fiancette

Should Ottawa citizens give zero waste a chance ?

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When it seems difficult for Ottawa citizens to significantly decrease their waste production, a Gatineau mom has the solution : buy as little wrapping as possible, and a lot of organization.

Jodi Wilson is a stay at home mom and co-owns the soap shop A Dream Lived Greener. She is also “zero waste” : two years ago, she decided that she would drastically reduce her garbage production.

“I just don’t want to contribute to the pollution to sending everything to landfills and the greenhouse gas it generates,” she said.

Wilson buys her groceries in bulk and uses her own reusable bags and jars. She makes her soap, toothpaste and deodorant herself. She washes the family house using only vinegar and baking soda. 

A work that requires an important organisation, but it pays off. Wilson estimates that she saves money by buying large quantities in bulk and resisting compulsive buying of goods wrapped in paper and plastic.

But more importantly, she realized that her waste of the past month can be contained in a small jar.

“It’s really good to see,” she said. Being zero waste made her realized how much waste she produced before, and how much goods are packaged in plastic in the supermarkets. 

In comparison, an Ottawa citizen produces 30kg of waste per month (360kg a year), according to the City of Ottawa 2011 waste plan data.

Wilson’s radical lifestyle transformation is not representative of the general trend that applies to the population of Ottawa.

Over the past five years, the waste generation remained stable, while the population is expected to increase, a study of the open data from the City of Ottawa website shows.

This should not be enough to avoid the implementation of a new landfill in Ottawa. Indeed, the Trail Road landfill is schedule to close in 2044, and the closure deadline depends on the amount of waste produced each year by households and companies.

The City has not come up with a solution on the matter and declined to comment on the subject.

In the meantime, the accent was put on waste diversion to resolve Ottawa’s waste problem.

“The more we can divert, the better,” said Mayor Jim Watson after the waste management company Plasco went bankrupt two years ago. “It’s in our collective interest and the fiscally responsible thing to do to continue to put as much as we can in the blue, black and green bins.”

The introduction of the green bin program in 2010 permitted to divert a great deal of waste from the landfills. But even here, the dynamic is now faltering. In 2014, the waste diversion rate was slightly lower than in 2013.

Note : This graphic shows a decrease in garbage sent to landfills per year after the start of the green bin program in 2010. The organic bin enabled to increase the diversion rates. However, the trend seem to change in 2014, as less people seem to have use their green bin.

Can the situation be solved thanks to changes in lifestyle ? Wilson seems to think so. But she insists that being zero waste requires a lot of organization, especially with children.

“It makes it difficult because you have to go to multiple places to shop,” she said.

For her, it is not necessary to be completely zero waste to help make a change, but participate by doing little things, like refusing disposable bags.

“The more the people do the little things, I think it would change maybe how businesses think and it might make changes in the future,” she said.

Is biking safe in Ottawa ? It might depend on where you live…

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Savannah de Boer (left) and Marina Cañellas (right) as they hesitate to ride their bike after the first snow fall of the year. (Photo : Chloé Fiancette)
Savannah de Boer (left) and Marina Cañellas (right) as they hesitate to ride their bike after the first snow fall of the year. (Photo : Chloé Fiancette)

More and more inhabitants of Ottawa use their bikes daily, while the number of accidents decreases. Ottawa slowly strengthens its biking culture, but not all wards are equal on creating a safe environment for cyclists.

When Marina Cañellas, 26, arrived in Ottawa in early September, she was delighted to find out that biking is relatively safe in Ottawa : “I think Ottawa is a great place to go by bike everywhere. I love it !”

Cañellas has not always been an avid cyclist. “I’m from Barcelona”, she explained. “I think it’s more dangerous to bike there, because there are too much cars and no bike lanes. ”

But after living for just a few weeks in her new home city, she decided to give biking a second chance. “The first time I tried, I was a little bit scared,” she said. “I was thinking about the cars, etc. But now, it’s totally normal for me.”

“In fact, I was a little bit surprised that it was so easy to bike here,” she said.

The young Spanish woman lives in the Capital ward, just a few steps away from the Rideau Canal. She follows the bike path along the Canal everyday to go to work at the University of Ottawa, where she started an internship in bio-informatics. An ideal trail, that saves her time without having to worry about encounters with drivers.

Her roommate Savannah de Boer, 21, follows the same bike path to go to the University, where she is an exchange student in psychology.

“The pathway helps us a lot,” the young Danish student said. “You feel safer and you can go faster and you know you would meet only other bikers and people walking.”

The bike path leads directly to the city center and the University of Ottawa, and can enable many people to safely reach their workplaces in a short time. It might be the very reason why the Capital ward is one of the areas with the highest number of people who list bicycle as their main transportation to work, according to the 2011 Household Survey.

Map : The highest concentration of people who go to work mainly by bike can be found in the Glebe and Old Ottawa East, near the Rideau Canal. Another high concentration can be found in the Kitchissipi ward, where there is another secure bike path along the Ottawa River.

Source : 2011 Household survey

De Boer realized that some areas of the town might be more safe for cyclists than others, as she went one day by bike to a danish shop on Clyde ave, in Nepean.

“Cars drive faster there, and if they don’t see you after a turn, they can hit you,” she said. “I rode on the sidewalk, and I was not the only one !”. She felt safer when she finally arrived on the familiar bike path near the Canal.

Recently, concerns about the safety of cyclists on busy streets of the city center made headlines. This September, a 24 year-old woman was killed after being hit by a truck on Laurier ave. Three collisions took place just a few days after the opening of a new bike lane on O’Connor St in October.

David Chernushenko is the Councillor of the Capital ward and has been an advocate for encouraging a biking culture in Ottawa. According to him, biking is not without risks, but the general situation improved in the city.

“It is safer, it is much safer than in my childhood and teenage years in Ottawa,” he said. “It is safe enough to attract thousands of people to ride now who wouldn’t have ten years ago.” He cites the creation of segregated bike lanes, foot and cycling bridges, better signalisation, as well as efforts in education about sharing the road, as reasons for these improved safety. 

Ottawa becomes more and more safe for cyclists. The number of bike trips increased by 40% between 2005 and 2011 in Ottawa, according to a survey directed by the TRANS committee. At the same time, there is a decrease in the number of collisions involving bikes over the last few years, according to the yearly road safety reports issued by the city of Ottawa.

Chernushenko said that the next projects for improved infrastructure will concentrate in the center, citing the example of the biking lane from Laurier to Parliament hill that will be finished in 2018. He explained that the accepted logic is too create a continuous network in the center before developing other wards’ bike paths.

In the meantime, cycling will not be as easy for everyone as for the two young exchange students. For the moment, the only thing that might dissuade them from riding their bike is the Canadian winter.

Street-art sometimes harmed by public’s complaints about graffiti

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The painting by Alejandro Hugo Dorda Mev was removed by the city services after complaints by inhabitants (screenshot of Deborah Landry's blog)
The painting by Alejandro Hugo Dorda Mev was removed by the city services after complaints by inhabitants (screenshot of Deborah Landry’s blog)

Each year, about one thousand people call the Ottawa city by-law services to denounce the presence of graffiti. These are then removed : sometimes at the cost of beautiful artwork.

A 15-meter tall gun, but to promote peace. The weapon, painted on a wall of the french-speaking centre Patro d’Ottawa who commissioned the work, is not what it seems: looking closer, you notice it actually being made of toys.

Through this original piece, the artist Alejandro Hugo Dorda Mev sends a clear message: the innocence of children is stronger than automated weapons. But the community didn’t had a long time to appreciate his work. Some Ottawa citizens, offended by the depiction of a weapon, called the 311 city services. 48 hours later, the painting was hidden by a big piece of cloth, before being painted over.

The incident, which occurred in 2011, is still a clear example of the previous municipal government’s policy inciting people to signal graffiti to public services, according to criminologist Deborah Landry.

“The consequence is that you have people calling in to check on things that aren’t graffiti at all !”, she says, noting that chalk drawings by children were reported as graffiti by some inhabitants.

The educational campaign of the previous city government under mayor Larry O’Brien seems to have long term effects. Open data of Ottawa city services show that in 2015, 1,049 people called the 311 line to report illegal graffiti. Every year, the Rideau-Vanier has the highest number of incidents reported.

311 Graffiti complaints  : The map shows the calls made to Ottawa city services to report graffiti in 2015, broken down by ward.

source : City of Ottawa open data site

But the strategy didn’t help to reduce graffiti, according to Landry.

“What we have now in the city is a whole bunch of patches of different color of paint over graffiti”, she said. “This makes a lovely base for another graffiti take!”

The researcher adds that the city is trying to stop something that has been done since Pompei. “We’ve always written on walls and this is nothing new. We live in a culture that tags everything with logos.”

Graffiti related 311 calls on the decrease

But the incoming 311 calls actually cost money. Landry said, “each report ranges between 90$ and 300$, for every time somebody responds to a 311 call and deals with it.”

“I think that the mayor Jim Watson knows that, and that he is not trying to encourage people to respond to something as benign as graffiti.”

The number of 311 calls related to graffiti has been decreasing since the election of Jim Watson in 2010, dropping by 33%, an analysis of city of Ottawa open data shows.

source : City of Ottawa open data site

Patrick McCormack, general manager at House of Paint, agrees that the general attitude changed about graffiti in municipal services and that Jim Watson puts a bit more value on art. “But we are still looking for the city to fulfill its commitment to the artists.”

House of Paint organizes a festival that celebrates hip-hop culture each year and collaborates with the city on the Paint It Up program, which enables young people to legally paint murals. But McCormack thinks Ottawa could do more for graffiti artists:

“Some artists want more legal space to practice their art”, he said. “They don’t want to go over a piece that someone else did two weeks ago.”

Ottawa has three walls where artists can freely paint without breaking the law. Gatineau, on the other hand, offers 28.

McCormack agrees that he wouldn’t want someone to paint on his garage without his authorization. For him, each case is different and should be resolved through collaboration. A point of view Landry shares.

“The focus should be: ‘how do we live together a bit more peacefully, with a bit more understanding amongst the communities?’”, she said. “We don’t get that through law, we get that through talking.”

Proving consent : why are men accused of rape so likely to leave the trial free ?

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One in four women in North America will be sexually assaulted during her lifetime. Yet, the chances for the victims to see the culprits locked in prison is slim. Even when  a trial is held, the accused is likely to be cleared.

In Canada, less than half of the criminal offenses all combined are cleared. However, when it comes to sexual assault, two third of cases are cleared (61%). A stable proportion over the last 15 years.

According to Blair Crew, lawyer and professor at the University of Ottawa, they are many reasons that explain this higher clearance rate.

The most delicate part is not to prove that the sexual intercourse happened, he explains, but to prove, « beyond a reasonable doubt », that it was consented.

Deb Singh, who works as a counsellor at the Toronto Rape Crisis Centre, agrees that proving consent is very difficult. « Sexual assault happens usually, according to statistics, when the two people know each other, in a private home. There is usually no witnesses. »

Other evidence might also be hard to find : « a person might have been assaulted even if they don’t have bruises, they might not even have conscience ! »

Often, the trial relies on the only testimony of the woman. But for Blair Crew, one of the reasons the accused is more likely to be cleared is that women might not be taken seriously :  « She can say, very clearly, ‘no, I didn’t consent’, and she might be not believed. »

For Deb Singh, it is also a matter of cultural perception of rape : « For decades, raping your wife was considered as something normal and acceptable. » According to her, rape is still not perceived seriously. « Last year in Ontario and Canada, there have been a number of judges who have made all sort of sexist comments, » she said.

90% of the cases are cleared in Nunavut

Aboriginal women might be even more exposed to the difficulty of the procedure.

The proportion of cases that result in a conviction can be drastically different from one province or territory to another. In Nunavut, about 90% of the accused walk free from the court, and about 80% in Northwest. In Newfoundland and Labrador, the rate drops at 37%.

Blair Crew states that « there might be different court procedures », but that the amount of aboriginal women might also be at stake. « Studies show that aboriginal women are less likely to be believed », he said. That would explain why in provinces where the proportion of aboriginal women is high, the clearance rates are higher according to the expert.

Only 6% of rapes are reported to the police

Many cases are thus cleared by charge, but some sexual assault cases might also be cleared otherwise, which includes, among other things, when the complainant declines to press charges. The proportion of cases of sexual assault cleared otherwise (18%) is slightly higher than in other criminal offenses (16%).

Blair Crew explains that it is more likely that the victims of rape tend to drop charges during the procedure, given the fact that it can be difficult to go through for the victims.

The defense might also ask for a therapeutical record, or request information about the woman previous sexual life. These requests that women could find intrusive or humiliating to the point that they decide to abandon the case.

From what Deb Singh observes after about 16 years of working with survivors of sexual assault, there is some kind of « double victimization » during the legal procedure. She recalls the case of a young woman against who the defense attorney used her activism against sexual violence on campus to discredit her, saying that « she wants the system to not convict her perpetrator because it would prove her activism was meaningful. »

The majority of the sexual assault are not reported to the police, only 6% according to a study of Statistics Canada (http://www.sexassault.ca/statistics.htm). While they are numerous reasons behind this, « women are aware of the difficulty of the procedure » said Blair Crew. « They fear they might not be believed. »

Blair Crew says that Ontario is currently training its crown better to handle sexual assault cases. « In the long term, I think it can make a difference. »