Neighborhood Profile - Youth in Kingston-Galloway Orton Park (KGO)

Neighborhood Profile - Youth in Kingston-Galloway Orton Park (KGO)

Deanna Salib

SOCD21 - Immigrant Scarborough

Professor Villegas

January 29th, 2014

University of Toronto (UTSC)

Introduction:

Within Canada, immigration policies and law have a determining factor in the composite of the Canadian citizens (Hallock, 2009). Canada has stereotypically been depicted as allowing all types of immigrants into the country in the forms of permanent residents, refugees, over-sea students and the like. It has been characterized as a multicultural country that embraces all ethnicities and cultures no matter where on the globe. Consequently, Toronto has not only become an immigrant point of entry to become a resident of Canada, but it has now become an immigrant destination to inhabit (Troper, 2003). Scarborough has been illustrated as the “little brother” of Toronto and many immigrants were pushed to this municipality in order to reside. The government allocated funds in order to construct small businesses, apartments and a transit system in order for Scarborough residents to commute to Toronto for work, as well as for them be able to “integrate” into the new host society (R. Schofield, personal communications, January 21, 2014). Integration during the early creation of Scarborough was unidirectional in which the migrant was expected to adapt to the host society (Basu et al., 2013). Presently, Toronto, especially Scarborough, is home to many immigrants from throughout the world and is a multifarious space where ethnicity and culture play a large component in social, cultural, economic and institutional spaces. Within East Scarborough there is the Kingston-Galloway Orton Park (KGO) neighborhood that is home to many migrants.

History of Kingston-Galloway Orton Park & Scarborough:

For migrants, Scarborough became a destination end point, a place where they could settle and start fresh in the new country after much chaos, stress and turmoil during the migration process. Scarborough and KGO have both been illustrated as negative, and criminally radicalized communities in order to maintain its status as undeserving of investments and responsible for it’s negative attributes. Scarborough has be stigmatized as a city of crime and poverty and is often referred to as Scarbiria or Scarlum (Basu, 2013). These stigmatized identity names of Scarborough consequently reproduce inequality within the community. The KGO area was originally known as West Hill, which was a small community with a post office and a couple local businesses (Abbas, 2011). After the Second World War, local motels and businesses began to take form along Kingston Road. With the introduction of the railway, highway and public transit, the KGO community became a pitstop for many travelers.

Within the 1980s, the Galloway Boys became a notorious gang that participated in drug and gun violence throughout the KGO community (Frisk, 2012). Much violence presently associated with the KGO community is due to feuds between the Galloway Boys and the Malvern Crew, which has caused many investigations into the community due to gun violence and murders. Scarborough is presently the home of the working poor, recent immigrants, refugees, undocumented workers and other low income citizens (Basu, 2013). Migrants are able to find security in Scarborough due to cheap housing, public transit, the presence of extended families or fictive kin as well as the location of nearby Toronto and it’s influx of jobs. Unfortunately, 90% of the population lives in high rise buildings (Abbas, 2011), and many residents fall below the poverty line (Yu, 2010). Presently, many groups within the community, with the help of the City of Toronto, are working hard to try to de-stigmatize Scarborough and KGO of their negative attributes by allocating more resources to the community as well as offering education services, youth group services and migration support.

Population & Demographics of Kingston-Galloway Orton Park:

The population within the Kingston-Galloway Orton Park community is approximately 23, 042 as of data collected in 2006 (Abbas, 2011). The majority of the KGO community is in the working age of 25-54 years of age (42.6% of the population). Interestingly, 28.7% of the demographics are youth within 5-24 years of age (Abbas, 2011). Furthermore, according to Abbas (2011) and the 2006 statistics on the KGO community, 42% of all families with children and single-parent families. Continuously, as of 2006, out of the 23,042 community members of KGO, only 3,412 of those individuals are currently employed (Abbas, 2011). According to the Toronto City Mission (2014) the KGO community has approximately 29% of low income citizens, with about 50% or more of the population in need of social services. Within the population, only 27% of the population has a high school certificate (Yu, 2010) demonstrates that the lack of education and resources within the area reduces one’s chance of attaining employment and financial stability. The lack of financial and employment stability is evident in the 2006 statistics that demonstrate that approximately 25% of the population makes less than $10,000 a year, and 10% makes less than $5000 yearly (Abbas, 2011). These demographics illustrate that there is a large number of citizens within the KGO community, and many of them experience forms of inequality through financial difficulties, employment irregularities and education.

Immigration Statistics

According to Statistics Canada (2010), immigration is defined as “persons residing in Canada who were born outside of Canada, excluding temporary foreign workers, Canadian citizens born outside Canada and those with students or working visas.” Between the years 2001-2006, Canada received 1,109,980 international immigrants and the City of Toronto become home to about 267,855 of those immigrations during this period (City of Toronto, 2013). Presently, half of Toronto’s population (1, 237,720) was born outside of Canada (City of Toronto, 2013). In the KGO community, there is diversity in the types of immigrants that reside there. According to Yu (2010), 39% percent of KGO are immigrants from South Asian countries (especially India and Pakistan), and 14.6% are from East Asia. Within the KGO community, 29% of the population identify themselves as African, 20% as Arab, 15% as Black and 7% as South Asian (Abbas, 2011). Within the Kingston-Galloway Orton Park community Abbas (2011) states that 87% of the community members are Canadian citizens, 4% are permanent residents and 4% are immigrants from 6-9 years. Lastly, in 2006, 47% of the population had a mother tongue in a language other than English or French, with Chinese (420,000), Italian (195,000) and Punjabi (138,000) as the top three mother tongue languages (other than English or French) (City of Toronto, 2013).

Services for Immigrants:

East Scarborough Storefront (4040 Lawrence Ave E) - The East Scarborough Storefront is a safe place for community members to receive services. These services range from employment, education, housing, legal, settlement, health and mental health (The Storefront). Not only are these programs designed for the adult community, but there are also services for the youth community in employment, mental health, health, after school services and the like. The East Scarborough Storefront is funded by Toronto, United Way Member Agency, Ontario Trillium Foundation and Metcalf foundation (The Storefront). Not only does it have recreational programs for youth, but it also has youth counseling programs. The services for immigrants at the Storefront are formal services. The storefront combines with other professional agencies in order to promote healthy lives and meaningful work for their community members. It is not run by the government, rather it is supported by governmental agencies such as the City of Toronto. When researching in regards to eligibility for their programs, the majority of the information was in regards to being a community member. With employment services, one was said to be unemployed and on OW or ODSP (financial help from the government) in order to be eligible for those services (The Storefront, 2010). Because the Storefront works with other agencies, there may be specific eligibility requirements for those applying for services.

TDSB Newcomers Services for Youth - The Newcomers Services for Youth is a youth program operated by the Toronto District School Board that offer two youth programs called the Youth Host and the Youth ISAP (Community Outreach). The Youth ISAP program is a program that offers information and services in regards to housing, education, health and resume writing (Community Outreach). According to the Community Outreach website, those youth who are eligible for the services are those newcomers between the ages of 13-24. They must be a permanent resident, landed immigrant of a Government Assisted Refugee. The Newcomers Services for Youth is a formal service that is ran by the government through TDSB and is funded by Citizenship and Immigration Canada (Community Outreach).

Boys & Girls Club of East Scarborough - The Boys and Girls Club of East Scarborough is a club where people from all economic and cultural backgrounds can participate in community social, recreational and educational programs (The Boys & Girls Club, 2014). The Club’s goal is to “enhance growth, personal development and potential as contributing members of society” (The Boys & Girls Club, 2014). The main focus of it’s clients are those youth between the ages of birth and 24 within the community. The Club is licensed in childcare, early year programs, before and after school youth programs as well as recreational activities (The Boys & Girls Club, 2014). For some services, there is an Orton park location where only Orton Park members are able to attend. It is a formal organization that is funded by the United Way Member Agency and the City of Toronto which means that it is governmentally run (The Boys & Girls Club, 2014). Continuously, it has over 24 different supporters such as Rogers youth fund, the Maple Leafs Sports Entertainment and BMO Financial Group. These programs not only help the youth but, they offer a safe place for parents to leave their children before picking them up for the evening.

Information Related to Youth:

Much of the paper already touches on the topics of youth and the demographics in the KGO community, but it is important to expand on the research and information. The Global News (2013) stated that there is a large push for private tutors to help children succeed in their academics. They also noted that there are income based differences in school test results and this effects the child’s future and academic success (Global News, 2013). Continuously, The Star (2014) has an article about how difficult it is for youth to become involved in groups. Community groups such as the Storefront or the Boys & Girls Club allows youth to get involved in the community and create new friendships with less stress.

Within Toronto, the top five visible minority groups in Toronto were: South Asian (12%), Chinese (11.4%), Black (8.4%), Filipino (4.1%) and Latin American (2.6%) (City of Toronto, 2013). According to the Toronto District School Board (TDSB, 2013) student registration, there are slightly more male (52%) than female (48%) students attending TDSB, especially within their secondary school locations. Among those students, 29% self-identified as white, 24% as South Asian, 15% as East Asian, and 12% as Black (TDSB, 2013). Within the geographical realm, these four ethno-racial groups tend to gather in nodes throughout the city. Students from South Asian descent live in greater concentrations in the suburban areas in the East and the West, East Asian families tend to cluster in the North York and Scarborough areas (TDSB, 2013). Within these youth communities, less than half of the TDSB students (44%) reported that their sole first language was English (TDSB, 2013). Interestingly, there are over 115 languages spoken by TDSB students, and the most common non-English languages spoken within their youth community are: Chinese (11%), Tamil (6%), Urdu (5%), Bengali (3%) and Gujarati (2%) (TDSB, 2013). The Toronto District School Board (2013) states that roughly a quarter of their students immigrated to Canada from over 190 countries with the majority from: China (4%), India (2%), Pakistan (2%), United States (2%) and Bangladesh (1%). The majority of the school board’s students (over two-thirds) are from immigrant families with both of their parents born outside of Canada (67%) and over 90% of the visible minority students present are of immigrant background (Toronto District School Board, 2013).

Analysis of Findings:

Throughout the research done on the Kingston Galloway Orton Park Neighborhood, it is clear that this neighborhood is a destination of residence for many immigrants. Unfortunately, it is still a pocket of concern for the government and even it’s own community. When looking at findings in regards to employment for example, it is heartwarming to know that there are community programs that offer employment services and employment resources for their community members. They help with writing resumes and looking for employment opportunities. These actions done by community services allow for the community members to gain employment and financial stability. Continuously, these community services offer a positive and stigma free environment in order to seek help and support. The Kingston Galloway Orton Park community is either discussed in two ways: positively or negatively. Information from news agencies, some governmental agencies and the media depicted the KGO community negatively. They would highlight the violence, crime and gang acts that occur in the community as well as the police presence and action that were in place. Community forums and websites did not touch on negative issues that occur in the KGO community, rather they highlighted the work and support services that they partake in for their members and youth. They framed their mission and vision of the community as a place where people can go for safety, services and the like. Personally I found this very conflictual. After speaking with fellow classmates and members of the Scarborough Archives, the KGO community and Scarborough is depicted as a positive community. In much research, many respondents believed that their community was safe and not dangerous. Yet, when talking to others, they depicted the KGO community as a “slum” or a “dangerous community”. These ideas partake on two opposite sides of the continuum. With the help of the government financial assistance and community members, the KGO community and Scarborough as a whole are changing. Community services have vastly helped in trying to de-stigmatize their community by having many fundraisers, community gatherings, farmers market activities and the like. The people of the KGO community are trying their best in order to be perceived as a neighborhood that values solidarity and community, rather than a crime breeding neighborhood. Scarborough is also working at trying to embrace it’s idea of a multicultural community. They are embracing their ideas of cultural differences (temples, mosques, churches etc) and depicted the Scarborough community as a welcoming municipality to outsiders (Basu, 2013).

Sources for Assignment:

When researching the Scarborough municipality and the Kingston Galloway Orton Park neighborhood, there are many detailed rescues to gather information from. There were specific sources on the KGO community as well as the history associated with it. The sources allowed for me to have a clear understanding of the strife, stigma and statistics associated with the area at study. Many statistics were present that allowed one to compare the KGO community to Scarborough and Toronto. It allowed for one to get a larger understanding of the community members that reside in the neighborhood. The sources were very user-friendly and easy to use. This allows for a clear understanding of the community not only for researchers but also for public knowledge and consumption. The only difficulty in finding out research about the Kingston Galloway Orton Park community was trying to find who is eligible for specific services or not. Majority of the services were available for “community members”, but it does not specify what types of members (e.g.: refugees, citizens, temporary citizens and the like). Due to the fact that many of these community service providers were governmentally funded and ran, it is safe to assume that some immigrants would be denied support due to their possible status as a Canadian resident. The majority of the tone the resources were presented to was positively except for when dealing with negative information about the community. In other words, there was constantly a battle between the positive notions of the neighborhood versus the negative ideas of KGO and Scarborough. Both negative and positive connotations would be present in the same article, which gives the reader a complex in evaluating the community.

Bibliography:

Abbas, R. (2011). Kingston-Galloway/Orton Park Community Resource and Needs Assessment.

Basu, R., O’Connor, K., Fiedler, R., Ko, Connie., & Prier, N., (2013). Integrative Multiplicity through Suburban Realties: Exploring Diversity through Public Spaces in Scarborough. Report to CERIS - The Ontario Metropolis Centre.

Boys &Girls Club of East Scarborough. (2014). Retrieved by:

City of Toronto (2013). Toronto’s Racial Diversity. Retrieved from:

Community Outreach. Toronto District School Board - Newcomer Services for Youth. Retrieved by: