Steps taken to expand access to city’s parks
Red tape and fees are cut as new user-friendly policies take shape
Last year, Star readers identified adopting an innovative parks policy to eliminate barriers that prevent community groups from accessing public green space as one of their top 10 big ideas. This week, we check in on what, if any, progress has been made.
All they wanted to do was host an acoustic music festival in the park, but as always, there was red tape.
Permits had to be applied for, insurance purchased and a noise exemption granted. It was all made more difficult because the city didn’t have a category of park permissions explicitly geared toward art events, so the Great Heart Festival was slapped with challenges and $2,500 in fees. That was before Mayor John Tory stepped in, slashing the event’s permit costs and instructing staff to make it easier for parks to be rented by opening up communication within city departments handing out permits — a gripe that the Star had chronicled in its Big Ideas series last year.
But it wasn’t until fall that city council took steps to ease park access, passing sweeping changes including free “Arts in Parks” and “Music in Parks” permits.
They come with regulations around noise levels, local councillor approval and minimum standards for insurance and aren’t contingent on the organizer holding charitable status.
“It solves everything. Our biggest beef was always that you had to be a registered not-for-profit or charity (to easily get permits),” said Bobby Kimberley, a Great Heart Festival organizer, who noted that his festival, featuring unamplified musicians, is small and, though not a charity, has no revenue.
That meant it had to rely on not-forprofits to assume liability and help with getting approvals to bring their low-key, “unplugged” festival to Trinity Bellwoods Park.
“It sounds like they’ve done what they needed to do to solve that problem,” said Kimberley.
But there’s still work to be done, said Dave Harvey, founder and executive director at Park People, a park advocacy group.
He authored a 2010 report for the Metcalf Foundation, an organization dedicated to innovation, explaining the need to improve Toronto parks.
He said the policies council adopted were “a really good first step” towards becoming a model for other initiatives that will expand access to parks for those in high-priority and under-serviced neighbourhoods — a need that the Big Ideas series highlighted.
“We are working with groups in Rexdale, Thorncliffe and Malvern, where we are seeing some of the per- mit fees waived on an ad hoc basis and are looking for opportunities where we can more formalize that,” he said.
Then there’s the five-kilometre linear park and trail called the Green Line, a part of Tory’s parks platform during his 2014 mayoral campaign.
It’s an ambitious idea proposed by community advocates, but moves are only slowly being made to license unused land at Dovercourt Rd. and Geary Ave. and Davenport Rd. and Lansdowne Ave. to form part of the line.
With parks and planning staff getting on board and helping build some positive momentum, Harvey said he is encouraged by the progress, though it is only moving forward bit by bit.
Harvey will have to wait and see how quickly things move.
He said, “I am always an optimist, but there has definitely been some very good progress in the last year.”