Former Halifax Councillor Jackie Barkhouse says that during her term she often told management and Mayor Kelly of staff being harassed and bullied, but that these reports were ignored. Barkhouse believes now is the time for an independent and public inquiry into the toxic workplace that HRM has become for many employees.
We’re very happy to present Remembering, a poem by Killa Atencio, a wonderful poet of Mi’kmaq and Quechua ancestry. It’s the first of eight poems we will publish during the remainder of the year, selected as a result of the call for poems we issued a while ago.
And another day at the human rights inquiry into the lack of supportive housing for people with disabilities. Two mothers talked about the horrors of institutionalization, in particular the circumstances at Quest in Lower Sackville. Wendy Lill mostly talked about policy issues relating to the disabilities roadmap, a government policy document written at that brief point in time when community advocates had some real hopes that things would get better, only to be disappointed once again.
Today’s update on the NS Human Rights Commission’s enquiry into the lack of supportive housing for people living with disabilities. We learn that their former supportive housing provider wanted the folks languishing at Emerald Hall to come home, and we hear one parent talk about her worries that at some point in time she will no longer be able to take care of her son.
Another day at the NS Human Rights Enquiry into the lack of supportive housing for people with disabilities. We learned that people conditionally discharged from the East Coast Forensic Hospital can’t leave because Community Services cannot provide them with the supportive housing options that they require. Waits can be longer than six years, averages are around 840 days.
I attended day 14 in a lengthy NS Human Rights Commission inquiry into the lack of supportive housing for people who live with disabilities. The main witness was disabilities studies professor Catherine Frazee, and I learned a lot.
Our mayor and Council don’t have the political will to put an end to the bullying and racism that sp many HRM workers are being subjected to.
Kendall Worth, on what to do when you don’t have anybody who cares enough to want to be your emergency contact. Nothing is ever easy when you’re poor.
This weekend’s weekend video is Etlinisigu’niet (Bleed Down), by Mi’kmaq filmmaker Jeff Barnaby. its theme is the violent destruction of indigenous identity in Canada by white settler culture. It’s quite terrifying to watch.
Oral speech may not be the best method of communication for the non-speaking autistic, writes Alex Kronstein. “Mainstream autism organizations are unwilling to admit that they are choosing to ignore non-speaking autistics. Non-speaking autistics have always been around, just like autistics who do use oral speech. And everyone – the medical and psychological professionals, the non-autistic parents, the mainstream media – needs to STOP pathologizing non-speaking autistics and using functioning labels.”