I’ve had to stop my daily garbage picture as it is getting harder to find disgusting garbage pictures that could top anything I posted on Saturday… and then again, there was such a huge (and necessary) push this past weekend to clean the streets that the city looks quite decent today… at least downtown.

As I’ve mentioned before, the group I march with share my views on not stopping anyone wanting access to the City offices. We are present on the line and we continue to be informative if we have any new information to share.

There is one exception though, every morning since going to our new picketing location, we do stop one person: our city’s Medical Officer of Health, David McKeown. We don’t detain him or anything, but every morning when the group has arrived, we make a point of thinking of a few questions we can ask him. This is a man who has the power to basically end this strike if he thinks it is bringing health concerns to Toronto residents. Mr. McKeown continues to say that all measures are taken to keep our dump sites clean of infestations and that there are no concerns for our health… yet.

This morning, when he arrived, it was the same ritual, I asked him if we could take some of his time for our question of the day and he politely agreed. As it is every morning, the entire group stops walking and swarms around him, not to be intimidating, but because we’re all concerned and curious. My first question was in regards to his press conference from last Friday when he said that there were no more rat sightings than usual in the city and if there were, they are certainly not being reported. So I asked him if he cared to elaborate on that since rats have been seen outside of dumping sites and in residential areas in the last few days. He said that all measures were taken to control the pest at dumping sites and I alerted him that the rat that DR saw was on the streets nearby where we live which is far from the nearest dump site. He looked concerned and said that if it had not been reported, we should indeed do so. He asked exactly what area it was, I told him it was close to the Central YMCA downtown. He said he was going to look into it… Others had questions for him and like a gentleman, he took the time to answer all questions.

After he was had left, I told DR he should report the rat incident to Toronto Public Health. With a quick look at the website, DR found their phone number (416-338-7600) and called to register the rat sighting officially. He was told that since he didn’t live at the address where the rat was seen, they couldn’t take his complaint???

HUH????

EXSQUEAK ME?????

That doesn’t really jive with what this person’s boss just told us outside his office… I guess the next thing to do now is to call Toronto’s 311 services to complain about the offices of Toronto Public Health for not taking a rat sighting seriously and see where that goes…

Oh… and I already know what my question of the day will be for Mr. McKeown tomorrow… which I’m sure he will politely respond to.

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