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About Us and the Park (Main)

For some history of the park, see the History section.

See also Park Events, People, The Friends of Dufferin Grove Park Annual Reports,
Neighbourhood e-list Discussions, Dufferin Grove Is In Trouble

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About Us | Latest News

About us: who are the friends of Dufferin Grove Park?

posted January 31, 2005, updated August 19, 2008

How the Park Works

Dufferin Grove Park is operated by the City of Toronto Parks, Forestry and Recreation Division. It is not operated by the friends of the park, nor by volunteers.

The friends of Dufferin Grove Park are not an organization. There is no executive, no annual meetings, no formal status. There is no written agreement anywhere between the friends and the city.

So how does it work then? And who are the "friends of Dufferin Grove Park"?

The friends in this case are all those people - more every year - who are friendly to that 14.2 -acre city-owned common space which is bordered by the Dufferin Mall, St.Mary's Catholic High School, and the mixture of affluent and subsidized housing that borders the park to the east and the south. Most park friends express their friendship only though their joy at what goes on in the park. At the other extreme, for the past 15 years, Jutta Mason has made friendship for the park her almost-full-time hobby. In between, there are many people who give things (time, plants, music, theatre, toys in the sandpit, conversation, sports skills, etc., etc.) as they feel moved to do that. There is no schedule to how these things are given, no five-year plan - it's (sorry) organic.

The City does have a formula for advisory councils, which includes a range of possibilities ranging from formal election of local representatives to an informal yearly meeting canvassing park users about what they want for their parks. In 2001, the Economic Development and Parks Committee put out terms of reference for any style of advisory councils. Advisors are to "provide comments, insights, and advice to assist staff in the performance of their responsibilities." They can "provide and, with City staff, manage funding designed to enhance existing City activities...Prepare and make public accurate financial records derived from fundraising activities."

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Dufferin Grove is in trouble

Working in public space, with the people who use it, is the job of Parks and Recreation Division. But at Dufferin Grove Park, the recreation supervisor who matched local initiatives with the needed support was moved away from contact with citizens completely, on February 19. We believe this is meant to send a warning to his colleagues across the city: don’t collaborate with local projects unless specifically directed from downtown. The current administration's top-down approach, mostly speaking with very little listening, is a very bad thing for our parks and community centres. It should be the other way around.

February 1: News that Brenda Patterson, GM of parks and rec, has directed that all recreation supervisors will be moved out of their current wards to elsewhere. newsletter

February 17 and 18: A community e-mail campaign to ask for help from the ombudsman. Community Comments. A Facebook group quickly got over a thousand members. Dufferin Grove Park Needs Your Help!

February 18: Ombudsman's response: "We note that PFR management is entitled and has the responsibility to redeploy their supervisors as it sees fit." read more >>

February 19: The Ward 18 recreation supervisor Tino DeCastro is removed and reasssigned to a job with no citizen contact. He supported the Dufferin Grove project in the day-to-day. The new Ward 18 supervisor is Dave Hains, whose previous work is also brought to a halt.

February 19: Brenda Patterson, GM of Parks and Rec, sends a form letter saying all supervisors have to be moved around to ensure "core competencies, training and skills development, performance, and succession management." read more >>

February 20: media on the subject: Catherine Porter in the Star

February 22: more media. The Torontoist quotes general manager Brenda Patterson: "The change in supervisors is in no way intended to change those programs." Several bloggers suggest the real problem is the friends, not the city. Are park friends engaged in illegal activities? FAQ's

February 23: meeting with Recreation manager Kelvin Seow: what staff activities count as "conflict of interest"? Background

February 25: more media Eye Weekly Quotes Recreation director Malcolm Bromley: "moving supervisors around isn’t in the interest of spreading the Dufferin Grove model." The Star: Bromley again, saying "his aim was to build more programs, not destroy existing ones. But he also said programs need to be regularized."

February 26: Ombudsman Fiona Crean's legal counsel, Marie Chen, agrees to meet to discuss the mandate of the ombudsman in a situation like this one. The meeting is scheduled for Tuesday March 2.

March 1: response from Councillor Janet Davis, chair of the Recreation Committee, to letters sent in: "from time to time it is necessary to make changes as staff....are moved around in order to provide excellent service to residents throughout the City."read more >>

Letters to and from the Ombudsman, read more >>

Letters to and from Brenda Patterson General Manager Parks, Forestry and Recreation, read more >>.

Letters to the Councillors: read more >>

"Conflict of interest" follow-up: read more >>

In the Media

posted on March 04, 2010

Trouble in the Grove

By: Andrew Cash
Published: March 3, 2010
Source: NOW Magazine, Volume: 29, Number: 27

Future of community-based park experiment hangs in the balance On a brilliantly sunny saturday afternoon, on my way into the Dufferin Grove clubhouse, I stop to watch some little kids pushing chairs around the park’s ice rink as they learn to skate.

I’m overwhelmed by an odd feeling. This place reminds me of a time before every public encounter had to be run through a risk assessment and given a lawyer’s approval before it could begin, when mutual respect and trust were the currency that kept communal spaces thriving. That’s the promise of Dufferin Grove. And the challenge.

Read more >>

posted on February 25, 2010

Porter: City crackdown hits park pizza nights

By: Catherine Porter
Published: February 25, 2010
Source: The Star

Down the path north into Christie Pits Park, you stumble upon a little gnome's house.

It has wooden sides, a shingled, peaked roof, a little chimney and a window shuttered in black metal and locked tight with a padlock. It's a community bake oven.

It was built 10 years ago by park staff and volunteers. The staff did the building; the volunteers brought the architectural drawings, construction supplies and refreshments. It was an ideal collaboration – community fundraising and spirit, city land and sweat. A win for everyone. That spirit is captured by the words on the commemorative plaque that celebrates the parks worker who built the oven. It reads: "This bake oven is dedicated in loving memory of Luis Antonio Andrade."

Read more >>

This Star article had 91 comments posted before they shut down the postings.

General mailout from Councillor Janet Davis, Thursday, March 04, 2010 12:12 PM

posted on March 08, 2010

The defriending of Dufferin Grove Park

Toronto’s most people-powered park is still struggling to make nice with the city 

By: Chris Bilton
Published: February 24, 2010
Source: www.eyeweekly.com

Pretty soon, someone is going to have to start an activist group called Parks Are For People — after all, there’s already a group called Streets Are For People. Admittedly, this sounds like a bizarre idea, considering that parks are, by definition, for people. After nearly a decade of Torontopian discourse — where public spaces are seen as both symbolic and vital to city living — you might assume that parks would be the most obvious places for cooperation between the city as an institution and its citizens. But that doesn’t seem to be the case with Dufferin Grove Park, where the city parks and recreation department’s move towards a stricter, more centralized bureaucracy is threatening to destroy a long-established tradition of citizen participation.

Read more >>

posted on February 23, 2010

City's Moves May Threaten Dufferin Grove Park

By: Suzannah Showler
Published: February 22, 2010
Source: torontoist.com

Dufferin Grove Park is home to a bonfire pit, wood-burning ovens where residents can bake pizza and bread, an adobe courtyard, a weekly farmers' market, dozens of year-round art festivals, two skating rinks, a cheap and healthy cafe, and regular pay-what-you-can community meals.

It’s a chaotic, eclectic, and fairly idyllic public space, but what makes Dufferin Grove Park truly unique is not what they do but how they do it.

Members of the community are more-than-usually involved in working to maintain the park, while city staff are more-than-usually integrated into the community. According to community leader Jutta Mason, this simpatico relationship is about to change, and with it all of the features of the park that neighbourhood residents have come to cherish.

Read more >>

posted on February 20, 2010

Porter: Bureaucratic meddling puts park's magic at risk

By: Catherine Porter
Published: Feb 20 2010
Source: The Star

A battle is brewing at Dufferin Grove Park. It's not the first thing you notice stepping into the rink house near Dufferin and Bloor Sts. There are too many other distractions: The teenage girls balancing on figure skates buying freshly baked chocolate-chip cookies from the Zamboni Café; the pregnant woman in the back kitchen cooking potato and kale enchiladas for Friday's community supper; the boys playing checkers near the wood-burning stove. It's a lot to take in, when you are used to the wet, hollow bunkers slumped beside most city rinks.

Read more >>

Comments on this article.

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Neighbourhood e-list discussions

The neighbourhoods near Dufferin Grove Park have a number of neighbourhood e-lists where discussions can take place. Most of the items posted there are practical questions or answers about home repair, apartments for rent, and so on. These are posted here (lots of good recommendations). But there are also discussions dealing with broader issues.

Broader issues:

Georgetown Rail corridor

J. W. wrote:

I'm not hearing any suggestions here...I'm a homeowner and can't just pick up and move.

The plan as I hear it is to run 500 diesel trains through here everyday. This would effectively turn west Toronto into a noisy toxic wasteland. There is no justification for this (other than to support urban sprawl?), and as residents of Toronto we will not accept this destruction of our health, homes, and wealth.

I wouldnt be surprised if this plan doubles the smog level in Toronto. The mayor should be thinking of the lost tax revenue too, as people choose to commute to the city.

The allen expressway was stopped. This project must/will be stopped.

where do we begin? Read more >>

A suggestion to Fuzzy Boundries

SUGGESTION: I think the best and fair thing to do is to give a ballot card to all the residences, one ballot to each family in the catchment area and ask them to pick one name out of lets say, the top five, out of their top 25 names, which is listed in their website. And also have a second question in the same ballot and ask the residents,what they would suggest as a neighbourhood or alternate name for their community. The ballots boxes should be placed in different locations in the community and then at the last Fuzzy Boundaries community meeting in January 2010, count the ballots. read more >>

Read more >>

Park Events

Twelfth Night: January 5 2010

Photos were taken by Teresa Vanneste

Working notes, from Jane Wells: Last week, on January 5th, a small group gathered at Dufferin Grove Park to observe old Twelfth Night, the evening before Epiphany, or Twelfth Day, or Old Christmas Day. Called many things, it is the finale of the Christmas celebration, almost certainly drawing on pre-Christian ritual to recognize the dark cold of winter, remind us of the distant spring, and make some charm for a good harvest to ease the winter next. In putting together this workshop of Twelfth Night, I drew on accounts from various regional British traditions, many apparently medieval, but not exclusively.

• We gathered behind the big oven, where noise-makers were handed out and a few jobs assigned.
• We were then greeted by Old Meg, a crone with a lantern. Played by Bruce Beaton (cross-dressing and disguise were a big part of medieval Twelfth Night parties), Old Meg was the name for the 13th and largest fire of the evening, which also sometimes had a straw figure, the old meg, in the centre of it. Creepy, but interesting!
• She led us to the two cherry trees, where declamations were made, caraway toast was hung from the branches, and cider poured down each trunk. This ‘wassailing of the fruit tree’ was traditionally done to apple trees, and in rural areas of the southern UK was the main event of a Twelfth Night.

Read more >>

Speakers' Series

2009

The Monday Night Run/Walk Club

Beverley Coburn - Friday Night Supper Speaker’s Series, May 8, 2009

“Walking is man’s best medicine.”
This is a quote by HIPPOCRATES, a Greek Physician born 460 BC and the Father of Western Medicine.

The Monday Night Run/Walk Club meets every Monday evening at 6:30 p.m. for an easy-paced trek through our neighbourhood. Running is one of my passions - and walking is the oldest exercise prescribed by doctors – such as Hippocrates.

Technically, the difference between WALKING and RUNNING is that when you’re WALKING, you always have one foot on the ground and when you’re RUNNING at some point both feet are off the ground. JOGGING is slow RUNNING and SPRINTING is fast RUNNING. Humans are the only primates and mammals who have perfected the ability to WALK on two feet. Read more >>

Click on poster to enlarge it.

CHANGES TO THE PLAYGROUND

On Friday May 15, from 6 to 8, City Councillor Adam Giambrone is the special guest at Friday Night Supper. The supper will be in an unusual location: at the playground. Adam will be available to take part in any and all conversations about upcoming playground changes. See the poster. For lots of background information about playgrounds, in Toronto and elsewhere, click here.

Read more >>

News 2010

From the March 2010 Newsletter:

SUNDAY March 14: 1 -4 pm: “The great sugar-off” MAPLE SYRUP COOKDOWN, (at the main campfire area). Host: “Not Far From the Tree.”

From organizer Heather Kilner: “Scattered around the city right now are a dozen or so trees, lovingly tapped to collect their bountiful sap. We'd Tap That! has been Not Far From the Tree's pilot project in urban maple syrup production. But as the weather heats up, the sap stops flowing....which means it's time to make maple syrup!

Let us bring the sugar bush to you, and join us for an afternoon of syrup tasting, fun, and learning this Sunday March 14th. We'll be serving up tiny tastes of urban maple syrup in Dufferin Grove Park, graciously donated as sap by homeowners across the city. We'll have activities, games, and storytelling for all ages, and information galore about the wonderful world of maple syrup. Come on out and chat with some of our amazing volunteers about their experiences, and what they've learned through the process.

There will also be live music (weather dependent) and a warm fire. The Zamboni Cafe will also be offering maple-syrup-themed fare (pancakes, beans, and sausages) .
Note: ** This event will go on, rain or shine.

FRIDAY March 19, 7.30 pm – “open-door” Dufferin Grove STAFF MEETING after Friday Night Supper.

Subject: (1) what needs to be changed/cut out for the playground wading pool area this summer? (2) should pizza-making days continue? Park staff will be discussing how the park programs may need to be altered to align Dufferin Grove with city policies. This is a chance for park users to learn more about the details of running the park programs.

THE BIG MOVE: TINO DECASTRO IS MOVED TO A BACK OFFICE AT METRO HALL

As was reported in this newsletter and in the media, Ward 18’s long-time recreation supervisor Tino Decastro was moved away from Ward 18, and from contact with citizens anywhere, on February 19. Tino matched local initiatives with the needed support, which accounts for much of what’s different about Dufferin Grove, compared to other city parks.

Most of the city’s recreation supervisors have been moved to other wards since the arrival of the most recent Parks, Forestry and Recreation general manager, Brenda Patterson. The general manager wrote to objectors that supervisory staff have to be moved around to ensure "core competencies, training and skills development, performance, and succession management." However, this management style didn’t play well with park users. Hundreds of letters were sent to city ombudsman Fiona Crean, and a Facebook group (“Dufferin Grove Park needs your help”) climbed to over 1000 members in two days. It’s now at 1800.

Catherine Porter wrote a column in the Star, and the Torontoist, Eye magazine, and NOW magazine published follow-ups. All this activity prompted a response from Councillor Janet Davis, chair of the Community Development and Recreation Committee of City Council. Councillor Davis has worked closely with Brenda Patterson on child care issues for twenty years and her letter made it clear that she has no problem with the management device of moving all the supervisors: “I believe that the dynamic life of Dufferin Grove, along with the many parks and recreation facilities across the City, will be sustained regardless of the individual in the position.” City supervisors in other departments say that they are also frequently moved, sometimes as often as every six months. The supervisors who talked to us have a different evaluation of the technique, though. They say it badly disrupts their relations with citizens, in child care, in welfare, in accessibility programs, in youth work. This needs public discussion.

FUNDRAISER FOR THE HAITI AND CHILE EARTHQUAKES:

SATURDAY MARCH 13, STARTS AT 7 PM AT THE AMSTERDAM BREWERY, 21 BATHURST STREET

A group of the Dufferin Rink shinny guys are holding a fundraiser in collaboration with park friends at Amsterdam Brewery, with backing from the Centre for Local Research into Public Space (CELOS), to help raise money for ShelterBox.

ShelterBox is a charitable organization that is providing tents and shelter supplies to survivors of the Haiti Earthquake and the Chilean Earthquake. Each ShelterBox contains a dry shelter, warm bedding, light and heat, clean water, cooking aids, and tools for TEN PEOPLE. Each box costs $1200, and they're aiming for a minimum of 5 boxes. For more information about ShelterBox, visit their website: http://www.shelterbox.ca

There will be Haitian food, Dufferin Grove bake-oven bread and spreads, live bands, a DJ, performers, a cash bar, and much more. At the Amsterdam Brewery, 21 Bathurst St., beginning at 7 pm. For more information: Daniel at: d_cayley@yahoo.ca If you can't make it but you want to donate: mail@celos.ca (charitable receipt will be issued).

DUFFERIN GROVE FARMERS’ MARKET, EVERY THURSDAY 3 TO 7 PM

As the weather warms up, more and more of the market will be set up along the outside walls, as well as at the inside tables. Here’s an excerpt from one of the March market e-newsletters, from Jessie Sosnicki: "Well, we’re certainly taking advantage of this awesome weather and we are seeding, seeding, seeding! We are not fooled, as it can get cold again and even snow, so we'll be ready to protect our sprouted and germinating crops in greenhouse. “

Read More News 2009>>

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