It started with one Waterloo Regional Police officer. Then two. It wasn’t too long before 10 officers were standing at the west entrance to Bingeman’s, the site of FordFest in Kitchener on Friday night. The detail was traffic control of a sort. On the roadside in front of the amusement park and conference centre complex were well over 500 people representing labour, environmental, and education groups who had come to (un)welcome the premier and his supporters to Waterloo Region.
Although it was supposed to be celebratory, FordFest came at the end of a long week for its namesake, Premier Doug Ford. It’s been almost one month since the Auditor General’s brutal report about corruption in the land swap development process for the Greenbelt, there was the resignation of the old Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister on Monday followed by a small cabinet shuffle, and numerous press appointments where Ford and other ministers have been pounded by the press.
FordFest would offer no reprieve though.
Celebratory banners and a stage could be seen over a hill from the road side on the Bingeman’s site, but the real show was out front. At around five o’clock, more and more cars started to enter the west driveway to the venue, and protesters clogged the entrance walking back and forth with various colourful signs. Police tried their best to let protesters make their case while keeping Bingeman’s Centre Drive relatively uncongested, but there were moments where things got heated.
“The police are pushing people into positions, they’re taking away some of our rights to peacefully protest, they keep telling us we’re on private land, and we’re obviously not on private land. They don’t even know where the land starts or stops,” said Paul Raymond, who was one of the most fired up in a crowd of fired up people.
“There’s all kinds of things that Doug Ford is doing that I don’t appreciate but the Greenbelt scandal is a travesty,” Raymond explained. “In all my years of watching provincial or federal governments, this feels like one of the biggest travesties I’ve ever seen. He has lied to the Ontario people about the Greenbelt twice and he’s ignored what the majority of Ontarians want in a time when we’re fighting climate change.
“He’s going in just the completely opposite direction and taking what is a prized prize jewel in North America, and desecrating it,” Raymond added.
Every day folks from around Waterloo Region, Guelph and the surrounding area were joined by several politicians and activists. Kitchener-Centre election candidates Debbie Chapman, Aislinn Clancy and Kelly Steiss each took a turn at the microphone, and they were joined by elected colleagues like Waterloo MPP Catherine Fife, Don Valley East MPP Dr. Adil Shamji, and Guelph MPP and Green Party of Ontario leader Mike Schreiner.
“If the lowest paid education workers in the province can stand up to Doug Ford we can all stand up to Doug Ford, right now!” Schreiner said barely needing the sound system. “We’re going to get him to back down and build homes for people, not to profit a handful of wealthy speculators. We’re gonna fight him with you every step of the way!”
Mike Marcolongo, Keep the Greenbelt Promise Campaign Co-ordinator, was also a speaker at the protest and he told Ford to “read the room”, meaning the large group of people gathered outside Bingemans and not “a small room full of developers.”
“Ontarians are waking up to what’s happening, which is the largest wealth transfer and land grab in the history of modern Ontario. The Greenbelt is the tip of the iceberg. Last fall, Doug Ford removed 15 parcels of the Greenbelt and in the last week, he has said that he will look at 700 to 800 new applications to carve up the Greenbelt,” Marcolongo said.
Perhaps Ford would do good to heed Marcolongo’s advice.
On Friday morning, two polls – one from Angus Reid and one from Abacus Data – revealed that the Greenbelt scandal had taken its toll on the Ontario government’s poll numbers. According to Abacus, PC party support is down seven points from July and sits at 34 per cent of committed voters, while Angus Reid notes that the approval ratings for Ford personally have gone down five points to just 28 per cent, the lowest approval for Ford since he was first elected in 2018.
“When we’ve got a government with an absolute majority for the next three years, how can you have any impact when, in some ways, they’re untouchable? On the other hand, we’re doing the only things we can do; we’re out protesting, we’re speaking up, and we’re writing and e-mailing,” said Kevin Thomason, vice-chair of the Grand River Environmental Network who helped organize the protest.
“It’s more difficult to enact change when there’s resistance, but on the other hand, it’s not impossible to change when we get enough people… Steve Clark is now out a job and Ryan Amato is now at a job,” Thomason added.
By 5:30, one of the protesters went inside FordFest and noted that Ford himself had not yet arrived at the event and with protesters waiting at both the western and eastern driveways to welcome the premier to his event, his arrival, when it came, would not go unnoticed. Drivers heading into Bingeman’s, at least the ones you could see from behind untinted glass, appeared either bemused or just slightly perturbed by the welcome wagon. A few would give a thumbs up or honk in support. People will do anything for a free hot dog and hamburger, Paul Raymond lamented.
“People are voting with their feet here,” Thomason said about the protesters. “People are speaking out, and with every protest we do the numbers double. Anything on an exponential curve is not something you want to mess with.”
Time will tell.
Guelph Politico 