Thanks to @HCCI1 for flagging the 2022 Year End Report on Hate Crime in Hamilton, which is due to come to the police board at its meeting on Thursday. If we want a better city, and I know so many of us do, this can't continue to be our story. 🧵 #HamOnt When Hamilton was dubbed the "hate capital of Canada", it was when we had reported hate crimes much closer to the 11-year average of 127 per year. This year, however, we're reporting hate crimes more than 35% higher than the average. Things are getting worse, not better.

It’s been 60 days since I was officially sworn in as Ward 2 City Councillor. I’m marking the occasion by sharing an update with Hamiltonians based on some of my observations, findings, and conclusions in the first 2 months on the job. #HamOnt If it feels like the status quo so far in this term of Council, that's by design. There are decades of motions and traditions from previous terms of Council that are still driving this ship forward. It's going to take a lot of will power from Council to turn it around.

Maybe this isn't obvious, so I'm going to say it for the folks in the back - as a queer neurodivergent person I have spent my entire life under a microscope. Most other Two Spirit and LGBTQIA+ people I know have. BIPOC have. If we've managed to survive, we're ready. #HamOnt I don't need help finding the washrooms. I don't need a manual on how to run or participate in a meeting. If it's in writing, I don't need you to read it to me. I can read it just fine. Will I have some questions? You bet, and I'll ask every single one of them.

I think that the Mayor's statement from yesterday is a perfect way to encapsulate some of the things that I hope the new Council will do away with. 🧵 #HamOnt Paragraph 3 is where it starts to get problematic. By thanking "all of the candidates who put their names and ideas forward" the Mayor invites us to pay respect to candidates, like Paul Fromm, and their ideas, like Fromm's widely-held white supremacist views. Nope.

Well, #HamOnt, it's still sinking in, but we really did do it. I'm Councillor-Elect for Ward 2, and I'm really excited about it! I have a lot to share, but I wanted to start from a place of gratitude, and a bit of honesty, about what this result does and doesn't mean. That picture was taken before our party got going by Lauren who, for 2 elections, has taken on organizing our celebration for Election Day. She is one of hundreds of people who have helped with our campaigns, and I am beyond grateful for every single person who showed up.

It’s Election Day and the sun is rising above our City Hall, a sign of the change to come. I’m hopeful that voters across Hamilton will turn out in record numbers to vote today, to elect a new Council that will lead with compassion, care, integrity, and accountability. #HamOnt I’m proud of the campaign we’ve run in Ward 2. We’ve been to the vast majority of the more than 200 buildings in Ward 2, knocked on doors out in neighbourhoods, more than once, and opened and staffed a fully accessible office.

I listened to the delegations today in response to @JasonFarrHamOnt's new motion to increase encampment enforcement. It was a long meeting. More than 40 delegates registered to speak to the Planning Committee today, all of whom were opposed to Farr's motion. #HamOnt

https://twitter.com/JoeyColeman/status/1506395208166084611

Simply put, increased enforcement won’t work. This isn’t just my opinion. It comes from having been out on the ground in encampments, speaking with police, City staff, housing advocates, experts, and community members. No one I have spoken with thinks that this is the solution.

After witnessing a near collision between a pedestrian and cyclist, I spoke to the @canadapostcorp worker who parked here and tried to plead with them not to do this. For those who don’t know, this is very close to where someone was injured last year. #HamOnt Simply put, this area is already extremely unsafe for pedestrians and others using the road and bike lane. A parked car here makes it more dangerous. And before anyone asks, there are at least 2 other places to park safely adjacent to this building.

As part of the @cityofhamilton's ongoing budget process, there's a report that will be presented to Council on February 25 that details how much was raised in "assessment growth" in 2021. I learned a few things from it that I thought were worth sharing. #HamOnt Assessment growth, in this context, is the extent to which the City is able to add, or subtract, as the case may be in some wards, tax dollars by levying money through property taxes. New development, zoning changes, and other things contribute to either growth or decline.

This article, from our city's Mayor, is an embarrassment, in my opinion. It reads as if he's been absent from Hamilton for the past 3 years. And the numbers he provides to back up his points are pretty questionable. Let's look at them more closely #HamOnt. thespec.com/opinion/contri… In this article @HamiltonsMayor throws out some statistics to make his points. He says that the budget has risen "more or less" with inflation, that salaries are more than 90% of that budget, and implies that any reduction in the police budget means fewer front line cops.

Not a great look for the Planning Committee to have to defer this important decision because it was about to lose quorum. If all members of Council sat on every Standing Committee, this would happen less often. It doesn't have to be this way. #HamOnt cbc.ca/news/canada/ha… Last year, I wrote a 20-page report and delegated to the Governance Review Sub-Committee, proposing that all members of Council should have to sit on all Standing Committees and that the City should seriously reconsider its flawed governance model.

Given the 2 departures from the @cityofhamilton today, it's important to remember that City Council is ultimately responsible for keeping the public in the dark about the 24 billion litres of mixed sewage that contaminated Chedoke Creek. This is how they did it, and why. #HamOnt Part 1 - They kept the initial report confidential. Here's a clip of Councillor VanderBeek, in August 2018, just 2 months before the municipal election, reading a motion into the record through which Council kept a report entitled "Chedoke Creek Contamination" confidential.

I'm interested to hear what @JohnPaulDanko has to say about how the seat left vacant by Chad Collins in Ward 5 should be filled. He has experience being on the other side of this and I think his perspective will be valuable in helping to inform Council's decision. #HamOnt For those who may not know, when @SkellyHamilton vacated her seat to head to Queen's Park, his opinion was that he should be appointed to replace her. While this situation is slightly different, Council still has the same decision to make - appoint someone or hold a by-election.

Looking forward to the reopening of the Ken Soble Tower in the North End. It's welcome news! It's also an opportunity to acknowledge those in the community that pushed to keep it both affordable and in public hands. A short #HamOnt story, if you will. For those who don't know, the building was in serious trouble. It hadn't been adequately maintained and, by 2015, more than half of the building was sitting vacant. Cash-strapped CityHousing Hamilton didn't have a concrete plan and rumours about a possible sale were circling.