Steve Lafleur

@stevelafleur.bsky.social

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"Shadowy think tank agent who secretly orchestrates the economy." 🌐🏗🏢🍁

Posts Replies Media

If you like my housing work and have a Twitter account, I'd appreciate your vote here! twitter.com/CNLiberalism...

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Steve Lafleur

Actual CBC headline: "Turkey that terrorized Quebec town taken down by slingshot-wielding resident." (An earlier version was headlined: "Mayor declares victory after vigilante kills aggressive turkey terrorizing Quebec town") www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

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Steve Lafleur

"We’re on the cusp of having a good rail system between Windsor and Quebec City. We should be excited about this — and we should get it done." — @stevelafleur.bsky.social

Via Rail isn’t as bad as its reputation. But we should still make it better | TVO Todayamp.tvo.org OPINION: Making the train faster means track improvements that will take years. But there are improvements Via could make in the meantime.

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"One group's decision to flex their rights impairs the ability of the other group to make their own choices." www.liberalcurrents.com/a-canadian-p...

A Canadian Perspective on Freedom and Gun Ownership in Americawww.liberalcurrents.com How the proliferation of guns in private life leads to draconian restrictions in public life

My reflections on the tension between gun ownership and freedom in America.

“In the wake of an uptick in gun violence, the city essentially turned downtown into an open-air airport.” www.liberalcurrents.com/a-canadian-p...

A Canadian Perspective on Freedom and Gun Ownership in Americawww.liberalcurrents.com How the proliferation of guns in private life leads to draconian restrictions in public life

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"Toronto mayor Olivia Chow is right to increase property taxes. We don’t have much choice if we’re going to close a $1.8 billion budget hole while maintaining a relatively functional, growing city." — @stevelafleur.bsky.social

I’m a lifelong fiscal conservative, and I support raising Toronto’s property taxes | TVO Todayamp.tvo.org OPINION: If we can’t raise $32 a month from the average homeowner to keep the lights on in the city, we’ve got much bigger problems.

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I think @stevelafleur.bsky.social's predictions are pretty much right here: average North Americans like suburbs. They aren't going anywhere. BUT: we can adapt existing ones to be more climate friendly. Ex.: active transpo infrastructure & slowly adding density. www.northofbloor.ca/p/is-canada-...

Is Canada a "suburban car-oriented nation?"www.northofbloor.ca Some thoughts on John Ibbitson's recent column

We made an incredible amount of progress on housing policy in 2023. Let's keep it going in 2024! www.northofbloor.ca/p/2023-the-y...

2023: The Year Canada Started Taking Housing Seriouslywww.northofbloor.ca Let's make 2024 the year we get the details right!

Fitst time in Orlando as an adult. Apparently every bar needs metal detectors if they want to operate past 10pm. If you need airport security for the whole downtown, maybe there are too many guns?

Riding Florida's new-ish sort of high-speed private train. It's kind of amazing!

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Good stuff from @stevelafleur.bsky.social on the trials and tribulations of finding the right level of governance.

Does everything feel broken? Canada's messy federalism is a big part of the problem - The Hubthehub.ca Subsidiarity is a good principle in the abstract, but a hard one to implement in practice. As a decentralized federation, Canada is grappling with the challenges of dispersed responsibilities. Happily...

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I want the NDP to be a real contender, we need them in Federal politics, so I wrote about how some of the language they and the old guard left use alienates the very people they need to appeal to and bring into their tent. www.thestar.com/opinion/cont...

Shawn Micallef: ‘Luxury condo’ is a slur the left wing needs to drop if it wants to help the hou...www.thestar.com Dismissing new condos as "luxury" only hurts the left and the housing movement.

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Steve Lafleur

Shedding light on government finances is never a bad idea. Here’s hoping audits will spur a necessary discussion about how Ontario cities raise revenue and from whom. — by Josef Filipowicz & @stevelafleur.bsky.social

What third-party audits could tell us about municipal finances — and housing — in Ontario | TVO...amp.tvo.org OPINION: Shedding light on government finances is never a bad idea. Here’s hoping audits will spur a necessary discussion about how Ontario cities raise revenue and from whom.  

Canadian friends: TVO is on this app now. You should follow them! bsky.app/profile/tvot...

bsky.app

Probably not what the regulators meant by requiring food with drink sales. 🤭

I stumbled upon a monorail in West Virginia this summer. Apparently it's the strange lovechild of Robert Byrd and Richard Nixon. No, I am not hallucinating! www.northofbloor.ca/p/under-the-...

Under the Monorailwww.northofbloor.ca Public transportation in the mountains of West Virginia

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All the people who ever said “we’re just returning it to the states, it’s a state issue, what’s wrong with that” were always lying. If they weren’t going to push for this themselves, they absolutely knew other people would push for it.

Alabama AG Steve Marshall has threatened to prosecute abortion funds and others who support Alabamans trying to get abortions in states where abortion is legal under conspiracy law. On Thursday, DOJ went to court to argue that would be unconstitutional. New, from @chrisgeidner.bsky.social —>

DOJ says Alabama prosecutions for supporting out-of-state abortions would be unconstitutionalwww.lawdork.com An important move from the Biden administration in an under-the-radar case. Also: Ohio Republicans say they want to ignore the voters after passage of Issue One.

Happy edible gourd season!

I'm all about eating seasonally.

This sums up the state of the TTC.

A handful of houses set to become 289 homes on Gerrard. Let's do this everywhere! 🏗🏗🏗

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Steve Lafleur

Lewiston is still in lock down. Since the gun debate is so often framed around freedom what about the freedom of movement, to leave your house, go to work, go out? Why does your right to Rambo cosplay trump my mom's right to run to the grocery store?

Mass shooting in my home town. Suspect at large according to the local newspaper. My mom is fine. It's just...the "serious" people who tell me I'm suppose to respect the people & opinions that keep this country drowning in guns. Fuck that & fuck them www.sunjournal.com/2023/10/25/m...

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"This was a terrible tragedy, but sometimes these things just happen and there’s nothing anyone can do to stop them."

‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happenswww.theonion.com LEWISTON, ME—In the hours following a violent rampage in Maine in which a lone attacker killed at least 16 individuals and injured numerous others, citizens living in the only country where this ...

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It’s not Fat Tony’s fault that a goon broke your legs. You got your legs broken because you wouldn’t pay protection money to Fat Tony.

My latest, in which I go to Kitchener in search of its German heritage and find it by accident. www.northofbloor.ca/p/the-real-o...

The real Oktoberfest is the friends we made along the waywww.northofbloor.ca I tried to go to Oktoberfest. Instead I got Kitchener's everyday German experience

Free Speech Warriors™️ banning 1984 is kind of Orwellian.

So school libraries are banning any book that deals with sexuality? 1984, Slaughterhouse Five and others are being kept out of Iowa schools because local officials are afraid of running afoul new state regulations. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

Opinion | How the ‘sex act’ has become a potent weapon for book banners in Iowawww.washingtonpost.com The book-banning mania takes another absurd turn.

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Really enjoyed this new piece by @stevelafleur.bsky.social: "Mississauga is a public policy problem" www.northofbloor.ca/p/mississaug... If you haven't already, subscribe to his substack!