To get the full extent of our printed fabulousness, please subscribe and support the writers, editors, photographers and illustrators in your neighbourhood, city and country.
Illegal increases, ramshackle conditions, bullying tactics from landlords – renters in Toronto are facing a free fall. For almost half of the city's population, finding and keeping a decent rental has become nearly impossible. And as housing prices skyrocket, their ranks can only grow.
Read MoreAt a boxing gym in the Junction Triangle, a free program is teaching young people from underserved communities how to cope with the challenges life throws at them.
Read MoreThis year, the Toronto Raptors teamed up with Room Up Front, a grassroots group that connects early-career BIPOC photojournalists with mentors. They gave WEP a sneak peek at the work Norma Ibarra, Lucy Lu and Adetona Omokanye have been producing at Raptors and Raptors 905 games, documenting the action.
Read MoreMy mom learned to cook Jewish to win over her in-laws. In the decades that followed, my dad, a newspaper man, spent decades clipping recipes and assembling them in big black binders for her - the best way he knew to show his thanks.
Read MoreWe work in the sky, in an unfinished highrise. The ground floors are almost ready, but higher up, where there are no windows or walls, the building is open to the sky. We are deep in the belly of the beast, building towers in the financial district, building restaurants we can’t afford to eat in, condos we can’t afford to live in.
Read MoreThe solution to Toronto’s housing woes isn’t to build more supply, according to a group of experts who sketch a picture for writer Leslie Sinclair of what a healthier housing landscape looks like. As they see it, it’s about tipping the balance: clamping down on units designed as commodities for investors and increasing the flow of housing that meets a wider swath of residents’ needs.
Read MoreIn a playful series he produced for WEP, photographer Kotama Bouabane confronts his younger self’s longing for fast food and his older self’s impulse to clean up his act.
Read MoreAt the height of the pandemic, South Asians reported the poorest mental health outcomes of any racialized community in Canada. But finding the words to discuss what’s happening to them — not to mention finding a South Asian therapist to provide culturally relevant care — can be a significant barrier to treatment.
Read MorePalliative doctor Joshua Wales describes what it’s like to be on call and travelling to patients at all hours of the night.
Read MoreThere was always something unsettling about the lack of shadows in this puppetless terrarium, where a few outfits remain with faded price tags. Now a handmade sign has been added to the display: “Everything must go.” And more urgently, “This is the last month.”
Read MoreWhen the province talks about affordable housing goals, what tends to get painted is an outdated scene. To seriously improve the current housing calamity, policy must tuck itself under, and soundly support, our most vulnerable residents first.
Read MoreBen Scott, a tenant at LivMore High Park, received notice that his rent would increase by 11.6 per cent. That increase would bump up his monthly payment by $300, a figure that Scott says would make life unaffordable for him and his son.
Read MoreIn 2020, nearly a quarter of hospitalizations for children and youth were for mental health conditions. Becca Lemire talks for the first time about her own hospitalizations for a mental health crisis during her teen years and shares what a better path out of those woods can look like.
Read MoreFor a class portraiture assignment at Sheridan College last year, Sabrina Sisco posted a call on their personal Instagram page asking for volunteers willing to meet locally for brief, outdoor shoots, “self-styled in their favourite thrift store find.”
Read MoreWe asked WEP writers to tell us about the most epic mess they ever got into in the old days.
Read MoreOn a sunny afternoon in late September, WEP sat down with a group of heavyweight student journalists – most of them editors-in-chief of their school publications. What unfolded around the table in a backyard in Bloordale was a conversation about how they see the world and tell its stories.
Read MoreThere are more than 700,000 people under the age of 25 living in Toronto, many of them struggling to cope with our city’s skyrocketing housing costs, surging inflation and uneven access to services and resources. We canvassed front line workers at Toronto-based youth organizations for their toughest questions — and put them to 59 city council hopefuls from eight West End wards.
Read MoreThe Dufferin 29 bus is a true workhorse: one of the city’s top five busiest surface routes, hauling 32,000 people per day along the long, strange arterial that is as hostile to pedestrians and cyclists as any other in the city.
Read MoreA backyard battle has been brewing between the High Park Club and Algonquin Avenue residents who claim the private curling facility needs to be a better neighbour – raising questions about how much we’re owed by the businesses who operate among us.
Read MoreDave Bidini writes about his favourite rink, McCormick Arena, a place that glows with life, wonder and city history, its lobby lights swishing out to the street.
Read More
