Pamela Gough will work to address gun violence – and will bring experience, a new vision, and integrity to City Hall

Screenshot from video clip, in which Pamela Gough explains how she made her start in politics. The iPhone screenshot captures the moment when she explains that, in her first run for election as a school trustee, she won by 20 votes. Jaan Pill photo

Our final two Pamela Gough campaign clips are concerned with neighbourhood safety – including the issue of gun violence – and the Ward 3 Candidate’s pledge to bring experience, a new vision, and integrity to City Hall:

Key Item No. 7: Pamela Gough outlines how she will promote neighbourhood safety in the face of gun violence

No. 8: Pamela Gough will be your transparent, fiscally responsible & engaged Ward 3 representative

Transcripts of final two clips:

“Promote neighbourhood safety”:

Gun violence

Toronto is increasingly becoming a city in which we are very fearful of gun violence – and we’ve had a terrible summer.

The question that people are asking themselves is, “Is it still the safe city it used to be?”

They’re not sure anymore.

And we will have to wait and see, in terms of whether the trend of the last few months is a long-term trend or not. But it’s clear that guns are being used in ways that is violent, and that violence on the streets has grown tremendously over the last year or so.

And how do we address that?

So in my opinion, the roots of gun violence are very complicated. There’s no easy solution. There’s no single solution.

I think if you look at the different situations our city has faced over the last few months, you’ll see that there are situations where individuals, who’ve had mental health problems – the mental health problems are in many ways at the cause, the root cause, of the violence.

Evidence-based decision making

Domestic violence, intimate partner violence: the same sort of thing. There are root causes there that have to be deciphered. We have to use evidence-based decision making to get at that.

Enforcement is important. I think a ban on handguns in Toronto, the way that the City Council has gone, I think is a very good direction as a start.

But banning handguns, alone, is not the entire solution – I think the solution has to go more into the roots of neighbourhood factors. Youth opportunities are really important. We have to foster those youth opportunities.

And, again, we need the mental health supports that don’t seem to be there, for situations, in which people are struggling with problems that result in them cracking and breaking loose and hurting others.

Final Campaign Item from Pamela Gough

So, and the the last one is not really so much as a platform as [it is] a description of the way I work.

I’m transparent. I am fiscally responsible. I think that the taxpayer’s dollars are very, very important and should not be wasted.

And I am engaged.

On the Candidate Card, I have my home phone number, so people can reach me very directly.

I really believe in listening to people, listening to their concerns, trying to understand, first and foremost – and then working in an intelligent, evidence-based way to find solutions.

So that’s me.

[End]

Updates

An Oct. 12, 2018 Toronto Star article by Jennifer Pagliaro is entitled: “Amid spike in shootings, Toronto is falling behind on its own plans to curb youth violence.”

An Oct. 15, 2018 CBC interactive news article is entitled: After the bullet: Many have lost their lives in Toronto gun violence, but many more have survived – and they are suffering in silence.”

An excerpt from the latter CBC article reads:

In the words of one researcher, gun violence has bred a “generation of young folks in cities across Canada — across North America for that matter — who are living day-to-day with various kinds of injuries, health problems and chronic maladies that greatly diminish their quality of life.”

The sheer number of people hurt in shootings in Toronto in recent years has strained existing support systems to a breaking point. According to frontline workers, local agencies are running at capacity, while community advocates have stepped in to try to bridge a considerable chasm.

[End]

A second excerpt reads:

Studies have also confirmed the critical role of early psychological intervention in the healing process and how it can prevent the cascade of violence that shootings can ignite, especially in volatile circumstances.

“When a person is dealing with all of these demons and all of this trauma, they need to have someone who they can talk to, who they can unload those complicated emotions onto,” said Jooyoung Lee, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Toronto.

[End]