The Agenda with Steve Paikin (Audio) - The New Regent Park

Episode Date: January 10, 2025

For decades in Ontario's capital city, the words Regent Park brought up images of drugs, crime, and decay. But over the past decade and a half, Regent Park has been transformed. Mitchell Cohen is president and CEO of the Daniels Corporation, which led much of the regeneration of Regent Park. He chronicles that journey in a new book called: "Rhythms of Change, Reflections on the Regent Park Revitalization".See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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a TVO original podcast. Follow and listen wherever you get your podcasts. For decades in Ontario's capital city, the words Regent Park brought up images of drugs, crime, and decay. But over the past decade and a half, Regent Park has been transformed. Mitchell Cohen is president and CEO of the Daniels

Corporation, which led much of the regeneration of Regent Park. He chronicles that journey in a new book called Rhythms of Change, Reflections on the Regent Park Revitalization. And he joins us now here in the studio. Mitchell, it's good to see you again. Nice to see you, Steve.

Describe the old Regent Park for us. The old Regent Park was built in the 1940s and early 50s, and it was built under this philosophy called Garden City, which was a philosophy that came from the United Kingdom. The idea was, how do you make kids safe in a community? You take out the streets. That was the concept, create these gardens where kids

would be able to play safely within an urban environment. No streets going through. No streets going through. And the buildings facing each other as opposed to the. Yes. Courtyard buildings that sort of enclosed and faced each other rather than the outside world. So the buildings were, by nature of design

and the community by nature of design, cut off this 69-acre neighborhood in the heart of the city. Cut it off from the rest of the city. That was the design. And obviously, they didn't design it in order to be terrible. They designed it thinking that that would work.

But what was the practical effect of all of that? The practical effect was dislocation, was this isolation, because truly it was disconnected from the rest of the city, inward looking. And the challenge really was is that successive levels of government failed to maintain the buildings. It was built by the federal government in the 40s and 50s. Subsequently they downloaded ownership to the province, province downloaded to the municipality

in the early 2000s. But over those decades there was very little maintenance. With little maintenance the buildings 2000s. But over those decades, there was very little maintenance. With little maintenance, the buildings decayed. And when the landlord doesn't care, and the landlord doesn't do any investment in the community, the community very just naturally begins to deteriorate. It became a haven for guns, for gangs, for drugs. How did that happen?

Well, these courtyards became these dark, isolated places where guns and gangs and drug trade could happen. Because they weren't, there were no eyes on the street. I mean, in the 1970s, Jane Jacobs said, we have to have streets that are pedestrian-based, that are based on people looking at the street, opening a front door to the street, mailboxes on the street.

The Regent Park that was designed and built had none of that. So there was no oversight. It was isolated, disconnected. When did the notion arise and sort of catch on that we could do better here, something better was possible? It was in the probably mid-80s

that the conversation began to start. But by the early 90s, it was primarily women in the community that said, our homes are deteriorating, nobody seems to care, we have to care. We have to rise up and do something and sort of lift up our voices to let government know that this is just completely wrong, allowing our homes to deteriorate. So what happened in the mid 1990s was a remarkable achievement. People in the neighborhood got together in church basements, they got together in kitchens and living rooms to talk about if

government were ever going to do something to change the nature of our neighborhood, what would we want? And it something to change the nature of our neighbourhood, what would we want? And it really was about the voice of the tenants who came up with principles of revitalisation. And guess what the first one was? Put the streets back in. Well, I was going to say, if the old design clearly wasn't working, what was the philosophy behind the new design?

It was very clear. Put the streets back in, reconnect our neighbourhood to the rest of the city as it was before. Toronto has this very healthy grid system of streets roads that connect neighborhoods. Region Park was isolated so number one put the streets back in but number two the community as it existed was a hundred percent social housing, rent geared to income. There were 2,083 units that were built in Regent Park. So the women and the people who came together said, this is not normal. This is not a normal community in the city of Toronto, which has a mix of market value housing,

social housing, all kinds of different shapes and forms but not 100% rent geared to income. So it came from the ground, the tenants themselves that said we need to have a community that is mixed income. Where, okay this is gonna be a bit of a weird question but you've got to have a certain amount of chutzpah to think that Regent Park with the reputation it had would somehow be a magnet for people from outside the community who would be prepared to spend market rate dollars to buy units there. Who had that kind of chutzpah? Well I

guess you could say we did. Who's we? Well it's the Daniels Corporation, it's our team at Daniels. You know my background Steve is in affordable housing. You know I would develop... You're a hippie from Montreal. Yeah you got it. In the early 70s when the federal government created a nonprofit housing program, a national housing strategy in 1973, I was working for the YMCA as a community worker in a very low-income community. Same vintage exactly as Regent Park in fact. And the tenants there were being booted out. They were given notices 30 days to get out of their homes. And that triggered my entire trajectory in terms of my career

and my life, which was experiencing at that moment the vulnerability of those tenants who had 30 days in order to find a new apartment somewhere in Montreal when the vacancy rate was less than 1%. So that really started my my work to find pathways by which tenants can take control of their lives. I guess one of the first things you had to think about was if you're going to redevelop Regent Park do you want to keep a name that for so many people is associated with toxicity? You obviously decided to do that. How come? What a hugely important question. When we started the process

with Toronto Community Housing, they had consultants that came to them and said, you know, if you want to do this and you want to be successful, you have to change the name because no one will buy a condominium in Regent Park it's too scary. So that was the the recommendation that came from outside consultants. Fortunately Toronto Community Housing you know after embracing us as their partner said what do you guys think and we said listen it is absolutely essential that the name be kept we have to honor the past we're gonna transform we're gonna work together with tenants in the

community but to erase not only their homes and buildings and parks where they hung out but to erase the name that will never fly so we said very clearly Regent Park is Regent Park we have to build on the strength of the women and the people in the neighborhood who always had a spirit of community. We have to build on that, not erase it. As you've already pointed out, Toronto Community Housing Corporation has not had the greatest reputation from time immemorial. What was it like to deal with them?

It was really brilliant in the first number of years because they had an ethos that they were going to listen to community. And it was that concept of listening that led to this partnership based approach. So we became a partner with Toronto Community Housing in 2006. But truly it was a three-way partnership because the voice of the residents, the residents were part of that dialogue, that conversation about how to go forward. Now politics got in the way in 2010. Mayor Rob Ford was elected and he wanted to really decimate Toronto Community Housing. He fired the CEO, he fired the Board of Directors.

That was a challenging moment and actually led Steve to a number of challenges over the next many years because there has been a lot of CEOs at Toronto Community Housing. It's very tough and I totally get it. 58,000 units of housing owned by the City of Toronto all of which need significant repair. That's a three billion dollar repair backlog. So without the resources it's hard to run that corporation. We get it. One of the things I learned in your book is how things happen. Okay.

There's a great story about how you've got a meeting at the Ministry of Health in hopes of getting a health care center publicly funded at Regent Park. And all the advisors around the table are apparently saying this can't be done there's no way it's gonna happen can't do it and then the deputy minister apparently says well we're going to do it now you guys go figure it out closes his book walks out of the meeting yeah is that how things usually work in the business well that was a really unique experience I mean you know Ministry of Health is so challenged in terms of all the different requirements, all the needs to support health services.

We just felt that we were going to keep knocking on that door, we were going to keep pushing that button as long as it took. And I think the Deputy Minister understood that. The Regent Park, it was important for the province to play a role. And so the team sitting around the table have limited budget to work with. So this was a political decision. And hallelujah.

Every once in a while, our politicians need to say, we're doing this. And that's basically what happened. February 6, 2006, demolition day. As the wrecking ball is apparently taking down some of the old homes, one family member says you're tearing down all of our history. Did that give you any pause as to whether you were doing the right thing? Well, it was hugely moving moment.

She said my family, my history are being erased. And she was crying. This is a grandmother that I knew in the neighborhood. So it was a very, very moving moment. But I really knew we were doing the right thing. I felt we were doing the right thing, because the buildings couldn't be left to simply further deteriorate. The most important principle that came out of those discussions, I mean, yes,

put back in the public streets, but also the right to return home to Regent Park. So I reassured that grandmother and we reassured everyone else in the community that the city's guarantee that you would move out and then move back into a brand new home would be respected. And was it for everybody? It was. People were offered the opportunity.

Not everyone came back. Because when some people moved into a new home or a new apartment nearby, they stayed. This is kind of a crazy situation because you've got a part of the city, the capital city of the province, which takes up a lot of space, has no banks, no donut shops, no Rogers Cable TV, no supermarkets. There's no nothing there. So part of your mission was to negotiate with all of these different stakeholders

and get them to buy into the vision and put some money into putting a spot there. How'd that go? It went well in the end. I mean, there were lots of bumps along the way, but at the very beginning, we went out to all the big banks. We said, Regent Park has not had a bank in 50 years there needs to be a bank and the banks all of them said okay pick me we're gonna be part of this but RBC said

not only we're gonna open up a branch but we're gonna begin to work in the neighborhood to hire local residents have them really trained over a period of a couple years while you're building the building Mitchell. And then when the building opens, they will move into that branch and they will walk to work. So RBC put their flag into Regent Park and said we're here. We're part of it for the long term. Stobies had as well. Stobies did as well. But they walked away.

Stobies... How'd you get them back? It was quite a process. I mean, Sobeys committed to be in Regent Park with a 27,000 square foot supermarket, which was phenomenal. Because there wasn't anywhere to buy food in Regent Park. Regent Park was actually known as this food desert. No food available.

So we knew going in that finding a supermarket was hugely important to success. So we went going in that finding a supermarket was hugely important to success. So we went to the supermarkets, we went to Loblaws, they said we're very interested, but they wanted a 75,000 square foot store. Way too big. With surface parking. Didn't make sense in an urban environment. Sobi said we'll do a 27,000 square foot store with underground parking. Hallelujah. Signed a lease, and then this thing happened. October 2008. Yeah, the Great Recession.

I call it global economic meltdown. But yes, the Great Recession. And Sobe's called us after, sent someone to our office, someone I'd never met before. Comes to my office and he says, Mitchell, the people who made the decision to open a Sobe store in Regent Park are no longer with the company. They made a terrible mistake and were walking away from the agreement. Oh my god, that was rough.

Because we were counting on that grocery store as part of the storytelling. You mentioned earlier that why would people invest and move into Regent Park? Because it was going to become a neighborhood like other neighborhoods, with a bank, with a grocery store, with a coffee shop. That was hugely important in turning the corner on what Regent Park could become. So they walked away.

Did you threaten to sue them to kingdom come? I said, you will not walk away. You cannot walk away. And here's where our partnership with Toronto Community Housing was so powerful. So John Fox Fox who is the in-house counsel at Toronto Community Housing and I went up to Sobe's headquarters Ontario headquarters in Mississauga and we sat there we're at a boardroom table literally there's seven lawyers and five executives and there's John and myself

and they opened the meeting by saying you know We're not exactly sure why you're here because as you know, we're walking away and We said I did my thing. Well, no, you're not walking away We're gonna sue you to kingdom come because we had been putting marketing materials out to the world about this new condominium coming the first condominium in Regent Park and Includes this beautiful Sobe store in the banner, in the rendering. It was fantastic. We said, this has been out there with your permission, because we got your approval to put all that marketing material out there. You're not walking away. We're walking away. No, you're away. So this went on until John Fox pushed a little button on a tape

recorder, which was this amazing moment. We had taped the groundbreaking ceremony, where, you know, RBC was there, Tim Hortons was there, because they committed to open a Tim Hortons coffee shop. And Sobe's Capital Corporation was there, represented by a senior executive. And on the tape, we of Sobe's Capital Corporation are proud to be involved in the Regent Park revitalization. We're here for the long term. We're here to help build this community. Push stop on the thing and look around the table at these executives.

And we knew that we had touched a nerve. And so they came back. Eventually. It took a lot of pushing further. What they ultimately did is created a new brand. They said, we're not putting a Sobe store in. We're going to put in a price chopper. And we said, you're not putting in a price chopper.

What did they eventually agree on? Fresco. Fresco, right, right. But Steve, very important point. We said, that's fine. We'll accept Fresco. But for the first 10 years, it has to be Fresco. Buy Sobe's. You wanted Sobe's name, it has to be Fresco by Sobies.

You wanted Sobies name on it. We wanted that Sobies name. Because it says something. It does. Gotcha. Sheldon, where are you? Sheldon, let's bring up the pictures here. We're going to scroll through some shots of Regent Park

because, well, a lot's happened in the, what is it, a decade and a half that you've been involved in this thing. So as we scroll through these pictures here, what do you think all of this says about Regent Park today? It says a lot. It says that if one is looking at these photographs of real buildings, these are actual buildings that are built, you can't tell which is social housing,

which is market housing, which is market housing, which is market rental, which is condominium. It's impossible to tell. That was one of the goals, is to ensure that you know, oh my god there's the social housing and you know, completely different, completely you know, standing out as rent geared to income. So that was important. But I think the other thing, and it's hard to sort of understand think the other thing, and it's hard to sort of understand it from these individual photographs, it's how the buildings work together.

It's a composition. 69 acres is a huge piece of land. And right now today, 53 of those 69 are pretty much complete. What's important is how the buildings relate to each other. Most important, how the streets relate to each other. Most important, how the streets relate to each other. The streets connect, not only within the community, but connect to the rest of the city, which was this correction of that design flaw from the Garden City.

Is the Regent Park experience unique to that part of the city, or is the philosophy behind it exportable? Absolutely, totally exportable. Is it happening? It is happening. I mean, Toronto Community Housing itself is taking the lessons learned on the road to Lawrence Heights, to Alexandra Park, to other communities.

But in addition, United Nations Habitat has embraced what has happened in Regent Park and has set up in Regent Park the World Urban Pavilion, which is what they refer to a global knowledge exchange hub. A place that will take the lessons learned in Regent Park, project them around the world, but also gather lessons from other communities, study them, understand them, and then create this opportunity for people to share information about best practices in city building. I want to ask you about what I think might have been a part of this journey that put a bad taste in your mouth. And that was after doing all of the work on behalf of Daniels Corporation to get this thing the first

few phases going, clearly the city said, well this is actually working pretty well, now we want you to have to bid against other developers to do the future phases. And you didn't win some of those future bets. We didn't. How ticked off were you about that? I was extremely ticked off. Our entire team felt we had put so much love, investment, resources into the evolution of this community. And again, it dates back to when, when, you know, the mayor, Mayor Ford terminated

Toronto Community Housing's team at the same time moved to terminate our contract. We had a contract for all phases. That was terminated by Mayor Ford. John Tory is elected. He had an opportunity to reinstate the contract but chose not to. So the city chose to go to tender. We put forward in our proposal for the last two phases, guess what? A partnership based approach, which is what we had done in the early days. That is what has created the success of Regent Park. And that's what we're talking to other municipalities about today. The way

to achieve this kind of success, these kind of outcomes, on complex long-term community development projects like this is by partnership. Mitchell, in our last minute here, I want to read a quote from the book and then come out of it with a question. Sheldon, bring this graphic up if you would. Here's Mitchell Cohen writing in Rhythms of Change. Our goal was to change the dial on how Regent Park was perceived within the broader city, as well as how residents viewed themselves. And the question is, have you achieved that?

We have. The city now flocks to Regent Park for all kinds of things. Regent Park has become a destination for great food, for music, for theater, for arts within Daniel Spectrum, a cultural hub. Regent Park Aquatic Center is again again, a destination for people. Regent Park Athletic Rounds, all of these are building blocks that are physical infrastructure that

supports the creation of a healthy social infrastructure. And through that process, residents of the neighborhood have got this tremendous strength and tremendous awareness of what they have achieved. This is their achievement more than anything else. That's Mitchell Cohen. His book is called Rhythms of Change Reflections on the Regent Park Revitalization and it ain't over yet. Mitchell, thank you for coming in. Thank you Steve.