What is causing homelessness in Kingston? Why are we facing a drug poisoning crisis? What does it mean to be food insecure? How are people responding to unaffordable rents? Division Street is a new YourTV series that probes these questions. But it does so in a different way.
“Too many of our neighbours don’t get a chance to share their experiences,” said veteran Kingston journalist and community producer Jamie Swift. “These are the real experts. People who’ve experienced struggles first-hand. And people who’ve walked alongside them.
Division Street looks at Kingston in an anxious age of falling expectations. Rents through the roof. Shrinking paycheques. Inflation. Drug poisoning deaths. Tent cities. Uncertain futures. “It doesn’t have to be that way,” said community producer Sayyida Jaffer, an organizer with the Providence Centre. “We’ll be introducing YourTV viewers to everyday people who are responding to local problems in ways that are both practical and hopeful.”
Division Street’s examination of Kingston’s frayed social fabric premieres Monday January 30 at 8pm and continues to early April.