“Our family helping your family”
We have been serving the Scarborough community like family since 1986!
ALL-WEATHER DRIVE EVENT
welcome to uncommon value
™
• Symmetrical Full-Time AWD • X-MODE® for extra traction • Award-winning safety features • Symmetrical Full-Time AWD • Excellent fuel-efficiency • Award-winning safety features
Volume 51 No. 8
BEACHMETRO.COM
June 14, 2022
SCARBORO SUBARU • 2590 EGLINTON AVE E. SCARBOROUGH ON M1K 2R5 • 416-265-4411
SCAROROSUBARU.CA
Leuty Lifeguard Station celebration to mark 100 years
St. Denis Catholic School’s Pride Month events include dance party, flag raising
PHOTO: AHMED DIRIE
PHOTO: ALEXANDROS VAROUTAS
PHOTO: JOSH SHERMAN
The provincial election on June 2 saw two NDP incumbents and a Liberal party candidate elected in the East Toronto ridings covered by Beach Metro Community News. Clockwise from top left: NDP incumbent Doly Begum was re-elected in Scarborough Southwest; NDP incumbent Peter Tabuns was re-elected in Toronto-Danforth; and Liberal candidate Mary-Margaret McMahon was elected the new MPP for Beaches-East York. An incumbent did not run in Beaches-East York. For more election coverage, please see Page 2.
FRE
E
Family d By
Sponsore
THE MESSAGE at St. Denis Catholic School’s first ever Pride Month celebration was loud and clear. “Love and inclusivity — that’s what today is all about,” said Anthony Pauk, the school’s principal. Around 2 p.m. on June 1, students, staff, and parents spilled out into the schoolyard to celebrate that message, as well as support members of the 2SLGBTQ+ community and their allies. The Catholic elementary school’s inaugural Pride Month event featured a dance party with a DJ and MC, a live piano-and-vocal performance from music teacher Marie McBride, and the unfurling of a giant 25-foot-long rainbow flag. “We’re the first Catholic school that I know of to do this big of a celebration,” Pauk told Beach Metro Community News. The celebration comes a little over a year after the Toronto Catholic District School Board decided to fly pride flags outside all its schools each June, beginning in 2021. (Although St. Denis raised a flag last year, COVID-19 dashed any hopes of a party.) Before kicking off the after-
KEW GARDENS Every Wednesday June 29th - August 31st Checkout The Schedule Here
In The Beach!
noon’s festivities, which followed a morning assembly and lunchtime visit from an ice-cream truck serving rainbow-sprinkled treats, guest speakers took the mic to speak about inclusion. St. Denis French teacher Wendell Isidor shared his experience of telling his parents that he was gay. “My mom sat there, she looked at me, and said, ‘Child, I knew since you were five,” he recalled. “My mom loved me nonetheless — both my mom and my dad… and that was the true definition of support and the true definition of an ally,” Isidor added. Rima Berns-McGown, former Beaches-East York MPP, told of her youngest child’s experience coming out as gay at 14 and as a trans woman in university. “It was really, really tough for her, and I know that when I tell her about all this love, it’s going to heal her, and it’s going to make her heart so happy,” she said. And Elisa Moolecherry — a member of the Equity Circle parent group’s 2SLGBTQ+ subcommittee, which organized the event — spoke about how 2SLGBTQ+ allies need to persevere. “Doing the work means you have
@makewaves.TO
U
By Josh Sherman
|M
Election Night winners
PHOTO: JOSH SHERMAN
St. Denis Catholic School students take part in a dance party during festivities on June 1 to celebrate Pride Month.
VIE
There will be food and entertainment, along with speeches from local dignitaries, at the celebration. For more information, please contact Community Centre 55’s Jade at 416-691-1113. The Leuty Lifeguard Station was built in 1920. While its location has moved around a little bit due to erosion, flooding and other issues, it is on the beach south of the Boardwalk at the foot of Leuty Avenue. Over the years it has faced a number of challenges and was saved from demolition by a community campaign in the 1990s.
MO
A COMMUNITY celebration to mark the 100th anniversary of the iconic Leuty Lifeguard Station in the Beach is set for the evening of Friday, June 24. Orginally planned to take place in the summer of 2020, which was the official 100th anniversary of the station, the celebration was delayed due to COVID-19 restrictions. The beach party, though, is on for this year and everyone’s invited. Organized by local residents with the support of Community Centre 55, the celebrations on June 24 are set to begin at 7 p.m.
SI
C
|L
AW
N
ES GAM
to be brave,” she said. “It’s not going to be easy; it’s going to be uncomfortable. It’s OK to be uncomfortable.” The Pride Month celebration was the Equity Circle’s first in-person event, although since forming during the pandemic it has spearheaded multiple initiatives, including contributing diverse titles to the school library for Black History Month. “We want to create a circle for parents so we can share and inspire the community to create events, resources, [and] education — for everybody,” group co-founder Andrea Henry told Beach Metro Community News. “We’re not just doing race; we’re not just doing Pride — we’re doing everything,” she added, noting accessibility and wellness are also focuses and she hopes to inspire Continued on Page 3
BEACH METRO COMMUNITY NEWS 50TH ANNIVERSARY 1972•2022
KS | SNAC
| PRIZES