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The no parking areas were at the back of the building where the garbage was picked up and the bins emptied. This area needed to be kept clear so we could get the city garbage trucks in. On this particular hot sunny Friday two cars were in the no parking zones and the garbage truck drivers refused to pick up our full bins. This interference with garbage pickup translated into health issues with the piling up of this unsanitary biohazardous refuse. The bins needed to be empty for the weekend as the next pick up was at the earliest three days away. I talked the garbage driver into coming back a little later in the day. I then tried to figure out how I was going to get these cars moved. I phoned the police to have them come and ticket the one car in the lane way. Then I started the usual routine with a dollop of tar and a sign on the front windshields of both cars. Just as I got finished, Bob, one of the drivers came back. He happened to be a friend of mine that had borrowed his boss’s car to pick something up in the building. After a loud exchange we got ourselves straightened out. I got some turpentine and rags to clean up the mess on his car. As we were cleaning up Bob’s car the driver of the car in the lane came back. She happened to be a guest lecturer at UoT from Detroit. She was a black activist and had just addressed a group of students about racism. Her escort was also black and they were both in a 1972, Civil Rights mood. When they saw the tar and the sign on the windshield they took it personally. Telling them I didn’t see them get out of their car so I had no idea who the car belonged to didn’t ease any of the tension. It was a racist act as far as they were concerned. Her escort was a scholarly man shaking with a combination of rage and fear. He wanted to beat me up. But he saw all the people from the building standing around. He thought he was out numbered. Little did he know everybody was standing around waiting to see if I was going to get a punch in the mouth. They were not going to help me. The tension kept growing even as I was getting the tar off. About this time the police showed up to ticket her illegally parked car. That is when the racism started to show. The escort vanished and the woman was left on her own to argue with the police. The cop asked me why I was cleaning the windshield. I explained the situation and that I didn’t know the owner was black and I was trying right the situation. He told me I had done the right thing and to leave the tar on. I told him it wouldn’t be right if I did, he called me a stupid hippie. At the end of it all I didn’t get a punch in the face. The police gave the driver a parking ticket. As I cleaned the tar and sign off her car windshield the woman activist thanked me for standing between her and the police. She came up close to me and said something that I remember to this day. She said, “Thank you very much for standing up for me. I see you are a gentleman. If we had been in Detroit, where I’m from, that police man would have shot me.” I don’t know if she was telling the truth or not but the guy she was with ran like a rabbit as soon as the police showed up. Sort of spoiled the show for the crowd that was waiting for me to get a punch in the mouth. They weren’t privy to the conversation. There were Toronto city garbage strikes in the summers of 1971 & 72. Where were we going to put our mountains of garbage? We were supposed to take the garbage to a city park. We knew how much we were going to dump and did not think it fare to the rest of the city’s residents. Piles of garbage means fires, racoons and rats. We did not want to be part of that problem. We rented a 25’, 5-ton truck from Hertz and loaded all our garbage into it. We had to empty the truck three times a week. Our first goal was to find a dump. The first loads went to the Maple disposal site. The Toronto union soon figured out where private companies were dumping and set up picket lines. I was driving the truck and I refused to cross the picket lines. So, we had to find someplace else. This was a point when the criminal mind came in handy. I asked a couple of the guys in our crew if they knew of any dumps. They did – when some of their buddies wanted to get rid of questionable materials during off hours there were quiet dumps they used. I told them it had to be a legal disposal area with posted hours and supervision. I needed a receipt for tax purposes. After they chided me for how straight I was for somebody that looked like such a freak, they sent me to a small village dump 25 miles north east of the city. The village was concerned about the union complaining about us dumping. But it was far enough away and too awkward to get to for the Toronto union to worry about it. As long as it did not get busy all would be well. We knew a good thing and did not tell anybody else about it. During the two garbage strikes Rochdale did not contribute to the destructive fallout caused by the piles of debris and waste left around the city. Things of this nature are snickered at by those that have never seen a city full of uncontrolled rotting leaking biohazardous infectious refuse. There is always an explosion of the rat, squirrel, pigeon, seagull and racoon population after a garbage strike. This is an unsung bit of Rochdale heroism. We paid for it ourselves. It was before receivership. Rochdale did this on our own for the respect we had for the city’s health and environment. Previous Exit Next |