>>>>>>>She figures it's aboiut $10,000 worth of plants and she's trying to get compensation. Following the letters to the newspapers, there appears to be nobody who is backing the city on this one. As usual though, it's a big hew and cry which the city is studiously ignoring. I think what it all comes down to is that the city didn't get it's pound of flesh. Apparently if one wants to grow a 'natural garden', one must apply for a permit, and she didn't. Can you imagine such a thing?
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>>>>>>I imagine the sanctity of private property has fallen into hands of unbelievers. All your lawn are belong to us.
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>>>>>That's Toronto for you. We also have to license our cats. What do I get for my license fee, you ask? I get another useless tag for the collar. If my cat gets lost, then Animal Services can return it. I guess if the tag comes off they have facial recognition software? I have microchips in the cat's napes, and that, I'm told, is not good enough, I must pay the city for a tag - as if they don't already wear tags anyway.
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>>>>>I also have to license them even if they are not allowed outside. Nobody can tell me why we don't have to license fish or birds.
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>>>>They stopped even dog licensing in the UK decades ago. Funny, in English law, a horse or dog is recognised as an animal, as in you need to report it if you run one down, but not cats. Now I knew that Canada was, shall we say, a trifle anal, but this takes the biscuit (presumbably by skilful sphincter control {g})
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>>>>How about you just let the cat be a cat? Who's to know? Do they have "cat-catchers" like the old US cartoons had dog-catchers (do they still exist?), ad a cat pound, as a means of generating revenue?
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>>>They came around distributing their propaganda about how it's a law and how wonderful it will be that you have license if the cat ever gets lost etc. I wasn't home, and apparently they leave this junk mail at every house. My cats, of course, inhabit the window sills and are very visible. Even my vet (well, he's not actually my vet, he's really the cats' vet) thinks this is a stupid cash grab.
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>>>Part of the problem is that we have two separate organisations. The Humane Society, and the Toronto Animal Services. Animal Services is a jealous God and wants us to have not other God. It's Animal Services that handles licensing. It's mostly the Humane Society with which people identify, and to which they give their money, and I think it galls Animal Services; so they wanted to come up with a way to get money for nothing. City council caved.
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>>For council money-grabbing scam also read "Residents' Parking Scheme" - Don't get me started in that!!!!!
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>Oh, I know. When I visit my mother (she lives in an apartment building), I have to pay a buck and a half an hour.
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>Once upon a time, our city council was to have a photo taken of the entire council (for posterity, I suppose). It didn't happen because they got to arguing about who should be in the front row and who should be in the back row. They argued over this for so long that the Mayor finally got fed up and left. The rest then trickled away. These are the people who run our city.

I'd like a picture of our council so I'd know who to stalk and brick from behind! Maybe that's why they didn't take the photo.