Toronto area made progress but residents worry bus stop shootings will revive stigma

For a Toronto community once notorious for crime and the influence of organized gangs, two shootings this month targeting innocent victims at the same spot, less than 24 hours apart, were more than just a chilling outbreak of indiscriminate violence.

For a Toronto community once notorious for crime and the influence of organized gangs, two shootings this month targeting innocent victims at the same spot, less than 24 hours apart, were more than just a chilling outbreak of indiscriminate violence.

The shootings that killed a newcomer to Canada supporting four children in Ghana and critically injured a 16-year-old boy also marked a setback for the neighbourhood around Jane and Finch, whichcommunity workers and experts say has made progress in addressing its reputation as one of Toronto's most troubled areas.

Police have said that gun violence in the northwest Toronto area "was at a 10-year low" last year.

"The minute any type of incident happens, it's almost like all of that work becomes undone," said Abdul Nur, 28, an outreach worker at the Jane/Finch Community and Family Centre.

Jane and Finch emerged as a bustling Toronto neighbourhood in the 1960s, when a series of highrise apartments were constructed and immigrant families began moving in, said York University professor Carl James, who has been studying the intersection and its surrounding community for nearly two decades.

Over the following decade, a lack of services and a government failure to support low income families bred social unrest in the area, said James, a sociologist whose work in part specializes in how racism and inequity impact Black communities.

James said his research has shown that negative perceptions of Jane and Finch have made it harder for some young people from the area to secure jobs and other opportunities, leading some to try to distance themselves from the community.