Mayor defends money sent to fund AIDS relief in Africa as 'good on us'

Taxpayers foot bill for Botswana fund
By SUE-ANN LEVY, TORONTO SUN

Last Updated: 18th December 2008, 3:52am

While Mayor David Miller's regime was busily dreaming up new ways to tax Torontonians in April, 2007, a Global Aids Prevention fund was quietly approved by council to fund AIDS projects overseas.

A total of $200,000 from that city-sponsored fund has so far gone to create a youth centre for the South East District Youth Empowerment League (SEDYEL) in Ramotswa, Botswana and to initiate preventative AIDS measures for young women both in Botswana and Nairobi, Kenya.

This special $100,000-a-year fund is over and above the more than $1.5-million in grants given to 47 projects this year to undertake HIV/AIDS prevention education programs in Toronto.

The money was handed over the past two years to Schools Without Borders -- a Toronto-based community agency. A report to the board of health in May, 2007 notes that this agency is "well-positioned to help support and implement a range of initiatives pertaining to youth engagement in Botswana, Kenya and Toronto."

Councillor Kyle Rae, chairman of the AIDS Prevention Community Investment Program, could not be reached for comment. A staff member in his office told my Sun colleague Bryn Weese that the councillor is away on city business.

"He's not in Canada," said the woman staffer, refusing to say exactly where he is.

The city's Botswana project co-ordinator, Barbara Emanuel -- a senior policy adviser in public health -- said the Federation of Canadian Municipalities has funded an HIV/AIDS "capacity building" partnership between Toronto and the South East District of Botswana since 2002. That funding is separate from the $200,000 provided by Toronto.

Emanuel said the new city-funded Global AIDS initiative -- in place for the past two years -- was a commitment made by the mayor and Rae when Toronto hosted the International AIDS conference in August, 2006.

Some of the money -- $40,000 -- went to create the youth centre in Botswana, some went to further support the FCM/Toronto partnership and some was spent to bring youth (training) leaders from Africa to Toronto, Emanuel said.

Julian Caspari, managing director of Schools Without Borders, said the money was used primarily to open the Ramotswa centre -- the new home for SEDYL -- and to operate Safe Spaces programs for young females in Botswana and Kenya. These programs provide sexual health training and teach the young women to be "facilitators" and "role models" in their own communities, he said.

Caspari also confirmed that the centre just opened officially in mid-October, an event he attended.

Emanuel confirmed she was there as well -- as part of the wrap-up mission for the FCM partnership -- along with Liz Janzen, director of healthy communities for public health and Councillor Rae.

She said FCM paid entirely for the $14,000 mission, some $3,000 or $4,000 of which went to the official opening.

"There was no city money at all," she said.

Not entirely.

When I checked with the city's director of council services, Winnie Li, she said Rae claimed some "minor" expenses for the Botswana trip but wouldn't say what they were, noting the details will be posted online with the year-end expenses report sometime at the end of February.

Asked why taxpayers should be footing the bill for AIDS initiatives in Africa -- when many are struggling to pay their vehicle ownership, land transfer and garbage taxes -- the mayor got quite heated in his response yesterday.

He challenged me to note in my column that Toronto's property taxes are lower than the rest of the 905 municipalities.

So I am -- but with the proviso that none of those municipalities have any of Miller's other creative taxes or the highest commercial taxes in the GTA.

On the Global AIDS initiative itself, Miller said Toronto should be taking this kind of leadership, being a city of the world.

"I certainly support the fund. At the AIDS conference I committed to expanding our efforts to working internationally on AIDS," he said, insisting I was incorrect to suggest the city funding for Global AIDS Initiatives only began in 2007. (I was not.)

He added that people in this city would say they are proud to be supporting this kind of initiative -- the "right kind of project."

"People would say 'Good on you, Toronto,' " he said. "I think Torontonians would be delighted."