Toronto City Council Candidate to Champion Famine Memorial

(TORONTO)–Toronto City Council candidate Greg Hamara says he intends to fight for a prominent downtown location for a proposed monument commemorating the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-1933.

“The gravity of the famine demands that any permanent memorial, such as a monument, be located where the greatest number of residents and visitors to the city are able to view it. The story of the Ukrainian genocide must be told in a prominent location and, in my view, this means a high-profile, downtown location,” said Hamara.

Hamara, who has been active in the Ukrainian community for many years and who is on the Board of So-Use Credit Union and served as president of St Vladimir Institute in Toronto, said that if he is elected in Ward 13 in the November 13 municipal election, he will fight for public funding assistance for the Famine monument project.

He will also strongly support other community groups who have additional plans to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the genocidal Famine, or Holodomor, in Canada and in cooperation with the government of Ukraine on educational outreach.

“The Famine had an enormous impact on the lives of thousands of Ukrainians who emigrated to Toronto following the Second World War. It is only fitting that our city, which is often described as the centre of the Ukrainian diaspora, recognizes formally how this tragedy affected the lives of so many of its residents,” said Hamara.

Hamara said he is open to site recommendations from those in the community who are spear-heading the drive to establish the monument. One possible downtown location might be the Bathurst-Queen-Spadina area where thousands of Ukrainians first settled in the 1920s, he said.

He also suggested the local Ukrainian-Canadian community might find it advantageous to work closely with a group such as the Daily Bread Food Bank in a bid to establish the monument.

Other issues that Hamara has committed to in his campaign platform are: building safe neighbourhoods; supporting affordable and efficient public transport; safeguarding and enhancing Toronto’s waterfront, promoting fiscal responsibility at the City level, and environmental sustainability.

Hamara is facing a tight race in Ward 13, which comprises the west Toronto neighbourhoods of Bloor West Village, Baby Point, High Park and Swansea. He is calling on the several thousand Ukrainians who live in these neighbourhoods to support his election to Toronto city council on November 13. According to Statistics Canada, more than 6 per cent of residents of the federal riding of Parkdale-High Park, which includes Ward 13, self-identify as Ukrainian-Canadians.

Born and raised in Toronto, Hamara has a political science degree from the University of Toronto and a journalism degree from University of King’s College in Halifax, NS. He has worked for The Toronto Star, Hamilton Spectator and the Kitchener-Waterloo Record. In the early 1990s, Hamara served as a press secretary and communications advisor to several members of cabinet at Queen’s Park. He also worked special assignments in the Office of the Premier.

In addition, Hamara has worked a Communications Director to the Krever Royal Commission on tainted blood and Manager of Media Relations with World Wildlife Fund Canada and was a Canadian representative to a CIDA-funded democracy building program in Eastern Europe. In his role as a CIDA fieldworker he worked closely with municipal officials, members of parliament, educators, women’s groups, and leaders of non-governmental organizations in Ukraine.

Since the late 1990s Hamara has operated his own communications consulting firm, whose clients have included Toronto Community Housing Corp., Hill and Knowlton Inc., CUPE Local 79 representing city of Toronto employees, among many others.

For more information about the Hamara campaign, please visit www.hamara.ca or call 416-762-5572.