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economist sunsuntribune community saturday march 27 2004 region fights ethnic isolation mainstream services try to attract cultures by roy green staff writer having an open cultural door isnt a guarantee the ethnic community will enter according to immigration specialist stephen lam even if the door to mainstream community services is open it doesnt mean its accessible said mr lam director of immigrant services and community programs at catholic community services of york region if you dont have the language and the culture people wont walk through the door mr lam was responding to a statistics canada report claiming recent immigrants to canada may become isolated from the rest of the community because they are increasingly likely to settle in eth nic neighbourhoods the study centred mainly on toronto vancouver and montreal maps out an isolation index showing where immigrants are less likely to meet people from outside their own visibleminority group while york region contains sev eral enclaves and some of the same problems mr lam believes the sit uation isnt as critical here at least in recent years new immigrants who didnt have the english language tended to concentrate in the same neigh bourhoods for social support that was only natural i think in the last five years there are more people who have the language ability they tend to disperse a bit now rather than stay in a heavy concentration they want to integrate more i can see it more are moving to areas like aurora and newmarket more than 39 per cent of the regions 850000 residents are for eign born up from 35 per cent in 1996 and 28 per cent in 1986 and most of them living in markham vaughan and richmond hill the 2001 census showed almost six in 10 markham residents are visible minorities second only to richmond british columbia richmond hill lawyer godwin chan believes the studys conclu sion is an oversimplification my personal belief is its help ing new canadians to feel at ease particularly at the early stage of adapting to a new country new customs said mr chan who ran for council last november but i dont feel most people who live in these enclaves try to isolate them- staff photosjoerd witteveen pacific mall on steeles avenue and kennedy road in markham has helped ease the transition for asian immigrants in canada by offering many of the services they were familiar with in their homeland selves secondgeneration italian sandro zoppi also has doubts about the study particularly as it relates to his own neighbourhood it used to be italian but is now an indian community the italians moved but mr zoppi said to me its not so much where you live but what you do and who do you associate with and its impor tant to make the effort to tap into the mainstream there are some who become doctors and lawyers and we need others to run for politics to have their voices count at the communi ty level or the province ranjit kumar a gormley resi dent and community representa tive on the regions human services planning coalition agrees look at york region in spite of having a high chinese population we dont have a regional councillor who is chinese mr kumar said and he acknowledges there is a potential problem with ethnic iso lation i dont think we have to be alarmed about it but in some places the ethnic community has become really established almost like a subgovernment they have their own professional services public services and this could cre ate solitudes that arent healthy within certain communities there c growth by numbers smm t yis6o0 from china 3 russian federation 2 1 2587 from india and 189 t southkorea before 1961 the immigrant popu lation in what is now york region was 35250 sand canadian unde origin italian at 14 per cent chinese at 13 per cent and canadian at 8 per cer fa non-cr- v w r i noncanadian citizens make up j 85 pexcent of the regions popula- itioh compared to 53 per cent t nationally 76 per cent in ontario and 124 percent inthegta is a disengagement they dont engage in public debates and cer tain consequences follow from that thus the region faces a chal lenge reaching out to ethnic com munities to make sure mainstream services are inclusive according to susan taylor director of the human services planning coalition its important we celebrate the cultural diversity of our new citi zens and help them protect their cultural roots and heritage but from a public service point of view we cant afford to be reproducing human services in many different communities ms taylor said we have to make sure the public mainstream services are inclusive for all to that end the coalition is hoping to launch two projects on cultural diversity in york region the first involves a research study in partnership with york university on ethnocultural growth and how it applies to spe cific patterns of use for services such as hospitals schools afford able housing and transportation we know those enclaves are here we didnt need stats canada to tell us that but we want to look at where immigrants are settling versus delivery of our services mrs taylor said the coalition also hopes to stage a symposium this fall on a strategy to meet the demands of diversity in york region a strategy which centres on three main ele ments making sure hospitals schools boards agencies and government in general are more representative of the broader community improving communications ensuring visible minorities know how to access services and feel comfortable about using them and creating an ethnocultural awareness understanding each others stories and perspectives ms taylor said representation on the planning group for the forum includes the united way catholic community services the public school board police servic es public health community home assistance to seniors and the regions community services and housing committee but mr kumar would like more involvement from municipalities its nice to have these sort of initiatives but the real incentive must be at the municipal level they ought to be having a healthy discussion around it at both the region and the local level if you visualize markham or richmond hill in 2026 it may very well be 75 per cent of the popula tion will be made up of people of asian origin they could generate a whole lot of enterprise but if this kind of subsistence becomes a soli tude if they just want to do busi ness with themselves it could be a problem for others and could cause prejudice we have to be conscious of that i 2004 c230 kbropressotspoitoius r entered in n draw 10 winone of six px 2004 cclass starting from 340 mth at 39 lease rate 29 purchase finance financing provided by mercedesbenz credit canada mercedesbenz markham 8350 kennedy rd 905 3051088 wwwmbtorontoca czz f j pft port iv 4v vfc vw biq iiitivi hup rm ii w 4 w v pj vrm m iwrj ipj wyvwii mpvqi i n p al ah- nhi nbmvwpwwwy mffcm frw tqftfbjtxa mm thtffft i wm tf4f 4f4m tn mmoml tl pt tgfoift m of cm mj ummff pj aj 1 j w jo sqrt c ri actfafl irtfcfltitfm 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