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Wainwright, Alta., residents grieving but resilient after tragic fire on army base
Army town remains stoic after military base fire
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Christopher Katsarov
Residents of a central Alberta town are grieving after a vicious fire killed four men and injured dozens more at a nearby military base, but living alongside soldiers preparing for battle has built up a deep stoicism and resilience in the community.
"It's heartbreaking. My heart goes out to the families but we'll bounce back," said Sharon Pashko, 79, whose uncle was once commander of CFB Wainwright.
Pashko said the community, about 200 kilometres southeast of Edmonton, takes care of its own and should be proud.
"We've gone above and beyond and I'm very proud of Wainwright residents," she added.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has been meeting with constituents in the town, which is in his Battle River-Crowfoot riding. He said while many unanswered questions remain, people are coping.
"I'm just amazed how resilient and strong the people are. Nobody's breaking. Everyone's just putting their head down and they're doing their jobs. It's the best of Canada," he said.
"They're obviously heartbroken. They see the loss of these brilliant young men in the springtimes of their lives but at the same time they bounce back and they keep working to support the living."
Wainwright Mayor Bruce Pugh said the base has always been a part of the community.
"It's a part of us and we're a part of it. It's a symbiotic relationship," he said.
Despite the temporary closure of the local polling station for Alberta's referendum, a steady stream of voters continued to cast ballots Monday.
"A couple of friends of mine from church are in the military and I've heard, last night, that they were actually both in Latvia right now,” Dustin Degenhardt said after voting.
“I'm grateful that they're safe, but at the same time I know hearts are here too.”
Degenhardt said the tragedy didn't affect how he voted and sees the two as separate issues. Other residents shared that view, while some said the shadow of the fire loomed over their decision.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 20, 2026.
By David Baxter and Bill Graveland | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
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Newcomers across GTA not a priority in transit planning
Brampton’s 2025 study links immigrant-rich neighbourhoods to poor transit access.
For the increasing number of immigrants settling in Toronto's suburbs, public transit is a lifeline, connecting them to jobs, education and a host of necessary services.
Yet research shows that while newcomers often depend more heavily on transit than longer term Canadians, those living in outlying communities face more challenges travelling around their communities.
The gaps are especially visible in Brampton, where the city's own 2025 study shows an overlap between immigrant-rich neighbourhoods and poor public transportation to access jobs, health care and other essential services.
Studies and surveys in Toronto and Mississauga point to similar difficulties, raising questions about whether transit networks are keeping pace with the needs of the new communities they serve.
As Brampton, Mississauga and Toronto prepare to elect their next municipal councils, the question is not simply the funding of public transit systems, but whether they serve the people who most rely on buses and trains to get around.
Newcomers are especially reliant on public transit. According to 2021 census data for the Toronto metropolitan area, 28.5 per cent of immigrants who obtained permanent residency between 2016 and 2021 commuted by public transit, compared with 11.6 per cent of non-immigrants. Among temporary residents such as international students and temporary foreign workers, the figure was even higher, at 39.6 per cent.
Steven Farber, a professor at the University of Toronto who studies transportation equity, said recent immigrants use public transit at higher rates than Canadian-born residents, a pattern reflected in both census commuting data and the Transportation Tomorrow Survey.
[caption id="attachment_43264" align="alignleft" width="1738"] Public transit commuting in the Toronto metropolitan area by immigration status, 2021.
Source: Statistics Canada, 2021 Census. Chart prepared by Professor Steven Farber, University of Toronto.[/caption]
A 2024 national survey by Mobilizing Justice found that 45 per cent of recent immigrants had turned down job opportunities because of transportation difficulties, compared with 26 per cent of Canadian-born respondents.
Brampton: Where disadvantage and poor access overlap
Sara Jose, an IT professional who works in downtown Toronto, arrived from India in 2023 and lived in Brampton until last November. Without a driver's licence, she initially relied on public transit to get to work, taking a bus from her home to the Brampton Innovation District GO station before boarding a train to downtown Toronto.
Although her family owns a car and she has since obtained her driver’s licence, Jose said she still prefers public transit because it is cheaper and saves her the trouble of finding parking.
But she said the local bus was often the weakest link in her commute. The Route 502 bus would stop at Ray Lawson Boulevard for 15 to 20 minutes before continuing to the GO station.
“That is when you really feel you lose a lot of time,” she said.
During bad weather, Jose said two buses would sometimes arrive together; other times, none would show up. On her return journey, buses departed before passengers reached the stop.
And missing a connection could mean a long wait. Jose said if she reached the GO station after 8:30 a.m., the train runs less frequently and she had to wait 30 minutes or longer for the next one.
She said she shared her concerns with the transit agency and noticed that buses wait longer at stops. She said there appeared to be closer monitoring of the length of time buses remain at stops.
Jose has since moved to Oakville, which falls under a different municipal region, and said the public transit system is much more efficient there than the one she left behind.
Brampton provides one of the clearest examples of the challenges facing transit-dependent communities. The city's own 2025 Transportation Equity Framework identified neighbourhoods where residents facing greater social and economic disadvantages also have poorer access to jobs, health care, schools and important destinations.
[caption id="attachment_43259" align="alignleft" width="463"] Brampton Transit suspended four routes, citing low ridership due to the loss of international students in the city. Photo: The Pointer[/caption]
The study identified parts of western Brampton, particularly around Mississauga and Mayfield Road, and the Wildfield and Castlemore area in the northeast.
To assess which communities were most vulnerable to transportation barriers, the city considered factors including recent immigration; visible minority populations; unemployment; housing costs and access to vehicles.
A 2021 study published in the Journal of Transport Geography also found that immigrants living in peripheral suburbs can struggle to access opportunities due to inadequate transit services.
Brampton Transit has faced financial pressures following changes to federal immigration policy. In a 2025 budget forecast, city staff reported a 20 per cent year-over-year decline in ridership and an estimated $26 million reduction in fare revenue.
The forecast attributed much of the decline to the loss of international students. In April 2026, the transit authority suspended four of the city's routes, citing low ridership.
Brampton Transit did not respond to requests for comment about the service changes and research findings.
Toronto: Who gets considered in transit planning?
Andrew Pulsifer, executive director of transit advocacy group TTCriders, said residents of areas such as immigrant-rich Scarborough and Etobicoke have long raised concerns about the level of transit service available to them.
"There is a general sentiment that places like Scarborough and Etobicoke don't have the higher order transit that they feel they deserve," Pulsifer said.
A 2025 University of Toronto School of Cities analysis found that immigrant settlement in the Greater Toronto Area has increasingly shifted toward these suburbs, with newcomers also settling just outside the downtown core.
A 2024 study published in Case Studies on Transport Policy found that 72 per cent of TTC riders considered equity-deserving, based on visible minority status or low income, lived outside the neighbourhoods the TTC prioritizes in its equity-based service planning. The findings suggest that relying on designated neighbourhoods alone may overlook many disadvantaged transit users.
Farber, the University of Toronto professor and one of the study's authors, said this does not mean the TTC necessarily overlooks immigrant communities, and suggested closer collaboration with immigrant communities to identify barriers involving language, affordability and access to destinations.
The TTC's 2026–2028 Ridership Growth Strategy also identifies lower satisfaction among some groups of riders, including those with low incomes, younger passengers and shift workers.
Mississauga: No alternative for many transit users
Nishant Sharma, a banking professional who works in downtown Toronto, arrived in Canada in September 2026 and stayed with relatives in Mississauga while he started his job and settled into life in Canada. He commuted downtown every day.
He said the morning trip was manageable, but the return trip was not.
As a newcomer, Sharma did not know the last homebound train leaves Union Station at 7:10 p.m. on weekdays. One evening, he left work a little after 8 p.m. and could not find a train to Mississauga. GO runs buses on the corridor after the last train, but he didn't know that.
He said he took three or four local buses instead, and a trip that usually takes about an hour took more than double that time.
Sharma said he also found the transit stations hard to navigate. A family member guided him, he said, but without their help it would have taken “a day or two or three” to learn the system.
“You shouldn’t need any help from anyone just to board a train,” he said. He recently moved to downtown Toronto.
In Mississauga, a MiWay customer survey found that 59 per cent of respondents had no alternative means of transportation. Nearly four in five were under 35, while 35 per cent were students.
Mississauga is home to a substantial immigrant population. According to the 2021 census, 379,420 residents were immigrants, including more than 52,000 who arrived between 2016 and 2021.
[caption id="attachment_43258" align="aligncenter" width="2560"] In Mississauga, a MiWay transit customer survey found that 59 per cent of respondents had no alternative means of transportation. Photo: The Pointer[/caption]
Although Mississauga’s survey does not identify how many transit-dependent riders are newcomers, the figures raise questions about how well the city's transit network serves residents who have limited transportation options.
Research by the University of Toronto's Mobilizing Justice initiative highlighted the challenges facing workers who travel outside conventional commuting hours. As reported by CityNews in 2023, research identified northeast Mississauga as an area with concentrations of evening and night-shift workers.
Newer immigrants are disproportionately represented among workers on these schedules and they face additional difficulties when transit services are sporadic outside peak periods.
In response to questions about its planning approach, a MiWay spokesperson said it collects data about where passengers begin their journeys and where they need to travel when making transit service decisions.
In Scarborough connections are key
The new Scarborough Busway opened Sept. 30, connecting Kennedy Station to Scarborough Town Centre along the former Scarborough Rapid Transit corridor. The dedicated bus route promised shorter journeys for thousands of commuters.
Pranitha Rathakrishnan, who moved to Canada as a child, is a master's student living in Scarborough-Rouge Park. She noticed the difference immediately.
[caption id="attachment_43256" align="aligncenter" width="2560"] The Scarborough Busway opened in September 2026 to provide faster service for thousands of commuters. Photo: Toronto Transit Commission[/caption]
The day before the Busway opened, she said she missed her connection by just 30 seconds which delayed her arrival at her destination by 25 minutes. The following day, with the new Busway, she reached Scarborough Town Centre with five minutes to spare before her connecting bus arrived.
It was a relatively small improvement, but for someone who relies on public transit, it made a big difference. She said her family's growing dependence on public transportation has made her more aware of the importance of reliable connections.
What the ridership figures don't show
Antonio Páez, a professor at McMaster University who studies transportation equity, said assessing whether a transit system adequately serves its residents requires looking beyond ridership numbers and service frequency.
Transit planners should examine whether services are distributed according to residents' needs, particularly those who rely entirely on public transportation because they have no viable alternatives, he said.
That means examining not only where people live, but also which destinations they need to reach and how long those journeys take.
"Does someone need to travel 15 minutes or 90 minutes to reach a doctor, supermarket, job, etc.?" Páez said.
He said equity is seldom considered in conventional transit performance measures, which tend to focus on operating costs, service delivery and fuel emissions.
Páez also pointed to a less visible problem known as "suppressed travel," which are journeys people never undertake because public transit makes them impractical.
For instance, someone might decide against visiting a doctor because the journey would take three hours. Since the trip never happens, it doesn't appear in ridership figures.
Copyright 2026, New Canadian Media. All rights reserved.
Shilpashree Jagannathan and Mubin S. Khan, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, New Canadian Media.
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Death threats, sexual harassment, sexism — female politicians in Peel, Halton speak out
Harassment affects 63 per cent of surveyed local politicians, with women facing identity-based abuse.
Brampton city councillor Rowena Santos said she has faced sexist treatment and serious threats to her physical safety during her time in office.
And according to several female politicians contacted in Peel and Halton regions — many seeking re-election in the Oct. 26 municipal election — her experience is neither unique nor an aberration.
“A couple of people threatened me and said that I deserve to be raped and killed,” said Santos, one of two female councillors on Brampton council.
The first Filipino person elected to Brampton council, she said her identity has also been a target of criticism. In one instance, a woman baselessly claimed that Santos’ Filipino background meant she was submissive to men and that her electoral success was the result of “sleeping her way to the top.”
2026 numbers from the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO) show that women account for 32 per cent of municipal candidates (2,103 of 6,663), up from 31 per cent (1,931 of 6,306) in 2022. This represents an increase of 172 female candidates, continuing an incremental rise in women’s representation on the ballot.
However, that increase has not necessarily translated into a more welcoming environment for all women.
Harassment widespread but different for women
While data from the 2025 Canadian Municipal Barometer shows that harassment is a widespread issue among elected officials, affecting 63 per cent of the 1,633 local politicians surveyed, the ways in which it manifests for women can be different in nature.
“When you look at the harassment and violence that’s directed to women and racialized candidates, violence tends to focus, not on who they are as politicians, but who they are as people,” said Dr. Erin Tolley, the Canada Research Chair in Gender, Race, and Inclusive Politics and associate professor in the department of political science at Carleton University, in an interview.
“It’s more likely to pinpoint their identities either as women or racialized or both.”
‘People show up at my house’: Caledon Mayor Annette Groves
Annette Groves, the mayor of Caledon who is not seeking re-election, said “some of the terms that people use on social media, the names they call us, they’re certainly not going to use the same description … or term for a male politician.
“I find people show up at my house. I don’t think you’d be showing up at a male person’s house. That is my private space where my family lives.”
Mississauga Coun. Natalie Hart on scrutiny of appearance
Natalie Hart, Mississauga’s Ward 5 councillor who is seeking re-election, has said that while running for office and serving as a councillor she was subject to sexist remarks as well.
“Shortly after I was elected there was a lot of commentary about the fact that the pictures that I’ve used on my signs didn’t accurately look enough like me. You still experience that at the doors where people will hold your flyer up to your face to see if it looks like you,” said Hart.
“You face a lot of scrutiny on your physical presentation. What you wear, how often you wear it, your weight, your age, your marital status, all of those things that are not necessarily a part of what it looks like as a male in these spaces.”
Burlington Mayor Marianne Meed Ward and the Elect Respect campaign
Marianne Meed Ward has been mayor of Burlington since 2018 and is also running for re-election. She too has been subject to gender-based discrimination and harassment, listing several unsettling incidents, including people:
- calling her office at city hall and making sexual references toward her
- threatening to set her on fire
- telling her she should be “strung up at city hall”
As well, she said she’s been threatened by people using profane and derogatory language specific toward women.
As soon as she went public with this story, she said the first comment she received was someone saying “weak women shouldn’t be in politics.”
Against the backdrop of this increasingly hostile political environment, Meed Ward began convening female elected representatives from across Halton Region, from school board trustees to members of parliament, to share their experiences as women in politics.
Twice a year this group of 25 women would get together, privately, for coffee to exchange stories and figure out ways to offer one another support.
At one of the meetings, she said someone asked, “if you had a daughter would you advise her to seek elected office?”
“All of us hesitated. And there was a time where I would have never hesitated,” she said.
“And then story after story came out … and every single person had a story of being threatened with bodily harm, and none of us had really talked about it with anyone. We had kept it private.”
The meeting of women in Halton led to the creation of the “Elect Respect” campaign, which brings together politicians from diverse backgrounds to call for more respectful and civil political discourse across the country, while recognizing that female elected officials may face heightened levels of intimidation.
Does harassment deter women from running?
Some female politicians believe that the unique treatment and threats women are subject to can deter them from entering the political arena altogether.
“I think part of the reason why women choose not to run is because they don’t want to put themselves into that situation,” Santos said. “You really have to have thicker skin if you’re a woman … Women always have to think twice or three times as to whether or not they want to put themselves and their family through that level of risk.
“It is sometimes mentally and emotionally taxing on you and so I think that’s part of the reason why a lot of women don’t do it.”
Added Hart: “It can really be tough to convince people that this is a career that they want.”
Women who run are more likely to win — so why aren’t more running?
Despite women in Ontario making up slightly more than half of the province’s population, they make up only 32.2 per cent of all municipal council seats, according to data from AMO.
However, Tolley said that when women do make the decision to run, research demonstrates they are more likely to win their elections.
Data from AMO shows in the 2022 municipal elections across Ontario, the success rate of women slightly exceeded that of men. Women candidates had a 47 per cent success rate while male candidates had a 44 per cent success rate.
Tolley said she believes the reason for this is because “the women … who tend to come forward, typically are more qualified than other candidates and the reason I think they’re more qualified is that they understand that in order to participate in this hostile climate, they need to be better than their competition.”
Elaine Moore, a former Brampton city and Peel regional councillor, said she did not experience sexism to the same extent while serving as a regional councillor, but noted that she felt the men around her viewed their opinions as more credible, leaving women feeling they had to be especially well prepared to have their voices heard.
Tolley believes that while the number of women seeking municipal office is still low, it is increasing because more and more women are either choosing to overlook the hostility or are empowered to change it through their presence in politics.
A parting message from Caledon’s outgoing mayor
Groves said as her mayoral term comes to an end her parting message to young women is not to be deterred or intimidated by such behaviour.
“This is a message I have for young women. Never be intimidated. You need to believe in yourself, you need to believe in who you are, and you need to stand up for what is right. And even if you are the only one standing, you must stand up for what you believe is right, and never be intimidated by any of this,” said Groves.
Copyright 2026, Mississauga.com. All rights reserved.
Bridget Potasky, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Mississauga.com.
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