1000 Dinners TO: Your Chance to Change Toronto (And Enjoy a Great Meal)

There are two things Torontonians love:

Talking about our city, and

Dinner.

It’s good news then that on October 7th you’ll have plenty of both as 1000 Dinners TO kicks off its inaugural event. 

The initiative asks residents of our self-reflective (and perpetually hungry) city to share their tables and thoughts for an evening of dining and idea sharing. The goal is to foster discussions on how to improve everything from bike access on city streets to how we can finally finance a subway expansion. Or what’s best for this former East End strip club, for example.

No idea is too big or too small.

Participants can opt to take part by either hosting a dinner themselves or being invited to a dinner hosted by someone else. These can range from home-cooked meals, to splitting the bill at a restaurant, or even simple potlucks. Group sizes are suggested to include 10 people or less to keep discussions intimate, and hosts will receive a toolkit to assist in creating a foodie forum of parliamentary proportions. Well, maaybe that’s a little ambitious…

But here’s the notable part: To add some credibility to the affair, 1000 Dinners TO will put forth all (reasonably intelligent) ideas to the October 16th mayoral candidate debate, which will be broadcast live on CBC Toronto.

A few hot topics to debate could be: How do we stop brain drain and retain our most promising human capital? Or, what’s the key to developing neighbourhoods with greater equality across all sectors of social and professional life? Even the more trivial queries have a place at the table. Like, when and how will White Russians finally have their breakthrough in Toronto’s rapidly evolving cocktail culture?

We can’t be the only ones wondering.

If you’re a little out of the loop, the Toronto Foundation’s 2013 Vital Signs Report is a great resource for identifying our city’s most pressing issues. One vital sign that stood out to us was the need to rebuild Toronto’s brand – and a dinner hosting 10 of the city’s brightest designers, wordsmiths, and international branding strategists sounds like a good place to start.

So if you’ve been ranting for four years that an ape could perform better than Rob Ford in office – here’s your chance to shine. And if you just can’t wait until October 7th, feel free to leave your bright ideas in the comments below.

 

#NOTABLE

Cover Image: stylemepretty.com

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