The City of Toronto thinks you need to be protected from the likes of Peter Genest.
His trade: Dealing mostly in new records, with a few second-hand CDs, out of a shop on Bloor Street West near Ossington Avenue.
The city’s demand: Cough up $555 for a special licence to sell second-hand goods.
For Genest, who has been scraping a living from his small shop for the past two years, it’s a sudden and unexpected demand for cash he can’t readily afford.
And neither he, nor politicians who make the city’s bylaws, can think of a reason why he should have to.
When asked whether he could think of any reason why a shop selling used CDs should need a special licence from the city, Councillor Howard Moscoe, who chairs the city’s licensing and standards committee, replied in a single word:
“No.”
