By Jack Brittle, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Kevin Jackson, a man who grew up in Burlington, recently started a petition to rename Bromley Park, located in the Elizabeth Gardens neighbourhood in southeast Burlington, after his mother and father, Donald and Patricia Jackson.
Jackson, whose petition has almost 200 signatures at the time of writing this article, said he started the movement as a way to keep the memory of his parents and their hard work alive.
“I felt the need to give something back to a neighbourhood that had given me so much and at the same time honour my parents for being survivors and the way they raised eight kids,” Jackson said. “I wanted to do something that captured the extent to which they were admired, respected, and loved within the community.”
Jackson feels that the current name “Bromley Park,” named after the street on which the park is located, which is in turn named after a town in London, England, does not have a sufficient connection with the people currently living there.
“A park named after exceptional parents of eight children from the immediate vicinity [whom] have added to the local history in constructive service has far more meaning and potential inspiration to younger community members as a reinforcement to family values,” Jackson said. “A number of people I approached in the door-to-door petition commented that ‘now we will finally have a park with a name that actually means something.’”
Kevin Jackson’s brother is Cam Jackson, who formerly served as mayor of Burlington from 2006 to 2010 and MPP of Burlington South from 1999 to 2006.
According to Kevin, Cam is not involved with the petition at all.
“He did not want this to become political or do anything that could draw attention to himself as he wanted this to be purely about our parents,” Jackson said. “I respect him for that, and it was the right decision.”
Jackson has pledged to donate his inheritance of $30,000 to the upkeep and maintenance of the park.
But Jackson’s petition is not without its detractors.
Denise Davy, a current resident of Burlington and former writer for The Hamilton Spectator, has started a counter-petition to keep the name of Bromley Park as it is. It has received over 350 signatures.
Davy says she was shocked when she first found out about Jackson’s proposal.
“I was absolutely gobsmacked,” Davy said. “Because there are so many areas where it just didn’t fit, starting with the total lack of community service that would merit such an honour to have an entire park named after a person or a family.”
Davy said she was also surprised at the fact that so many of the signatures were seemingly coming from people living outside of Burlington.
“I was shocked that, I think at the time there were maybe 10 or 20 actually from Burlington in terms of the names on the petitions, and the other names, because I just went through and looked at the other names, were people from Las Vegas, New York, Hong Kong, Calgary, and tons from B.C.,” Davy said.
Davy hypothesized that all the out-of-country and province signatures might come from other connections to Jackson.
“I think these are people that have never been to Burlington, never been to the park, and are either friends or business acquaintances of Kevin’s,” Davy said.
Jackson said that this is not the case.
“Yes, the online petition shows people mostly outside of Burlington,” Jackson said. “But these are largely people from the neighbourhood in the 1960s or people who knew my parents. What was omitted on social media was there is also a door-to-door petition of over 300 names.”
Jackson said that he was part of the door-to-door petition as well.
“I personally canvassed Linwood, Bromley (above White Pines), Pineland, Waldoncroft, Maureen Court, and White Pines,” Jackson said. “Nine out of 10 people who opened their door to me signed, many before I could even finish my pitch. There were six people who preferred to keep the status quo, one person who signed and then changed her mind, and some people who were not home.”
According to Kevin Klingenberg, the manager of information and governance and deputy clerk of Burlington, the city will look into the postal codes.
“If the postal codes are not Burlington codes, it would not affect the petition eligibility; however, it may affect the Council’s consideration of the petition,” Klingenberg said.
Davy also questioned the donation that Jackson has pledged to help work on the park.
“I was concerned about the fact that he had offered this so-called donation to the upkeep of the park,” Davy said. “Well, park maintenance is completely covered by tax-payer funded city budget. So, you can’t actually give money to the city to help with the upkeep.”
Along with these factors, Davy was concerned with the fact that Jackson currently lives in Turkey, and not in Burlington.
“I thought, ‘he’s not even really vested in this issue as much as the people who live there,’” Davy said. “I want to stress the importance of that, that people live in the area and have a connection to this park. And I think it’s an issue that he doesn’t even live in this country anymore, let alone this neighborhood.”
Davy mentioned the fact that Burlington has a program in place where you can nominate people to name a city bench after and wondered why Jackson didn’t choose this route instead.
“I don’t know. I guess it’s just a bigger splash,” Davy said. “So many people in the Facebook posts [about the petition to rename the park] have said that’s what these memorial benches are for.”
Jackson says that to him, a bench just wasn’t enough.
“A park bench just did not capture the strength of feelings I have for what my parents accomplished by raising eight kids as well as they did when you consider the horror and torture that my mother in particular sustained as a young child,” Jackson said.
Jackson mentions in his website dedicated to the petition that his mother hired “young women (and one LGBTQ, I recall) who were down on their luck to help out looking after us while she was giving birth and the months following.”
Davy said that many people in the LGBTQ+ community that she knows were not pleased with this statement.
“I have neighbours who are a member of that community, and they took great offense to that,” Davy said.
“They’re like, ‘I’m sorry, he hired one lesbian or something?’ Like, really? And then again, that’s when people say, ‘Is he serious?’ That his mother used diaper pail water to fertilize the lawn, and so many people have said to me, ‘So did my parents. I’m not asking for a whole park to be named after me,’” Davy continued.
Jackson says that after all the opposition he is trying to figure out another way to introduce the petition to City Hall.
“I have to assess the whole situation in view of the blowback from some in Ward 5 who feel that the park name should remain as is,” Jackson said. “I have no wish to divide the community and am working with the city to find a solution.”
Davy says that she has spoken to people who are willing to join together and stop the renaming.
“The group I’ve talked to are willing to fill city council chambers and delegate against this,” Davy said. “And it’s nothing to do with lack of respect for the Jackson family or anything.”
Davy said that even without that happening, she doesn’t think the petition will succeed.
“I can’t see it going ahead,” Davy said. “I can’t see it being approved. Like I said, we have way more names. We’ve also got tradition on our side in terms of why Bromley was named the way it was. And so, for those two reasons alone, it’s not going to go ahead. I can’t see it being approved.”
Despite all this, Jackson still believes in his petition.
“While my mother did nothing in particular that warranted news headlines, it is the hundreds of quiet daily acts of support and care that bolstered her neighbours and her community,” Jackson said. “The fact that she was able to do this, while raising eight children, is what made her so loved and admired within the community.”
