Relocating and importing

Our research has led us to some solid conclusions.

Since moving to Canada directly would involve Nickie going without health insurance or employment for around 10-18 months, by my current guesstimate, we decided it would make more sense to stay in the U.S. for now and continue saving up while the paperwork is processing.

I looked into what it would take to import our vehicle(s) into Canada. I also looked into importing an RV to Canada. There are things you have to do with U.S. Customs as well as Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA). When all is said and done, it doesn't seem like it's worth the pain in the rear. We even asked about buying a Canadian-made RV and bringing it to the U.S. - that would be considered importing to the U.S. even though it would be temporary, and re-importing to Canada including all associated fees even though it's already made to Canadian specs. Our decision -- forget it. Wait until we land in Canada and buy one then. And part with one or both of our cars before landing, to minimize the headaches.

Thirdly, our current neighborhood is most excellent for driving one absolutely mad, what with helicopter chases, gang members hiding out on the property, and all sorts of other insanity I don't care to get into. So we have been looking for another place to live while the paperwork is in process and such, as mentioned before. We looked into a number of places here in Southern California that, last we knew, were still decent places to live. Very few of them have remained decent - most of them are now gangland, plagued with crime, and falling into disrepair and neglect. We even saw some of this as far north as Santa Barbara! Southern CA is a dump, overall, and getting worse... Northern CA rents are, incredibly, even more expensive than Southern CA. We found all this rather discouraging, and weighed more heavily toward leaving CA altogether; of the out-of-state areas we were considering, that mainly left MN and OR. It seems that Minneapolis, MN rents are expensive like L.A., and I know from my research that it's actually colder in MN than in Ontario, Canada, and I've been buying warm clothes but I really don't think we're prepared to drive into the ice and snow to try and acclimate in the dead of winter. Ditto on the winter thing in upstate NY, which right now is measuring snow in feet, not inches. That leaves Portland, OR, which is a relatively short drive away (about 14-15 hours), has a milder winter, and we've been there and liked many things about it.

So in a nutshell:

• Complete and submit Outside Canada application
• Move to Portland OR vicinity, save up and wait
• On approval of application, sell car(s)
• Land in Canada and purchase RV
  

Locations

This is a list of some locations currently under consideration for our immediate move. Items will be turned gray if we cross them off our list. Because we are (A) visible minorities and (B) gay, and want minimal hassling over either of these, things like racial diversity/tolerance and legal recognition of gay relationships will weigh heavily on our decision about where to go.

SSM= Same-Sex Marriage
civil union = same rights as marriage but with a different name
domestic partnership = most of the legal rights of marriage

div = amount of racial diversity
unempl = unemployment rate
jobout = job outlook (the higher the better)


Alaska - anti-SSM constitution, no recognition

• Juneau
• Fairbanks

California - domestic partnership, racially diverse

• Brea
• Fullerton
• Irvine?
  
• La Mirada
  
• Monrovia
  
• Pasadena
• Placentia
  
• San Dimas
• San Luis Obispo-Atascadero-Paso Robles - 3.2% unempl
• Temple City
  
  avoid:
  
  
• Anaheim
• Garden Grove
• Santa Ana
  

Connecticut - civil union

• Bridgeport - $? 5.3% jobout
  
• Danbury - $? 50-60% div 3.4% unempl 6.3% jobout
  
• Hartford
• New Haven-Meriden - 50-60% div 6.5% jobout
  
• New London-Norwich - 30-40% div
  
• Stamford-Norwalk - $? 50-60% div 3.2% unempl 5.1% jobout
  
• Waterbury - 6.7% jobout
  

Massachusetts - SSM

• Barnstable-Yarmouth - $? 10-20% div
  
• Boston - $? 50-60% div
  
• Brockton - $? 10-20% div
  
• Fitchburg-Leominster - 30-40% div 7.1% jobout
  
• Lawrence - $? 30-40% div
  
• New Bedford - $? 10-20% div
  
• Pittsfield - 10-20% div 5.4% jobout
• Providence-Fall River-Warwick - 5.7%
  
• Springfield - 5.8% jobout
  
• Worcester - 50-60% 6.4% jobout -2.4% jobgro
  

Minnesota - no recognition

• Minneapolis - major traffic, colder than Ontario
  

New York - no recognition

• Ithaca
• Rochester
• - Skaneateles
• - Victor
• - Perinton
• - Pittsford
• Syracuse

Ontario - SSM

• Ottawa
• Peterborough
• Markham
• Toronto

Vermont - civil union

• Burlington - 3.1% unempl

Comparison

• Los Angeles - 6.2% jobout
  

Locations - Plan B

These are more considerations in case there is a problem with immigration. If for some reason Canada was unattainable, it would be nice to live close by so we could at least travel there frequently. Michigan and New York are the closest states to the area we want to be in, and I apologize in advance to any, uh, Michiganians? Michiganis? ...but we are not interested in living there.

I've read that Ithaca, NY is very gay-friendly and sounds like a nice place to live. It's around 4-5 hours' drive to the border. Also (and I'd have to check on the details of it's job market and such), Buffalo, NY is just this side of the border and I've read that it and Syracuse have a decent IT job market. One thing we can vouch for after driving and taking the train through upstate NY is that there's no denying it's gorgeous. This could be a very pleasant alternative.

In other news, it looks like getting the RV washed up would be about $60+, or a wash with a long-overdue wax job would be about $150-250. Ouch, but I'll bet you're liable to lose a lot more than that trying to sell it dirty, as people will assume it's been neglected and be willing to part with much less $.

RV prep, Locations, and some thoughts

Well, after spending most of the weekend emptying, dusting, scrubbing, wiping, and sweeping the RV (or recovering from it, LOL), I can finally say it's almost ready for sale. I still need to do a couple of things, but it's looking very nice inside. There is no access to a water hose or anything there in the storage facility so I'll have to hire someone to wash down the outside. Here's hoping it will fetch a fair price!

Some good news: one manager of the RV storage facility called this afternoon and said he'd found the info for a guy who regularly does RV detailing there, and better yet, he might even make us an offer on it while he's at it. If he's willing to offer a reasonable amount, I can't think of anything more perfect than that!

We're still talking about where we're going to go. For one thing, it's very important to us to live in a gay-friendly area, something we unfortunately always have to consider.

By the way, is it annoying to have such restrictions on where one can live without having people feel it's their business to butt into your life and hassle you about something that's none of their *#@! beeswax, without living in fear that one day they're going to drag you from the back of their truck to the boonies somewhere and then beat you to death? You betcha it is! As I posted in one forum:

...if two people are happy in a gay/lesbian relationship and minding their own business, what gives you or anyone else the right to butt into their lives and start lecturing? You may call it "evangelism," but a lot of other straight people would call it HARASSMENT.

Catholicism condemns divorce, but you don't see Catholics picketing provincial courts and tracking down divorcees to lecture them that they're going to hell.

You don't see Muslims stopping female neighbours to lecture them that it's sinful for them to be going outside with no scarf over their hair.

You don't see Jews stopping people in supermarkets to lecture them that it's an abomination for them to eat non-Kosher foods.

Then why do you think it's okay to harass gays and lesbians in this way?

I don't get why people seem to think it's okay to run around judging other people and telling them how to live. But until they get a clue (or a life), we'd rather live someplace where tolerance is the rule and not the exception.

Anyway, Minneapolis has been looking the most promising as a geographical midway stop in terms of being very gay friendly and having a high quality of life in many ways. It looks like it's clean, has lots of jobs, highly educated people, low crime, lots of walking/bicycling trails, plenty of museums and things to do, etc. People from/visiting there seem to have great things to say about it. By the way one of my favo(U)rite places to check on U.S. cities is CityData.com . It would be even better if they'd also do Canadian cities, and I suggested this, but what can you do?

We've been talking, however, about the fact that it would likely be better and cheaper to just go directly through to Ontario and do an "inside Canada" PR application. Otherwise we'd have to pack up everything in boxes, move, get driver's licenses, license plates, and car insurance for the new state, then turn around and do it all again to go to Canada. As lovely as Minneapolis sounds, I still think it would be my second choice. Which is good to keep in mind, because one of the things I've heard that immigration asks you is what your plans are if your PR application was to be turned down. They want to know that you've discussed the possibility and planned for it. Minneapolis sounds like a truly great place, and a Plan B that we could be quite happy with.

Background

I'm a dual citizen, having been born in Canada to a U.S. father and a Canadian mother and all the proper residency requirements having been met. As a citizen I have the right to live and work in Canada, but since my wife and father are U.S. citizens, there is some paperwork and such to do for them to be able to do the same. They need Permanent Residency status. My father had PR status back when I was a kid, but it's debatable whether he can retain that. That's a story for another day. There are several ways to get PR status, called classes. As a Canadian citizen I can sponsor my wife under the Family Class, which involves "sponsoring" her for 3 years. Sponsorship means agreeing to ensure that her living needs are met so she doesn't need to apply for social assistance (welfare). In other words, they want to ensure you're not creating a burden on the system by bringing people to Canada and then just expecting the government to support them.

The best place to start for more information on Canadian immigration is the Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) website at http://www.cic.gc.ca . It's pretty well organized and they also have all the forms you'd ever need, in downloadable Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format. Saves them from mailing them and you from waiting for them. :)

It's worth mentioning that we are pretty desperate to move, regardless of the destination. We stay here for free because my mother owns the property and I'm managing it on her behalf (also another story for another day, and one reason why we've stayed as long as we have), but this area is infested with gangs and it's positively nervewracking to live here. After more than 2 years of watching the gangs move into our neighborhood, and putting up with more and more of the helicopter/car chases, gunfire, crime, graffiti, habitual trespassing on this property doing who knows what, and other problems they bring, we're ready to leave this place by hook or by crook - yesterday if possible. What a cesspool! Why anyone sane (who isn't rich enough to insulate oneself by living in the well-to-do areas) would ever choose to live here voluntarily is beyond me.

That said, we've been rather undecided whether to make the move directly to Canada and apply for PR after we're there, or temporarily move someplace else in the U.S. and apply for PR while continuing to save money for the "big move." I suppose we will probably do the latter, but if we do, then where? We'd like to cut costs to save money faster. We have an RV but it's not equipped for cold, so we can either live in the RV someplace temperate (we don't mind it, and it's cheaper than renting an apartment) or sell it and live someplace with a lower cost of living. Ultimately, for our Canadian destination, we'd like to end up somewhere in Ontario between Toronto and Ottawa. Some considerations for the meantime, so far:

• local suburbs - "known evil," may be quickest way out, not great but at least significantly better than here
• Oregon coast - wonderfully peaceful and beautiful, but is also tsunami hazard zone, and finding work could be a real challenge
• Minneapolis - very nice place in many regards, jobs seem plentiful, much closer to Ontario, but we'd have to rent an apartment because the RV wouldn't withstand the winters
• Colorado somewhere - beautiful area, don't know much else so still doing research, RV wouldn't withstand the winters