After enduring a crummy PowerPoint presentation from Metrolinx, apparently, city columnist Marcus Gee is a little cranky. In the pages of Globe and Mail, Gee argues that what the city needs to solve its transit problem is a nonpolitical agency to tell city council, the province and the citizenry what to do. Of course, such an agency exists: it’s Metrolinx. As Gee points out, Metrolinx was established to provide oversight and guidance—some might even say leadership—on regional transportation planning. Curiously, though, the organization has remained mostly on the sidelines while Rob Ford and Toronto council duke it out for transit supremacy (heck, even Nick Kouvalis is in on the action). Instead of choosing a side, or, you know, settling the dispute, Metrolinx CEO Bruce McCuaig invited journalists to attend a presentation designed to “provide information” and “restate principles.” In other words, to bear witness as Metrolinx continues to waffle. Read the entire story [Globe and Mail] »
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Local experts blast Rob Ford’s transit plan, turning his government-as-business rhetoric against him
(Image: Christopher Drost)
Just in case the mayor is feeling a little too confident after city hall’s victory over CUPE 416 in the recent labour negotiations, a group of over 100 planning experts, academics and other civic leaders issued a letter denouncing the current state of transit planning in the city. The letter challenges Rob Ford’s steadfast commitment to burying the Eglinton LRT and calls for it to be built partially above ground, as well as for a form of “higher-order” transit on Finch West and Sheppard East and the conversion of the Scarborough RT line to light rail.
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Shrewd move by provincial Liberals puts John Tory in charge of Ontario Place revitalization
The Cinesphere is one of the facilities now shut down (Image: Loozrboy)
Earlier this week, the provincial government shut down Ontario Place to make way for a major redevelopment of the entertainment park in time for Canada’s sesquicentennial in 2017. More interesting that the redevelopment, though, is Dalton McGuinty’s government’s choice to have former Progressive Conservative leader John Tory captain it. By all accounts, it’s a deft political manoeuvre—one that effectively limits the scope of criticism for whatever plan the Liberals decide to implement. Still, Tory will be fighting a tough fight. Ontario Place’s attendance numbers are low, the space is expensive to keep open, and the draw has been largely uninspiring for years. While it’s tempting to celebrate revitalization plans, that’s probably not the Liberals’ real agenda. As the Toronto Star’s Martin Regg Cohn suggests, McGuinty is likely more concerned with shutting down a site that costs $20 million a year. In other words, the government is cutting costs and wrapping that in nice political packaging. Read the entire story [Torontoist] »
Editor’s Letter (February 2012): why Ontario schools should talk about homosexuality in the classroom
When I was in the sixth grade, a health instructor employed by the board of education was parachuted into my classroom to talk about puberty. She arrived with two life-size felt cut-outs of naked, child-like bodies—one male, one female—which she hung on the blackboard. After a brief preamble, she asked the class to name the changes bodies experience during puberty. Kids tentatively put up their hands, offering ideas: “Girls grow breasts,” and “You get pubic hair,” and “Boys grow moustaches.” After every correct answer, the health instructor dug into her bag and, without even a sprinkle of humour, extracted small felt swatches of pretend armpit hair and cushiony stuffed pretend breasts. As she Velcroed them onto the nude figures, we watched the nameless doll figures grow up before our eyes.
By that point, a few kids in the class were already going through puberty, so most of this wasn’t news. But it was helpful to have the subject released from behind a cloak of confusion and shame. The rest of my preteen sexual education was provided by Sue Johanson, who was a sex educator in North York classrooms before she became a media personality. On her Sunday night call-in show, she took all questions seriously, no matter how goofy, offering frank answers. She believed that everyone had the right to enjoy sex, safely and sensibly, and I can’t imagine a better way to learn about it.
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In the face of mounting dissent around his transit plan, Rob Ford and his inner circle are dusting off their trusty set of talking points. Doug Ford is quoted in the Toronto Sun saying that he refuses to treat Scarborough residents like “second-class citizens” (because first-class citizens waste billions of dollars on unnecessary subways?), while Rob says Scarborough residents voted him into office with, you guessed it, a mandate to build subways. The mayor also pointed to the province’s support of his current plan—but the Dalton McGuinty government appears to be having second thoughts, given transportation minister Bob Chiarelli’s statement yesterday that the city “doesn’t have its act together.” Heck, even Giorgio Mammoliti is having doubts. Read the entire story [National Post] »
Gord Perks on why he thinks Rob Ford and co. have a “radical conservative agenda”
“I believe the administration we have right now does not believe that government should be delivering services….They’re like the Margaret Thatchers and Ronald Reagans of the world, who say we should cut government, we should just eliminate it and who cares about the social benefits that government provides.”
So said city councillor Gord Perks earlier this week, joining the group of left-leaning councillors who have ramped up their rhetoric in the city’s budget wars.
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Are Rob Ford’s proposed 2012 budget cuts essentially equivalent to health care cuts?
(Image: Christopher Drost)
A group of health care professionals visited city hall early this week with a petition in hand containing nearly 300 signatures and calling on Rob Ford and his council cronies to spare community programs from the axe. The group warned that many of the proposed cuts to city services were tantamount to health care cuts—a move that will likely amplify the growing backlash against the 2012 budget and make the task of selling cuts to the public that much harder for the mayor.
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How bullying became the crisis of a generation
Kids are committing suicide, parents are in a panic, and schools that neglect to protect students are lawsuit targets
Mitchell Wilson had a short life. He was born in March 2000 at Markham-Stouffville Hospital to Craig and Shelley Wilson. From the age of three, he had trouble running and jumping. He climbed stairs slowly, putting both feet on each step before moving up. He fell often, and sometimes he couldn’t get up on his own. His doctors thought he had hypermobility syndrome—joints that extend and bend more than normal.
When Mitchell was seven, his mother was diagnosed with an aggressive melanoma. Her treatments left her distant, sometimes testy and mean, and in so much pain that she rarely left her bedroom. “I sort of kept Mitchell away,” Craig Wilson told me.
“He basically didn’t talk to his mother during the last four months of her life.” Wilson often left his son to his own devices while he took care of his dying wife and ran his family’s industrial knife business. Mitchell spent most of his time in his bedroom, playing video games. He comforted himself with food, and by the time he was four feet tall he weighed 167 pounds. Once, in a Walmart, he fell to the ground and his grandmother had to ask store employees to help her lift him.
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Reason to Love Toronto: because the city ombudsman fights city hall—and wins
Fiona Crean skis double black diamonds. She paraglides off cliffs in Peru. And as Toronto’s ombudsman—our Judge Judy on all matters municipal—she takes on the power brokers at city hall. In October, she pulled off her biggest coup since starting the job in 2009. Crean discovered that over 90 per cent of the 12,000 claims residents made to the city between 2005 and 2010—over sewer backups, fallen tree branches, potholes and the like—had been automatically rejected. Her team’s sweeping, 14-month investigation unearthed something even more gobsmacking: the staffers who were dismissing these claims were lying to claimants, telling them that an investigation had been conducted. Crean is a seasoned political animal, having worked as interim ombudsman for Ontario, so she knows how the game is played. She held a press conference to reveal her findings, essentially giving Ford—the mayor who prides himself on quality customer service—no option but to comply. She made 10 recommendations, which the city manager, Joe Pennachetti, quickly accepted, promising to implement a new service standard by the end of this month. For a resident with a flooded basement or a cracked axle, that means no more bureaucratic foot-dragging on the other end of the line. Within 18 months—a nanosecond in the glacially paced world of government—Crean spotted a gargantuan problem and fixed it, turning her fury into results. Now that’s something we can get behind.
Rob Granatstein: why the city should sell off its assets—slowly but surely
To close the budget gap, Rob Ford wants to sell city assets. Good idea, bad timing. Even a novice real estate investor knows to fix up the house before putting it on the market
Cities acquire assets for many reasons. Sometimes a wealthy citizen donates a property, as in the case of High Park; sometimes assets, such as Henry Pellatt’s Casa Loma, are seized when tax bills go unpaid. A city grows to meet the needs of its citizens, adding public housing and office buildings, a zoo (or three), convention centres, highways, police and fire stations, parks, arenas, garbage trucks, landfill sites and libraries.
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Apparently bored with actual news, the Toronto Sun conducted a poll of city councillors to see if Rob Ford has the votes necessary to kill the five-cent plastic bag “tax.” Unfortunately for Ford, 23 alleged pinko latte sippers councillors support keeping the fee (only the mayor and 13 allies—including Frances Nunziata, who called it “a crazy tax”—would kill it). In an editorial on the same issue, the Star countered that, “like much of Ford’s agenda, his opposition to the mandatory fee seems based more on small-government sentiment and raw populist emotion than any sound policy analysis.” Given the real (and obvious) benefits of the bag fee, we’re inclined to agree. Read the entire story [Toronto Sun] »
The provincial government is looking to replace the Public Works Protection Act, better known as the “secret G20 law,” which gave police sweeping powers during the international summit. The PWPA was originally intended to protect the province from “Nazi saboteurs,” so we say it’s probably safe to scrap it, though what’s even more surprising about the act is that it hasn’t been done away with already. Read the entire story [Toronto Star] »
Head of Indonesia RIM a suspect in BlackBerry brawl
Anyone afraid of more ugly news after Research in Motion’s no good, very bad week probably should click over here—because the Jakarta police have implicated Canadian Andrew Cobham, RIM’s president director in Indonesia, and RIM security consultant Terry Burkey in the mayhem over a BlackBerry sale that left dozens of people unconscious and several injured two weeks ago.
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The Toronto Star reports that Metrolinx is considering snubbing the TTC on the Eglinton Crosstown LRT, opting instead for a public-private model to build and operate the $8.2 billion project that wouldn’t involve the city’s transit authority. Apparently, if Metrolinx does go the private partnership route, it will create the biggest public transit project in the province, one that’s administered by Infrastructure Ontario (the government agency that handles alternative financing and procurements). And, according to the Star, the TTC isn’t interested in that approach. Transportation Minister Bob Chiarelli says the model would ensure that cash for Ford’s beloved Sheppard subway extension doesn’t disappear into the Eglinton line—so you can guess how the mayor feels about the idea. Read the entire story [Toronto Star] »
Rob Ford’s finance figures continue to look rather arbitrary—still, he won’t give up his apocalyptic budget rhetoric
(Image: Christopher Drost)
The National Post referred to the most significant cuts in the proposed 2012 budget as “highlights,” which we find slightly unsettling, but the paper does do a good job of rounding them up—closing outdoor swimming pools (both the wading and regular kinds), shutting down three homeless shelters…the list goes on. There’s also that 10 per cent TTC fare hike, which will see transit riders paying a premium to ride more crowded vehicles that come less often. Rejoice! But what’s as interesting as the cuts themselves is that many departments didn’t make the cuts they were supposed to—in other words, they didn’t fulfill Rob Ford’s desire for 10 per cent budget reductions across all departments.
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