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(Photo: John Cullen)
We expected a bumpy ride with Ford as mayor, but we weren’t prepared for a self-sabotaging Lindsay Lohan of politics. With a new scandal every week, it’s easy to lose track. Hence, we present a scrapbook of two very long years in Fordlandia.
Rob Ford earned $173,869 including taxable benefits in 2012
Each year, Queen’s Park releases the sunshine list, a catalogue of all the Ontario public servants who made $100,000 or more—and, because the $100,000 threshold hasn’t changed since the list’s inception in 1996, that exalted group now contains nearly 88,412 members. (Were the benchmark tied to inflation, it would now be over $139,000, cutting the list to about 18,000 people.) Since most people have better things to do this long weekend than sift through tens of thousands of names, we put together this cheat sheet of 2012’s most high-profile recipients of public largesse.
Ontario Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak sounded eerily like his good buddy Rob Ford yesterday in a speech to the Toronto Region Board of Trade. Hudak outlined his three-point plan for expanding Toronto’s transit system: (1) root out waste (one of Ford’s favourite pastimes); (2) subways, subways, subways, especially in Scarborough; and (3) no new taxes or tolls to pay for transit (Ford has been criticized—and mocked—for his staunch opposition to new revenue sources). Hudak even said Toronto is a city where “something has gone off the rails”—like, say, a gravy train? [Toronto Star]
(Images: Tim Hudak, Ontario Chamber of Commerce; Rob Ford, Christopher Drost)
(Image: Facebook)
After a Liberal leadership convention full of the usual back-room alliances and surprise reversals, Kathleen Wynne emerged as Ontario’s first female premier and Canada’s first openly gay premier. Although a few columnists and reporters touched on those firsts, most politicians and pundits are focused on how Wynne will handle the long list of headaches she’s inheriting from Dalton McGuinty: the Liberals are facing a precarious minority government, poor poll results and the province’s $14.4-billion deficit. Below, what Queen’s Park watchers are saying about Wynne’s win, and whether she can handle the challenges ahead.
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(Image: Sh4rp_i)
Despite the fact that Ford Fest is open to anyone who cares to schlep over to Rob Ford’s mom’s house in Etobicoke, every year there seems to be some issue with the guest list at the community barbecue. Last year it was speculation over whether Tim Hudak would attend (he did); this year, a contingent from the LGBT community is planning an unofficial Pride parade for this evening’s event. The idea is to help the mayor see what he’s been missing (and, we imagine, to enjoy some hot dogs, beer and pony rides). The group’s Facebook event page explains:
Well, since Rob was too busy to come to any Pride events this year, we are going to bring the Pride Parade to his backyard. After all, everyone is invited.
Not in Ontario (Image: Owen Byrne)
Well, that was fast. Despite corralling 113,000 signatures, a request from the Ontario Convenience Stores Association to bring beer and wine to corner stores was shot down by Ontario Liberals yesterday. In an email to the Toronto Sun, Aly Vitunski, a spokesperson for Ontario Finance Minister Dwight Duncan, adopted an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” kind of attitude, saying: “The current system balances access for both customers and suppliers with social responsibility. We take the concerns of convenience store owners seriously, but we believe the current system of selling liquor is an effective way to guard the public interest.” The Sun also quotes NDP MPP Rosario Marchese making similar noises, although Tim Hudak, at least, “didn’t reject the idea outright.” Perhaps the $1.5 billion annual dividend the LCBO pays to provincial coffers has something to do with all this? [Toronto Sun]
Loyal councillors have defied him. His approval ratings have plummeted. And his powerful Conservative backers are nervous. How did it all go so wrong? The strange story of Rob Ford’s city hall
On Newstalk 1010, the sly strains of the Hollies hit “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother” offered the first clue. Then morning host Jerry Agar burst on the air with a surprise announcement: Rob Ford and his councillor sibling Doug were taking over the station’s Sunday afternoon talk-fest, The City. For the once-staid CFRB, landing the boisterous brother act that Margaret Atwood had puckishly dubbed the “twin Ford mayors” was clearly a coup, but that didn’t answer the more obvious question: why on earth would the Fords want to spend two more hours a week in front of an open microphone when they were hardly suffering from a lack of media exposure?
Rob Ford, after all, ranks as one of the most compelling and exhaustively chronicled figures in Canadian politics, adored and despised with equal gusto. His every pronouncement seems to turn into front-page fodder, his every grimace and belly scratch catalogued by rapt photographers. And who could forget the YouTube footage of comedian Mary Walsh arriving in his driveway, decked out with a velvet breastplate and a plastic sword?
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—Progressive Conservative leader and Boston Bruins fan Tim Hudak, on why Toronto’s home team is just like the prank-loving, Jesus tattoo-sporting pop star. Though Hudak praised the city for having “the best damn hockey market in the world,” his warm feelings don’t extend to the perenially struggling Leafs (he calls their plans to rebuild “another way of continuing to strive for mediocrity”). So, what does the naysayer think could help? He told the Globe and Mail that competition from another Southern Ontario team would force the Leafs to pull up their socks (we’re looking at you, Markham). Although we agree with Hudak that the woebegone Leafs need to get their act together, we doubt alienating both the Bieber-loving and Maple Leafs-loving demographics is a smart political move. [Globe and Mail]
(Images: Tim Hudak, Ontario Chamber of Commerce; Justin Bieber, Adam Sundana)
Rob Ford is now looking outside Toronto’s borders to continue the eternal fight for subways. Ford, an avowed supporter of Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives, told radio listeners Sunday that he’d to use the powers of Ford Nation in the provincial by-election in Kitchener-Waterloo. “I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure a certain party does not win,” he said. “We cannot let the Liberals run this province like they are.” See, if Dalton McGuinty and his Liberal party win the seat, they’d clinch a majority government at Queen’s Park and the support for LRT construction would continue. If anyone but the Liberals win the seat, there would still be a chance for the Liberal minority to be toppled, setting the stage for PC leader and Ford buddy Tim Hudak to re-open the notion of subway-building. Sounds like a lot of ifs to play out before Torontonians are riding underground along the length of Sheppard, but Ford is nothing if not obsessed with subways, subways, subways. [Metro News]
(Images: Rob Ford, Shaun Merritt; Dalton McGuinty, Jennifer K. Warren; Sheppard subway station, Kenny Louie)
(Image: Christopher Drost)
Rob Ford has been silent since Metrolinx resurrected the LRT-based transit plan he cancelled on his first day in office, but the mayor’s brother Doug (as usual) was less shy. Yesterday, Doug vowed to continue fighting for subways into the 2014 election—even though construction on the Sheppard LRT line is scheduled to start in the summer of 2014. “We are going to run on subways,” he told the Globe and Mail, saying that councillors who voted in favour of the LRT-based plan “are going to be held accountable in the next election” (we can just picture the construction-site press conferences). Moreover, if Dalton McGuinty’s Liberal minority topples before 2014, Doug said he would leave his brother’s side, run as an MPP and try to help direct the transit debate from Queen’s Park. Though that’s several steps off, Doug’s comments do serve as a reminder that this plan is only secure as long as the Liberals maintain their hold on Queen’s Park—the Progressive Conservatives’ Tim Hudak has already shown how much he supports subways. [Globe and Mail]
(Image: Ontario Chamber of Commerce)
Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak took some time this week to catch up on his correspondence, sending out 100,000 postcards to Torontonians as a reminder that the PCs love subways and would give the city a Sheppard line if they were in power. Except, they’re not. And council just voted 24-19 in favour of an LRT on Sheppard a week ago. And the PCs killed the Eglinton subway expansion back in 1995. So, the mail-out is really more of a lame (albeit nicely designed) attempt to pander to residents who believe Toronto would be a world-class city with an extra subway or two—and to score some points with a mayor whose clout is waning. Read the entire story [Torontoist] »
Dalton McGuinty made $208,974 last year (Image: Communitech Photos)
Once again, Ontario’s sunshine list has spotlighted the public servants who made $100,000 or more last year. A list of rich people is always a delight, and this year’s disclosure—released late last week—set the stage for today’s release of what will likely be an austere provincial budget, given Ontario’s troubling $16-billion deficit. The full group of six-figure earners is 79,000-strong, so we’ve compiled a cheat sheet of a few of the most high-profile.
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(Image: Ontario Chamber of Commerce)
Tim Hudak’s bit of grandstanding on the Toronto transit file was a political move—and a bad one, it would seem. In today’s Toronto Star, Martin Regg Cohn explains why Hudak’s call for the province to ignore council’s wishes and support Rob Ford’s subway dreams didn’t help the Progressive Conservatives at all. Not only is Hudak’s call for subways hypocritical, since his party cancelled the Eglinton expansion in 1995, but it also contradicts his claim that cities’ wishes should prevail on other issues (like wind farms). Regg Cohn also reiterates that joining forces with Ford didn’t work for the Tories in last fall’s provincial election. So why is Hudak so keen to do it again? Read the entire story [Toronto Star] »
(Image: Ontario Chamber of Commerce)
As if Toronto’s transit planning, with its many hirings, firings and re-hirings, wasn’t slow enough, Tim Hudak tried to throw more sand in the gears yesterday. The urban planning expert Progressive Conservative leader moved for the province to force through Rob Ford’s pet subway project and axe the council-backed light-rail plan. (A hypocritical move, Dalton McGuinty pointed out, considering Hudak was part of the PC government that killed the Eglinton West subway back in 1995.) Hudak’s arguments in favour of subways sounded familiar enough to make us wonder if he’s joining Ford in some early campaigning. If that’s the case, even the motion’s quick defeat doesn’t matter much: according to the Ford handbook, what supporters think you’re trying to do counts more than what you actually accomplish. Read the entire story [Globe and Mail] »
Apparently hoping to learn a thing or two about, you know, actually winning elections, the Ontario Progressive Conservatives chose one of the masterminds behind Rob Ford’s triumphant mayoral campaign as the new party president. Just like the man he helped put in office, Richard Ciano, who runs the political consultancy firm Campaign Research alongside Nick Kouvalis, won the election handily. With Ciano at the helm, the Conservatives are hoping they can make in-roads in Toronto (Tim Hudak made the painfully obvious point that Ciano knows how to win elections there), where the party hasn’t landed a seat since 1999. Though we can’t help but wonder if the Conservatives really want to be betting on the Ford factor to deliver them Toronto right now. Read the entire story [Toronto Star] »
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