City
Morning Brew: Balsillie Rejected Again, John Tory for Mayor, Electric Rail Link to Pearson, Strippers Behaving Badly
Photo: "Orphaned" by thisisclaudia, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.
What's happening in the GTA (and sometimes beyond):
Hockey fans mourn. A Phoenix judge has shut down Jim Balsillie's attempt to move the failing Coyotes NHL franchise to the GTA. Will he give up, or will he try again in the future, with the next failing US team? Any chance he could present a solid case to create an expansion team in the area?
John Tory is considering a run for mayor of Toronto. Given the current state and gloomy forecast in the economy, would a fiscal conservative be a good choice for this city, or would electing him seem like a good idea in the short term and a reason to bitch when services get trimmed nearly bare?
Strippers in Etobicoke are getting neck-deep in trouble. A male dancer has been arrested after it's alleged that he cornered a female patron and assaulted her in a club's basement, and in a separate incident a female dancer was arrested and charged with impaired driving after hopping a curb in her car and bouncing her ex-boyfriend's face off the windshield.
When finding yourself in the unfortunate situation of having to choose between your iPhone and your spleen, always choose your spleen. A suspect is being sought after allegedly repeatedly stabbing his mugging victim when the victim resisted handing over his cell phone put up an argument.
Toronto Public Health has it right. They're bluntly telling Metrolinx that the proposed rail link between the city core and Pearson airport must be electric from the start. With the amount of people it'll be moving (along with GO Transit's anticipated growth), it would be detrimental to plan on diesel.
And I was lucky enough to catch a preview screening of an incredible film last night - one of those films that makes you think "everyone should see this film!" When Food, Inc. opens at theatres in Toronto (on June 19th), go see it!
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Jerrold, do you have any information as to where it will be playing on June 19th?
Given the current state it would be nice to have a Mayor, for the first time, fix the city's finances and have some money left over instead of begging, pleading and bending over to the province and feds.
To be fair, however, even if Tory or some other conservative ran and won, if city council is still full of left-of-centre hacks, not much will get done and the city will be even worse off than it is now.
Focus on transit by putting toll roads up and dedicating funds to transit development, focus on further privatizing services such as the TTC and garbage pickup by not renewing union contracts, focus on public housing and focus on balancing the budget. It can be done. The current city council does not have the stomach to do it. Maybe some new people won't have that same issue.
As for privitizing the TTC....well, if you want a service that runs great during peak times on peak routes (the profitable ones) but doesn't go to Scarborough after 7 PM and not at all on Sunday, sure, go ahead.
As for privatizing the TTC, I meant (should have clarified) getting rid of union workers for private workers and not privatizing routes. Transit needs to be expanded but not if the guy who collects tickets and fares makes more than you and I combined.
I agree. Let's make the decision to stop approving budget increases for the police until they open up their finances to public scrutiny. I bet we could trim their budget by 25% without any impact on community safety.
Ain't it funny how Toronto/Ontario/Canada has so much trouble wrapping its head around infrastructure that's common in, say, rich and advanced countries like Bulgaria?
Oh, and John Tory for mayor? Sounds like it might be worth a shot. This city is crumbling under Miller, and people are losing faith. A red tory (as opposed to the extremists in Ottawa) could be what we need.
Oh, and Rob: a successful mayor must be able to secure funding and support from the feds and QP. It's arguably THE big job of the mayor, and the biggest challenge for Toronto in particular.
Instead, I'm advocating that in a bloated city government there are savings to be found and made. The city for a long time has let themselves go and refuse to make tough decisions that hurt in the short-term but will be beneficial for the long-term stability of the city and citizens.
If TO really wants to rebuke Miller, focus on the local counsellor race. Miller has support of the 3/4ths of council that leans left. Elect a better mix of Left and Right and he (indeed any Mayor) will need support from both sides of the aisle to set the agenda.
The city isn't broke because of a few thousand here and there in councillors' office budgets, it's broke because of millions of dollars of legitimate and appropriate public spending that needs stable, ongoing transfers from Queen's Park (esp. for transit) along well as a renewed commitment from Toronto residents to put a little more in the pot for everyone's benefit.
Begrudging city workers a decent wage while we pay such low property tax rates (and insist we're already being bled dry) is foolish, selfish, and bunch of other ishes that I won't bother enumerating. Do you want your busses operated by a $12.50/hour exhausted zombie working two jobs to make rent? Cities are expensive, and it's about time we all put up the cash or shut up and move to the middle of nowhere.
I'm not saying there's no fat to be trimmed, but I am saying that obsessing over relatively small expenses without addressing artificially low revenues is pointless. Selling out our votes to slash-and-burn divide-and-conquer latter-day aristocrats in exchange for another piddling tax cut or absurd union-busting fantasies is not the answer.
Remember this folks, never vote for the person that the media loves. Vote for those ignored by the media, those that never get a chance to speak in the media-controlled 'public' debates.
Think of how Rob Ford and Minan-Wong vote and speak out against Miller at every opportunity. Do their opinions on every single issue brought to city hall differ so radically? I doubt it. Now imagine a city hall where that minority now has the power to completely stall progress simply because they belong to a different party affiliation.
And you know that if city hall was lead by the right wing with Miller and the left wing being the minority then it would be the same damn thing with Miller voting down anything proposed by Mayor Rob Ford.
Everyone bitches about what the councilors make, but if you think you would put up with the cranky ratepayers, the lousy hours, the boring ribbon cuttings for what they make, you've obviously never worked in the private sector!
John Tory has business experience. What did Lastman have? Oh, that's right: Bad Boy, which went bankrupt anyway.
Right now, I would vote for a team of trained monkeys to run this city, because they couldn't do a worse job.
Travel a little and see what's going on in other great cities of the world, friendo. Toronto has somehow emerged from a major boom a little more rickety than it was in the mid-90s.
We should all be demaning more of our leaders. It ain't good enough to vote for the lesser evil.
Now excuse me while I go run my taps for 5 minutes before I fill my water jug -- the City's (leaky) water main on my street is still made of lead.
Or
and there's no chance of the extra load leading to another blackout, right?
p.s. why is this "add comment" button so finicky? v. annoying.
p.s. why is this "add comment" button so finicky? v. annoying.
Also, I dont anyone will try and mug me of my Nokia greenscreen relic of a phone, so i should be safe?!