Mayor Rob Ford says he won't attend a flag-raising event at city hall designed to show solidarity with the LGBTQ community on the May 17 International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia. Many thought Ford would attend the event along with Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke as a consolation for skipping the Pride parade later this summer. Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam described the event as "gentle" and "welcoming" to the Globe and Mail. And so the movie for this mayoralty continues to be "Do the Wrong Thing."

Councillor James Pasternak is hopeful council will vote to restore cash to High Park Zoo, Far Enough Farm, and a special hardship fund despite the budget committee voting against the measures. Pasternak wants council to use some of the $292-million surplus money to reverse some of the controversial budget cuts made earlier in the year. The budget committee advises council but cannot make decisions on its own.

The Ford's radio show is stupid and offensive and demeans us all, according to Matt Elliott on his Ford for Toronto blog. If you haven't heard, the brothers Ford and their sidekick, Sun Media's David Menzies, spent most of Sunday afternoon making completely inappropriate comments about many of their (former) rivals - including a discussion about why they couldn't ask George Smitherman if he would die from "HIV-leading-to-AIDS" in office. Though most of the insane remarks were made by Menzies, the Fords made no attempt to separate their own opinions from his.

Outside the radio studio, Rob Ford attended a special meeting of the National Ethnic Press and Media Council of Canada yesterday in the City Hall rotunda to mark Press Freedom Day, but didn't take any questions. Amazingly, The Star write-up made no mention of the ridiculous irony of the occasion.

Pearson Airport is the worst and the second-best airport in Canada. It's also the sixth best in the world, according to a poll. Yeah, what?

Things aren't looking good for Woodbine Live! - the Rexdale entertainment and retail development we updated a couple of months back. The Star reports tax breaks promised by city council will expire in 2014 unless the development company can meet construction targets - something looking less and less likely every day the construction site sits idle. The location has been touted as a possible venue for a Toronto casino should the project implode completely. Meanwhile, Doug Ford says the project isn't dead yet.

And speaking of the casino, another telephone poll conducted last night and reported on Twitter asked "if the casino created millions of jobs, would you support the idea?" Millions? Really? That's a whole lot of croupiers. Also on the poll: the efficiency of councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong.

TWEET OF THE DAY

Inspired by the idea of Toronto residents in croupier uniforms, city hall writer Matt Elliott brought a little 80s nostalgia to the online dialogue surrounding the casino telephone poll.

IN OTHER NEWS:

• Falling concrete on Gardiner causes infrastructure headaches [The Star]
• Committee sticks to streetcar spending strategy [CTV]

Photo: "Aggregate View" by BruceK in the BlogTO Flickr pool.