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Next Mayor of Toronto?

Dilla said:
People south of Bloor had to deal with all these things, too. Perhaps there is a somewhat lower percentage of car owners, but that would be the only difference I can imagine. Miller didn't do the core any special favours, if a victimhood complex such as the one your talking about exists in the outer city, it would be irrational.
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I realize that everybody got hit with the fees. The impact feels disproportional though if you are out in the burbs. When you are paying the same taxes but freezing your ass off waiting for a bus in Malvern or Rexdale, I think it's fair to say that you won't be too appreciative of Miller's legacy.

I think the car tax is probably the one that's most upsetting to suburbanites. Not because they want to drive. But because they don't see any value coming from paying it. The roads have not been improving. And transit has not improved substantially in the burbs, negating the need to drive.

That's where the the frustration comes from. People will support taxes if they see the value that the get in return. While I understand the issue of lag, I would argue that most people don't and there's frustration that every fee is going up around them, and new ones are popping up and the returns from these added fees has been minimal. Any mayor that can tap this frustration in the burbs would win quite handily.
 
kEiThZ said:
I realize that everybody got hit with the fees. The impact feels disproportional though if you are out in the burbs. When you are paying the same taxes but freezing your ass off waiting for a bus in Malvern or Rexdale, I think it's fair to say that you won't be too appreciative of Miller's legacy.

I think the car tax is probably the one that's most upsetting to suburbanites. Not because they want to drive. But because they don't see any value coming from paying it. The roads have not been improving. And transit has not improved substantially in the burbs, negating the need to drive.

That's where the the frustration comes from. People will support taxes if they see the value that the get in return. While I understand the issue of lag, I would argue that most people don't and there's frustration that every fee is going up around them, and new ones are popping up and the returns from these added fees has been minimal. Any mayor that can tap this frustration in the burbs would win quite handily.
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You're really far off base here, if anything Miller made quite a few more improvements in the suburbs then downtown. The pity license registration tax is a non issue.

The so-called bus improvements you refer to were exactly that, bus improvements - mainly bus service north of bloor - if not solely that.

Moreover, I'm not too sure what Miller had to do with that directly anyway, that was TTC decision that Miller likely had little to no say in. Please list the 'downtown' only improvements Miller focused on.

For all the Miller bashing going on he likely started a lot of things he'll never be recognized for, environmental programs and things along these lines are city wide - while they're only starting up now many of these incetivies will be seen down the road and surely someone else will take credit for them. He also did a lot of work at the province level in terms of relationships that he'll likely get no credit for.
 
Anyway, the one thing I liked about Smitherman's speech is he seemed to stress GTA relations i.e. the relations between Toronto and it's neighbors. This is a key area we're really lacking in compared to other regions. He also stressed the business side, which again is easy to write off at election time when most of the ignorant public care only about how small the property tax raise will be. (note the *most*).

In many ways not having Tory run is a bad thing whether you're against Tory or not. The more higher profile candidates the more media coverage the more interest by the general naive public - hopefully this will force 'real' issues to be discussed.
 
kEithZ, I think the suburban downtown wedge is a real tangable political force for many voters in the inner suburbs. I think from a money perspective however it is largely a mirage because over the last decade the property tax burden has shifted significantly off suburban wards and on to old city of Toronto neighbourhoods as a product of CVA and property price trends.
 
http://www.insidetoronto.com/news/local/article/262472--thompson-has-no-plans-to-enter-mayor-s-race

Thompson has no plans to enter mayor's race

Will seek re-election as councillor in Scarborough Centre

Count Michael Thompson out this time.
After he "strongly considered" a run for mayor last year, the Scarborough Centre councillor decided over the Christmas holidays to pass on the chance to take Toronto's top job in 2010.

Thompson simply thought there were enough potential candidates out there with the skills to be a good mayor, he explained this week.

That hasn't changed now that former Ontario Progressive Conservative leader John Tory has announced he won't run.

But Thompson said Tory, a former CEO of Rogers Cable, "would have been an extremely good mayor" and the city would have benefited from Tory's management expertise. His absence from the race is "a loss in my view," the councillor added.

Politically right-of-centre on Toronto Council, Thompson last year urged negotiation so that several like-minded contenders, including Tory and himself, could agree on a single champion to oppose Mayor David Miller.

Asked if he would now throw his support behind former Liberal MPP George Smitherman, a presumptive frontrunner for the job and someone he counts as a friend, Thompson said he's not ready to join Smitherman's camp.

For now, he said, he will support anyone with a vision for a more efficient city that includes more people in decision-making, finds more revenue without having to take it from taxpayers and promises young people a better future.

And although he hasn't done so yet, Thompson said he'll soon register to seek re-election in his Scarborough Centre ward.
 
http://www.insidetoronto.com/news/cityhall/article/260123--ford-considers-run-for-mayor-s-chair

Ford considers run for mayor's chair

Outspoken right-wing city councillor Rob Ford is strongly considering a run for mayor in 2010 in the wake of news that John Tory won't be seeking the office.

Ford, who has long advocated slashing Toronto's $9-billion budget and has been an outspoken critic of Mayor David Miller, has threatened to run for mayor in the past. But he said as long as former Ontario PC leader Tory was running for the job, he'd stay out of the race.

Now, he said he's inclined to run.

"I'm going to have a decision made shortly," said Ford. "I'm getting a ton of phone calls. They've not stopped coming in, the emails are coming in, all people who want me to be mayor of the city, and I want to be mayor of the city," he said. "There are a couple of people I want to consult with first - one being my wife and the others being my mother and my brothers, and we'll take it from there."

Ford said he hasn't had a chance to speak with any of his family face to face since hearing from Tory that he would not be running for the job of mayor. But while he hasn't yet spoken to them, his enthusiasm for the idea was hard to contain.

"There will be no nonsense when I'm mayor," he said. "We'll have the city running like a well-oiled machine. People want me to run. People want representation in the city; people are sick and tired of being taxed to death, of not getting calls back from the civil servants down here."

Ford wouldn't go into much detail about any platform he'd bring, but he did offer a few particulars.

"The first thing I'd do is abolish this car registration tax - it's hurting everyone," said Ford. "And the land transfer tax too. A lot of decisions we made I'd like to review. But I'm not going to come out now and say here's my platform."

Ford said he'd make an announcement one way or another in the next "couple" of weeks
 
Juan_Lennon416 said:
http://www.insidetoronto.com/news/cityhall/article/260123--ford-considers-run-for-mayor-s-chair

Ford considers run for mayor's chair

Outspoken right-wing city councillor Rob Ford is strongly considering a run for mayor in 2010 in the wake of news that John Tory won't be seeking the office.

Ford, who has long advocated slashing Toronto's $9-billion budget and has been an outspoken critic of Mayor David Miller, has threatened to run for mayor in the past. But he said as long as former Ontario PC leader Tory was running for the job, he'd stay out of the race.

Now, he said he's inclined to run.

"I'm going to have a decision made shortly," said Ford. "I'm getting a ton of phone calls. They've not stopped coming in, the emails are coming in, all people who want me to be mayor of the city, and I want to be mayor of the city," he said. "There are a couple of people I want to consult with first - one being my wife and the others being my mother and my brothers, and we'll take it from there."

Ford said he hasn't had a chance to speak with any of his family face to face since hearing from Tory that he would not be running for the job of mayor. But while he hasn't yet spoken to them, his enthusiasm for the idea was hard to contain.

"There will be no nonsense when I'm mayor," he said. "We'll have the city running like a well-oiled machine. People want me to run. People want representation in the city; people are sick and tired of being taxed to death, of not getting calls back from the civil servants down here."

Ford wouldn't go into much detail about any platform he'd bring, but he did offer a few particulars.

"The first thing I'd do is abolish this car registration tax - it's hurting everyone," said Ford. "And the land transfer tax too. A lot of decisions we made I'd like to review. But I'm not going to come out now and say here's my platform."

Ford said he'd make an announcement one way or another in the next "couple" of weeks
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OOOOOOOOh, that would be such an entertaining train-wreck of a campaign. I believe it might actually end in suicide; Ford appears to be oblivious to the degree to which he is a parody, and the shocking realization that he has LeDrew-esque levels of support might send the poor fat bastard off the Bloor Viaduct. I can almost see him getting tricked into eating mushrooms during a debate, a la Sam Locso.
 
One slight problem - there is a suicide barrier on Bloor, and I have a feeling that sad slob voted against it. Pity he lost.

We'll have the city running like a well-oiled machine.
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I am sure he meant greased. And he is in a good position to supply that.

AoD
 
TorontoBookie said:
Rossi chaired Tory's 2003 campaign. It is difficult to see the right running two well-funded candidates, and even more difficult to see what possible critique each of these guys could have for the other given their shared (if unsuccessful) history.

I just can't see Tory running against Rossi. Maybe Rossi's just being a good liberal and running as a spoiler to clear the way for Smitherman?

Maybe he's doing this as a favour to Tory so Tory doesn't have to suffer the ignominy of losing again?

Inquiring minds are wondering how Warren Kinsella would survive trying to serve both the Tory and Rossi campaigns? He might have to clone himself. Ewwww.

By my count, this makes it Rossi vs. Smitherman on the main card, with the undercard consisting of Joey Pants (maybe Shelley Carroll or Giambrone) duking it out to represent the NDP vs. Minnan-Wong (maybe Thompson) from the hard right (I am deliberately discounting Mammoliti's and Ford's candidacies as irrelevant).

Provided the foregoing is correct (i.e. no Tory), I propose the following table of odds:

Furious George - 2 to 1 - Way in front in terms of grassroots organization and name recognition. Could still be undone by eHealth, Samsung, heroin addiciton and whatever other skeletons he's got in the closet.

Rocco Rossi - 4 to 1 - 5 weeks ago, I told someone that Rossi was a 150 to 1 longshot. "Rossi's name seems to crop up every few years because he's a political bagman and a local boy, but he has zero name recognition and there are too many other viable candidates with whom his candidacy would conflict. Still, based on connections alone, he needs to be mentioned. Who knows -- he could be next year's Stephen LeDrew, another former political bagman whose political dreams disintegrated at their first exposure to sunlight." In retrospect, I suppose I was mostly wrong, but we'll see how much the name recognition thing costs him. Even in a losing cause, if he plays his cards right, he might just get a bowtie and a CP24 job.

NDP candidate - 10 to 1 - As much as I like at least one of the names I mentioned above in the NDP slot, it's not going to happen for them this time around. This is strictly an exercise in name recognition building (for Carroll or Giambrone) and the NDP's need to keep its municipal muscles moving.

Sentient right-wing candidate - 15 to 1 - Plenty of support from The Sun and 680 News will only guarantee the favour of the knuckle-dragging 20%, many of whom don't vote. Rossi would have to crash and burn AND Tory would have to decline to step into his shoes for Minnan-Wong/Thompson to have much of a shot.

Rob Ford vs. Georgio Mammoliti - too gross to watch; plus, it's a sequel to their earlier rumble-in-the-saucer, and sequels always suck.
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At some point, the accuracy of my predictions will have to be recognized by at least one person. :cool:
 
AlvinofDiaspar said:
One slight problem - there is a suicide barrier on Bloor, and I have a feeling that sad slob voted against it. Pity he lost.
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I took that into account and had an engineer friend calculate the tensile strength of the barrier relative to Ford's girth, mass and velocity. The math confirms it: when powered by appropriate amounts of cheap gin, cheeseburgers, hubris and stupidity -- and with gravity in his favour -- Rob Ford is an irresistible force.
 
Oh how I would love to see Ford run for mayor. This guy thinks that forcing residents to place fences around their swimming pool is socialism. Just imagine what his platform will cover. Banning stop signs because its big government telling one how to drive their car?
 
Juan_Lennon416 said:
http://www.insidetoronto.com/news/cityhall/article/260123--ford-considers-run-for-mayor-s-chair

Ford considers run for mayor's chair

Outspoken right-wing city councillor Rob Ford is strongly considering a run for mayor in 2010 in the wake of news that John Tory won't be seeking the office.

Ford, who has long advocated slashing Toronto's $9-billion budget and has been an outspoken critic of Mayor David Miller, has threatened to run for mayor in the past. But he said as long as former Ontario PC leader Tory was running for the job, he'd stay out of the race.

Now, he said he's inclined to run.

"I'm going to have a decision made shortly," said Ford. "I'm getting a ton of phone calls. They've not stopped coming in, the emails are coming in, all people who want me to be mayor of the city, and I want to be mayor of the city," he said. "There are a couple of people I want to consult with first - one being my wife and the others being my mother and my brothers, and we'll take it from there."

Ford said he hasn't had a chance to speak with any of his family face to face since hearing from Tory that he would not be running for the job of mayor. But while he hasn't yet spoken to them, his enthusiasm for the idea was hard to contain.

"There will be no nonsense when I'm mayor," he said. "We'll have the city running like a well-oiled machine. People want me to run. People want representation in the city; people are sick and tired of being taxed to death, of not getting calls back from the civil servants down here."

Ford wouldn't go into much detail about any platform he'd bring, but he did offer a few particulars.

"The first thing I'd do is abolish this car registration tax - it's hurting everyone," said Ford. "And the land transfer tax too. A lot of decisions we made I'd like to review. But I'm not going to come out now and say here's my platform."

Ford said he'd make an announcement one way or another in the next "couple" of weeks
Click to expand...

With one side of his mouth he says he's not sure he's running but on the other, he offers a lot of specifics of what he'd do as Mayor. The man is running ...and he will lose.

I'm happy that he'll finally be off city council and that we'll have some comic relief during the campaign.
 
TonyV said:
Downloading.. remember that? A good way to make Smitherman uncomforable is to bring back the issue -- get him to talk about it, since the public wants to see what he's like under pressure. This might be a good way to smoke out some of Smitherman's personality traits.

Smitherman served a Premier (McGuinty) who once decried the evils of the Harris government's downloading of social service costs to cities. McGuinty has done very little to offset downloading... promising to phase it out over several years. In fact, I think Dalton actually likes the downloading now.

Smitherman wants to be mayor of Canada's largest city, and downloading hurts cities. Would he publicly make nasty with the premier that got him his ticket into the big dance of politics?

I'd love to see what happens.
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A columnist, a rather good one, has these thoughts in today's Star:

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/747981--hume-province-leaves-us-twisting-in-the-wind
 
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