How I learned to stop worrying and love the clamshell
Hunter S. Thompson once said that Ronald Reagan was using the Book of Revelations as a sketchy guide to the 1980s. Here in Toronto, the trials and tribulations of city hall come across more like a re-enactment of the Book of Job. Between ongoing financial troubles, constant in-fighting and projects being bungled with alarming regularity, the average citizen can’t help but feel that some higher power is testing their faith.
Not that every day inside the council-chamber clamshell turned out to be a total bummer this year. Occasionally, some useful policy passed — sometimes unanimously, though almost always after lengthy debate. There is even evidence that the entire city hasn’t succumbed to political apathy. Despite the fact that David Miller announced he won’t be running for a third term as mayor, his legacy of inspiring grassroots participation and citizen activism has resulted in some of this city’s most significant triumphs. Here’s a look back at the highs and lows, the middling and the mind-boggling — and even a few happenings that were downright encouraging.
Double talkin’ jive
As the global economic downturn tumbled towards full-on Recession, a voting majority of councillors made city hall look like a bunch of greedy bank CEOs as they voted against debating their automatic wage increase. Adding insult to injury only a few months later, they voted to freeze wages for the city’s non-union employees. And then, of course, we cheered wildly for a 2009 TTC fare freeze, only to have it come back and bite us in the ass when the commission decided that the only way to maintain service levels was a whopping 25 cent fare hike for next year.
Fight for your right to party
Not since the dark days of Lastmania has city hall been so clearly divided along party lines. Some blame the overruling power of the mayor’s executive council for allowing a distinctly left-leaning agenda to prevail. But the most obvious alignment came in the form of the conservative-minded Responsible Government Group, starring Karen Stintz, Case Ootes and David Shiner. While the latter group remains united in their criticism, this new front has become less essential now that the 2010 mayoral race will be a wide-open field where gay fiscal conservatives and dudes from Winnipeg are thought to have as much of a shot at succeeding David Miller as any of council’s familiar faces.
Notes from the gaffeteria
The political spectrum aside, the phrase “goddamn city hall” was often hissing through the lips of residents as we dealt with the rollout of a hugely frustrating (and still confusing) garbage bin project and then suffered through the longest garbage strike in the history of trash collection. (Well, at least it seemed like it once dead raccoons started showing up in garbage bins and some of our parks looked like Marjory from Fraggle Rock.) That both of these predicaments could have been better handled with just a bit of foresight is probably the most disconcerting blunder. I mean, did anyone expect the trash collecting unions to gladly suffer a wage and benefit shafting after many of the city’s other unions had been given raises? At least only one of these stories was picked up by CNN.
Torontopia 2.0
Needless to say, community groups and citizen critics had a lot to discuss in 2009. Consequently, a number of advocates have had a huge effect on both policy and procedure at city hall. We’ve talked at length about the impact of public-space activists on getting a proper sign bylaw and billboard tax passed; and then there are people-powered initiatives like iVote Toronto’s push for voting rights for non-citizen Toronto residents (which the mayor endorsed) and the finally answered call to make the city’s documents and information available in an open source format so things like Ian Stevens’ TTC Google map can be the way of the future. We also can’t ignore the Twitter effect, which saw a modest one-man startup like @ttcupdates set the standard for Tweeters like TTC’s director of communications Brad Ross while our very own Mayor Miller became one of the app’s pioneering politicians — the latter development serving as a welcome bridge between council and its constituents.
Toronto the better
And yes, there were even some municipal affairs that made us proud of our council. Sure, no one is impressed with the TTC’s fare hike, but at least service has continued to improve. More importantly, we are finally going to see subway and LRT expansion in the next few years — and we even have the money to pay for it, sort of. Also, don’t forget about the city’s new guidelines for mandatory green roofs and the fact that Toronto finally secured one of those Olympic-type events that we’ve been pining for: the 2015 Pan Am Games. But keep in mind that next year is an election year, so we can (we hope) look to a whole new book for municipal inspiration — a title other than How to Win Friends and Influence People.
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