This week’s lead City story, The Rising Right, was the result of a number of interviews and pages and pages of transcribed notes. Needless to say, I collected much more information that I had room for, so over the next few days, I plan to follow up with stories, quotes, thoughts and tidbits of information that I didn’t have the space to include in the paper. Today, I’d like to offer some points of clarification.
X MARKS THE OPPOSITION
Though he does usually veer to the right of the political spectrum, Councillor Mike Del Grande — who opposed the taxes but did, at the time, put forward ideas that went beyond simply saying that the city has to get its “fiscal house in order” — doesn’t identify with being a member of city hall’s official opposition. “I don’t subscribe to any grouping of people,” he told me when we spoke over the phone. “I don’t think in terms of opposition.”
“The media is really quick to pigeon hole people,” he said. He had many other unflattering things to say about the media as well, which, perhaps, is one of the reasons I’m attempting to give him a fair shake here. Like my journalist peers, I guess I’m guilty of pigeonholing him as well — I did list him as a member of council’s “unofficial opposition,” in my article. But based on some of the things he said about the way he likes to operate in council — in addition to some positive reviews he received from some of his co-workers on the left — I don’t think he necessarily deserves to be lumped together with the “just say no” crew of Miller opponents. In other words, though he often opposes the mayor, he tries to give alternatives and constructive feedback when doing so.
“My approach is to be fair and not go in preconceived to a debate,” says Del Grande (pictured above). He may be wordy, repeating the same points over and over again when it’s his turn to speak at meetings. He may come across as angry, frustrated and maybe even a little whiney, but one thing Del Grande prides himself on being is fair. Mayor David Miller even made a point of complementing him on his efforts to ask fair questions when council last met before the holiday break (though both admit they don’t see eye to eye on many things).
Budget Chief Shelley Carroll had this to say: “Sometimes we deserve to be opposed on things, but let’s do it for the right reasons. There never seems to be any interest in that. We end up in debates where it’s just not possible to say, 'OK, let’s find consensus in this.' A councillor who’s sort of changed now — he’s actually tried to move constructive motions and add controls and accountability — is councillor Del Grande. He’s slowly morphing into the kind of person who brings constructive opposition. [He says], 'I’m opposed to it for this reason, here’s possible motions for how you can get around that.'”
Del Grande on accessing information at city hall: “The information at city hall is like an onion. You have to peel on layer after another to get into the core, and peeling layers is pretty tough.”
Del Grande on party politics at city hall: “While it may exist, I’m 100 per cent opposed, because I’m not interested in being labeled a Conservative or a Liberal or whatever.”
Del Grande on city council: “I get very frustrated when I see people rushing down to push a button — they haven’t been there for the debate, so it’s all been preconceived. That to me is a disappointment because debates are what may change people’s mind. After 'Oh Canada' is sung, half the council disappears.”
Del Grande on Del Grande: “What some people are often surprised about is that on the environment, I’m probably more left than De Baeremaeker. That was proven when the region of York came, and all the mayors, with respect to the Big Pipe. It was I who led the charge. It was [because of] I that the mayors left with their tails between their legs. It wasn’t De Baeremaeker; it was me. Now on some other things I may be conservative, but it depends on the issue, but the perception with the media is you get pegged; you get pegged with a big X, and that’s all the lenses of the papers show. They don’t track you by issue, they just track you by, I don’t know, personality?”
CORRECTION
The quote below, which appeared towards the end of the original article, "The Rising Right," should have been attributed to Councillor Shelley Carroll and not Adam Vaughan.
“[Councillor Stintz] constantly says she doesn’t have a voice, but never once has she come into my office to say, ‘You know, I have a better way you could do something, what do you think of this? If I move this, where do you stand on it?’”
This is significant, I think, because as Budget Chief, you would think Carroll would be the one person that Councillor Karen Stintz would try to meet with to voice her concerns about Toronto’s money problems and to discuss ideas that might help put the city on sound financial footing. Stintz, it seems, believes this is a lost cause.
Interestingly enough, Carroll’s quote, which was mistakenly attributed to Vaughan, is not that far off from a comment Vaughan made: “[Stintz] may be right [about one thing or another] but does she come here and explain it to you? Does she come and say, this is why the policy is in place, this is what I think is wrong with the policy, this is a corrective strategy that I think might accomplish A,B or C, this is the trade off, what do you think?”