Public Works and Infrastructure Committee.
Public works; private moments.
Apropos of nothing. Felt it had to be said. Movie tagline smooth.
Aside from the Budget Committee, Public Works and Infrastructure may be the most important committee at City Hall*. This is where big decisions about big stuff get made. Transportation and streetscapes. The delivery of water and the collection of waste. None of it necessarily pretty but all of it absolutely vital. Properly done, public works and infrastructure is the difference between a successful, well run city and one that is neither of those things.
“The Public Works and Infrastructure Committee’s primary focus is on infrastructure, with a mandate to monitor, and make recommendations on Toronto’s infrastructure needs and services.”
Public Works and Infrastructure offers up politicians and municipal civil servants the opportunity for greatness and lasting contributions to the city they serve long after they’re dead and gone. 
Read John Lorinc’s Globe and Mail article from last year about R.C. Harris, Toronto’s long serving Public Works Commissioner from 1912-45, and marvel at what can be done with some vision and fortitude. The R.C. Harris Water-Treatment Plant and Bloor Street Viaduct are the obvious example but as Lorinc points out:
Harris..left his civic fingerprints all over Toronto, building hundreds of kilometres of sidewalks, sewers, paved roads, streetcar tracks, public baths and washrooms, landmark bridges and even the precursor plans to the GO commuter rail network.
Of course, Harris wasn’t a politician and subject to the whims of the electorate. In fact, his contributions may’ve been the product of his time, impossible to duplicate outside of those particular circumstances. “…it’s unlikely a towering and outspoken figure like Mr. Harris…,” Lorinc quoting Professor Steven Mannell in his article, “would thrive in public service today, given years of political attacks on civil servants at all three levels of government.”
While I hardly mean to equate R.C. Harris with the ex-TTC CEO Gary Webster, it’s useful in underlining Professor Mannell’s point. 
Mr. Webster expressed an opinion about transit options our mayor disagreed with, and Mr. Webster was ousted. In such a politically volatile environment – a toxic mix of ‘parsimonious politicians’ elected on ‘narrow mandates’ to paraphrase Professor Mannell , and our dimly held view of bureaucrats — it’s hard to see how anything gets built, let alone anything on the grand scale that R.C. Harris imagined.
In fact, it could be argued that getting things built is the exact opposite goal of our current Public Works and Infrastructure big cheese, committee chair Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong. Unless it has something to do with road maintenance, he might be better referred to as Cap’n Tear Up. Jarvis bike lanes, gone, expensively re-replaced by that reversible 5th lane. Proposed Fort York pedestrian bridge scaled back for being too fancy. Scrambled intersections? I don’t know. 
We need to look at those just in case cars are having to wait too long at red lights.
And that Gardiner Expressway Environmental Assessment ordered up to examine the various options for the eastern portion of the roadway? Mysteriously disappeared upon the councillor’s appointment as PWIC chair, only to be revived last year when over half a billion dollars was budgeted for the Gardiner revitalization starting with its eastern portion. Wait? What did the EA recommend? What do you mean, what EA? Where the hell did the EA go? Den-ZILLLLL!
Like the administration it represents, the current Public Works and Infrastructure Committee reflects its mandate by doing the exact opposite of what it should be doing. Tearing down instead of building up (unless, of course, we’re referring to roads). Looking back instead looking forward. Status quo instead of adaptation.
Or as Rowan Caister so succinctly put it: …money that we could spend on public space and innovative infrastructure is being clawed back in order to dismantle inexpensive infrastructure (Jarvis) and keep expensive infrastructure on life support (Gardiner).
At Wednesday’s meeting the committee chair and one of the newest members, Councillor Michelle Berardinetti, both indulged their colleagues by voting to receive the report update on the Gardiner EA while knowing full well what the outcome must/will be. There will/must not be any removal of any part of the Gardiner. 
Drivers depend on it. Any alternative will result in chaos.
As it was and has been, so it shall always be.
It isn’t the motto a Public Works and Infrastructure committee should try to uphold. Cities flounder when they do. That’s just how important this committee is to our well-being. We need to treat with the respect and attention it deserves.
* * *
(*Not including the Executive Committee which is made up of the Mayor, Deputy Mayor, Chairs of the 7 Standing Committees and 4 at-large members.)
— diggingly submitted by Cityslikr
Waiting for Patrick Smyth to post a comment finding a way to relate this to affordable housing and stintz
oh, don’t worry, it’ll happen. “a bore is a man who deprives you of solitude without providing you with company” – gian vincenza gravina.
Gosh Glenn, you’re very clever looking. Is it only here you get to show-off your talents or do you write such clever stuff on other blogs? I’d like to follow you.
FYTP
You see, what’s described in the post above is another example of the corrupt culture on the Circus.
Just as clowns like Vaughan, Perks, Carroll et al., voted to eliminate much-needed Affordable Housing in Toronto, DMW appears to have acted in the same dishonest fashion, if he did indeed bury the EA.
Apparently, DMW is acting, just as Vaughan, Perks, Carroll et al., did, against the best interests of the City and its Policies.
Let’s hope more community-minded residents will dig up more dirt on these clowns and bring them to heel.
Then there’s the definition of a fanatic: someone who can’t change his mind and won’t let anyone else change the subject.
“When men think and believe in one set of symbols and act in ways which are contrary to their professed and conscious ideas, confusion and insincerity are bound to result”
This resembles you Sol.
Change the subject all you want, it’s only me, your conscience, talking to you.
FYTP
@Patrick: It would appear that your fight is with your councillor Karen Stintz, Minto and the OMB. In which case you should also understand that city council really has very little say in what’s presented to the OMB and OMB may hold up the process briefly but inevitably sides with the developer. If you had a binding agreement in place then file suit against Minto…but do be careful around Karen Stintz….she’s likely to slap you with charges of harrassment….or call for security again…
….Visser, Michener, Hebert et al (snicker) don’t seem to be that upset about it…
I wouldn’t say that Ron. People all over this city are pretty upset about all kinds of stuff going on at the Circus.
I think it’s great that guys like cityslikr are getting involved to spread the word and try to make a difference. I’m the same. Not everybody can do that on an unpaid basis.
Visser, Michener, Hebert had departed the scene long before Stintz turned rogue.
FYTP
Ron, you’ve missed the point in my “fight”. It has nothing to do with the OMB or Minto.
The community council stipulated in the Bylaw that they approved unanimously that there should be 5% Affordable Housing units in the NEON condo building. This was agreed to by the community and the developer. Stintz put it forward at the community council. As I outlined earlier, 10 days later she, and a group of lefties on the Circus, eliminated that clause. The developer got a big financial gain and the City got a big fat zero.
Stintz was too much of a coward to articulate the request to eliminate when she rose to speak on the item. Or, like the lefties perhaps, too ashamed to mention it? None of them are prepared to explain why they did it.
You should know;
According to the Integrity Commissioner, a councillor can improperly use the influence of their office, while conducting their personal affairs, and mislead council, but the office of the IC will not investigate.
I don’t thing I’ll hear from any of the actors in this farce. I might get the odd crank post but that’s only to be expected. How long are you allowed out for?
My curfew is 2015….