Our next installment of city council challenger endorsements begins in Etobicoke. Seems we’re always starting in Etobicoke. Maybe Etobicoke is the nexus of change at City Hall this October. (A different, more positive change than the one that came eastward in 2010.) As Etobicoke goes, so goes Toronto?
This one landed on the radar late in the campaign. An open ward left vacant by the departure of Peter Milczyn (not necessarily in a hurry) for the provincial legislature at Queen’s Park. The only “names”, such as they are, vying to replace him are a former staffer in the former councillor’s office and the runner-up in Ward 5 in 2010 who came within a hundred votes or so of defeating Milczyn.
But the real deal in Ward 5 is Raymond Desilets. I cannot say enough good things about his candidacy. He is a pro-growth, urban-minded challenger with a platform full of ideas to revitalize and renew neighbourhoods and communities in the ward. How many candidates have you heard make this kind of statement? Property Taxes – I’m Not Complaining. He’s even got a streetcar proposal to provide relief to transit users commuting to and from work downtown.
Perhaps my favourite bit of information about Desilets — Spoiler Alert! This story is contained in the post I wrote about him a couple weeks ago – is how, when mulling over a possible run, he took 4 months to put together his reasons for running and held a mini-Town Hall for 35 friends and family to see what they thought. Fortunately he got a thumbs up from them.
We here at All Fired Up in the Big Smoke endorse Raymond Desilets for city council in Ward 5 Etobicoke-Lakeshore.
Alex Mazer is in an odd kind of uphill battle in the Ward 18 race. He’s facing a not entirely awful one-term incumbent but a wholly uninspiring one. Ana Bailão may be one of the most inconsistent, flippy-floppy councillors of the past term.
As we discovered in our talk with Mazer back in June, his is a dynamic campaign built on a foundation of increasing civic engagement. He wants to push forward the concept of participatory budgeting, opening up the budget process to wider public input. He’s a fierce supporter of using schools as community hubs and is strong in his defence of not selling off school properties for simple residential development.
While I don’t think there’s much of an age gap between Mazer and the incumbent he’s looking to replace, their respective ideas on city building seem generations apart. Alex Mazer represents a new era. Ward 18 could use the change.
We here at All Fired Up in the Big Smoke endorse Alex Mazer for city council in Ward 18 Davenport.
— hopefully, helpfully submitted by Cityslikr
We met Ray at his modest booth outside our local No Frills on the Queensway Desilets is different. He impressed my wife and I so much that we took a lawn sign and I volunteered to help his campaign team, first time ever I’ve gone that far in civic politics — aside from dressing as Darth Vader and Don Corleone to help blow up the Mega Casino scheme.
Re: Mr. Desilets. I have 17 years of neighbourhood experience and volunterring and I can confirm it takes more than 4 months to a. know the issues and b. understand the people , city staff and the history.