Tag Archives: John Barber

Smart Track’s Coming Off The Rails

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Smart Track.

catchytitleIt’s catchy, succinct. Two words, and it tells you everything you need to know.

It’s smart and… it involves tracks.

Smart Track. Rolls off the tongue without so much as giving it a second thought.

Which is a good thing (at least for the John Tory camp) because when people start putting more than a passing thought into this much hyped transit plan, the only thing left to say about it… Track. fingerscrossedYes, it definitely involves track.

Just over a week ago, the Globe and Mail’s Marcus Gee began to wonder how exactly John Tory was going to fund the city’s contribution to the ambitious 53 kilometre, 22 station plan. “I don’t propose to offer hardworking Torontonians transit relief in exchange for a financial headache that could last for years,” Tory said back in June. “Therefore, I will not raise property taxes to build the SmartTrack line. The city’s one-third portion will come from tax-increment financing.”

Tax-increment financing, everyone! The solution for not paying for stuff we need now has a name to it. And a fancy-schmancy, official sounding name it is too.

“But it is far from clear that TIF could work here in Toronto, especially for such a costly project,” Mr. Gee writes.

doesnotcomputeWait, what? ‘Far from clear that TIF could work…?’ Did I read you right there, Mr. Gee. “This leading candidate for mayor is just feeding more false hopes,” he concludes.

**sigh**

A leading candidate feeding us false hopes on transit. Stop me if you’ve heard that one before.

Where Marcus Gee was cautiously skeptical about the Tory Smart Track plan, John Barber, writing in the Toronto Star a week later, was nothing short of stupendously apoplectic. “As mayor, John Tory could derail Toronto by trying to implement his half-baked, financially fraudulent transit plan,” states the sub-headline. And Barber is just getting started.

The magic carpet Tory has commandeered for this trip is called tax-increment financing (TIF), whereby the city borrows $3-billion and promises to pay it off with future tax revenue generated by property development attracted to the new stations. Tory’s breezy backgrounder cites a study by Metrolinx, the provincial transit authority, to explain how the magic is supposed to work. But because the type is so big and the single page so small, it doesn’t have space to report the study’s conclusion: that TIF is the riskiest, least desirable of all potential transit financing mechanisms, given one star out of five in the study’s final rating.

“But because the type is so big and the single page so small, it doesn’t have space to report the study’s conclusion…”swoon

If he wasn’t so grumpy looking all the time, I’d plant a big wet one on John Barber for that sentence alone.

John Tory’s big plan for building much needed new transit is untried and untested here in Ontario. Expert panels brought together to come up with the best ways to fund transit expansion have ranked tax-increment funding well down the list of feasible approaches. As Marcus Gee pointed out in his article, a recent panel chaired by Anne Golden listed tax-increment funding “as one of its ‘smaller’ revenue sources.” Both Gee and Barber point out the funding of subway construction in New York has fallen far short of the original TIF projections.

What happens then? Unsurprisingly, taxpayers are left to make up the differencedoesntaddup1.

AND THERE’S NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT, PEOPLE!

If we want new infrastructure, whether it’s transit or roads or new sewer lines, we should be paying for it. When did we start believing this stuff comes at no cost to us? When crass, craven politicians like John Tory started pitching us a line, telling us there was a magic pot of gold at the end of the rainbow made from unicorn tears.

Nobody seems to dispute the worthiness of the plan itself. The province has been working on their version of it for a few years now. doesntaddup2If it actually contributes to helping reduce gridlock and congestion, bring it on.

But stop trying to convince us it won’t cost us a dime. We bought into that scam 4 years ago and here we are, plans delayed, plans scuttled, relief years, if not decades away.

— in arrearsly submitted by Cityslikr

The Problem Of Weight

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I’m going to let you in on a little secret. I was the one who instigated the “late-night beer-enhanced” conversation that led to Sol Chrom’s post over at Posterous, Why making fun of Rob Ford’s weight isn’t cool. For the record, it wasn’t just some idle intellectual exercise, ‘late-night, beer-enhanced’ chatter about the use and nature of language, positions of privilege, etc., etc. Although it was indeed late at night and most definitely beer-enhanced.

The discussion stemmed from an actual exchange I had earlier in the week. Let me take you back (cue squiggly lines) to Monday September 26th, 2011. Taking a break from the special city council meeting, I wandered down to the south end of Nathan Phillips Square to take in the Stop The Cuts rally. Making my way through the crowd, sussing out the situation, firing off occasional tweets with my trademark pithy observations. One such came about when I couldn’t help think that no matter how loud these people yelled, no matter how hard they beat their drums, regardless of the justness of their cause or their fearful certainty that the city they love will be that much worse for wear if this current administration has its way with it, the mayor couldn’t give a shit about them.

That wasn’t thought in any fatalistic way. I wasn’t questioning why these people would be bothering to protest given it was all falling on deaf ears in the mayor’s office. (I don’t imagine the intent of the rally was to change Mayor Ford’s mind anyway. It was to try and change the minds of more and more city residents). I made the observation out of anger and frustration at the fact the mayor was so willing to run roughshod over public opinion, touting some mythical mandate that was nowhere near as strong as it once was and based almost entirely on false pretenses.

Looking around, I spotted a chip truck parked nearby on Queen Street. I then tweeted something to the effect that the mayor wasn’t going to listen to anyone in this crowd until we overturned the chip truck. Just before pressing send, I was struck by the possibility someone would read it and assume I was making fun of the mayor’s weight. Fuck it. That wasn’t my intent. I sent it out.

What was my intent, you might be asking? I spotted something trivial amidst the crowd brought together in a fight against the crucial. Daycare cuts. Library cuts. Emergency service cuts. Cuts that made the already vulnerable even more vulnerable. And I thought the only thing that would get the mayor’s attention would be if the crowd did something out of the ordinary, like overturn a fast food truck. Not because of the food inside but because of the unexpected gesture.

As with any attempt at humour, once it gets put under the microscope for a detailed analysis, it kind of loses its core of funny. Or, very possibly, it was never really that funny to begin with. I’m perfectly willing to accept that. What it most certainly wasn’t, I can assure you, was a shot at the mayor’s weight. I would’ve thought the very same thing, fired off the very same tweet if either dancer thin Doug Holyday or muscle bound Giorgio Mammoliti were mayor. It had nothing to do with the food.

Yet, soon after, I received a reply from what I would assume to be normally a politically aligned point of view. Let’s not descend to fat jokes (or something to that effect). Yep. I guess I should’ve trusted my instinct and not sent out the tweet. Notice how I refrained from saying ‘gut’ instinct lest someone think I’m taking another shot at the mayor’s weight?

So now any reference associated in any way to food can be construed as making fun of Mayor Ford’s weight? Or how about this? Mayor Ford did not exercise acute political judgement on the waterfront issue. What do you mean, the mayor didn’t exercise? Are you making fun of his weight again? See: previous paragraph’s ‘gut instinct’ discussion and make up your own example.

Really? It’s come to that? Those are the eggshells we must walk on when criticizing the mayor?

The thing is, I don’t see Rob Ford as your average person with weight issues. I see Rob Ford as the mayor of this country’s largest city. I see Rob Ford as a highly entitled politician whose approach to public service is to protect wealth and privilege. I see Rob Ford as a politician catering to our basest instincts. I see Rob Ford as many have seen his type of politician:

Any attacks I might make on Rob Ford using his weight is not an attack on anyone else who considers themselves fat. I’d like to think any criticism I may level at the mayor referring to his weight would be seen as more attitudinal toward his politics than his person. To my mind, it would be entirely germane to refer to Mayor Rob Ford as a fat cat or fat head without having to fend off those who might accuse me making issue with his weight.

But the issue is so fraught with emotional landmines that I have been very, very careful to steer clear of intentional references to the mayor’s weight. I’m sure a search of this site will reveal that early on we were less careful. I know we made constant comparisons to then candidate for mayor Rob Ford and the late comedian Chris Farley. We have attempted to heed the advice of many who have rightly pointed that there is so much more to criticize in the mayor than his weight.

We will continue to do so for three main reasons despite still believing that the mayor’s weight, through his politics and attitudes, is fair game.

1) I’m not sure my argument is rigorous enough to withstand oppositional scrutiny even within my own head.

2) Because I read this in the above Sol Chrom post. My issue is with the mayor, his views of government and those who support him. I hardly want to inflict emotional damage on others because I’m going for an easy, obvious shot.

3) Finally, and to show that my politics trump both empathy or any concern about being an intellectual lightweight, I try to refrain from going at the mayor with weight references because it gives succour to his backers. It gives a line of rebuttal where otherwise there would be none. As Sol argued in his piece, it puts the mayor in the position of being the underdog, the little guy, the put upon people’s spokesman dismissed because he doesn’t look the part, the anti-politician. It gives him justification to chase much better men from the room.

— thoughtfully submitted by Cityslikr

Oh, Giorgio

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Oh, Giorgio.

Giorgio, Giorgio, Giorgio, Giorgio.

Oh, Giorgio.

Communists? Really? Communists?? Support the Ford Administration to save the city from communism?

At first blush, one might conclude that the always colourful councillor from Ward 7 is simply fulfilling his duty to make the mayor, his brother and the other far right-wingers now ruling the roost at City Hall seem almost reasonable and of sound judgment. Almost. An unstable outlier that defines the boundaries of extreme. Here’s Giorgio. None who dare to pass that point can be taken at all seriously.

Then again, long before he became a confirmed Fordista, Councillor Mammoliti never shied away from making a spectacle of himself. Remember his run for mayor last year? A red light district on the islands? A floating casino. And before that, the bare-chested protest of nudity at Hanlan’s Point. The strip club tour. The flagpole.

Giorgio Mammoliti seems to court controversy and publicity. Covet may be the better verb to use in this case. As writer John Lorinc mused on Twitter yesterday Mammoliti “…operates in a realm that embarassment cannot touch. It’s performance art.” Style (such as it is) trumps substance (such as it ain’t).

Plenty of opinion was also offered that the Mammoliti Circus Side Show was nothing more than a distraction from the real harm being planned for this city by the Ford Administration. Councillor Mammoliti fiddles while Toronto is being burned. Look at me, ma. Top of the world! Ka-boom!!

Perhaps his Facebook page where the councillor vows to keep out any waft of communism is nothing more than theatre. He throws the bait into the water and gleefully stands back to mock the incredulous but inevitable reaction it elicits from the usual suspects. The left wing kooks. The downtown elites. The whiners. The communists.

Come on, guys. Communists? Really? Who in their rightful mind would be tossing around such dated terminology? Gimme a break. I was joking. Lighten up, would ya.

Seems possible except for the fact that Mammoliti buddied up to then councillor Rob Ford in the John Barber contretemps a few years back, calling the Globe and Mail a ‘socialist’ newspaper. The Globe and Mail socialist? Really? Anyone sporting that view seems capable of believing communists have been running City Hall for 8 years or so.

So maybe it is the ravings of someone caught in a pre-1989 time warp. He did talk about being brainwashed by leftists early on in his career on the CBC yesterday, I guess as a way of explaining his NDP and union affiliations back in the day. Sorry. Did I say a pre-1989 time warp? Let me be more specific. A 1950s time warp.

Best we just ignore it. Move on. Nothing to see hear. I’ve already screwed up by dedicating any space whatsoever to the man’s loopy opinions.

In my defense, however, let me just say this. Councillor Mammoliti may be beyond the reach of shame or embarrassment but what about those more moderate right wing and centrist members of council (yes, I am convinced they are out there) who have been lining up in support of the mayor so far? How does the headshaking, eye-rolling behaviour of Team Ford’s QB sit with them? Are they going to boast to their constituents of how they continually took their marching orders from council’s clown prince? All it took was a big thumbs down for them to vote how the mayor wanted?

Councillor Mammoliti might operate ‘in a realm embarrassment cannot touch’ but I’m not convinced a majority of other councillors are willing to risk their political futures dancing out there on the fringes with him. The left-right divisions Mammoliti seeks to exploit could well wind up as fissures in the current coalition the mayor’s cobbled together to push through his agenda. So, sing on, Giorgio, the discordant tune you perform so well.

— operatically submitted by Cityslikr