Even with the success of acts like Lonely Island and Flight of the Conchords, people still tend to view musical comedy with some suspicion, and not without reason. Those high-profile success stories aside, at the club level, musical comedy is too often the province of people who aren’t quite good enough to make it as musicians, but not quite funny enough to make it as comedians.

Two local comics, Robert Keller and Rush Zilla, are out to change that perception with their show, Off Key Comedy, which features a wide variety of acts whose only commonality is that they combine music and comedy in one form or another. The third edition of the monthly show will take place on May 23, at Comedy Bar.

Despite the fact that the last show in Buddies in Bad Times Theatre’s 2012/2013 season is titled Of a Monstrous Child: A Gaga Musical, Lady Gaga herself takes a secondary role. There are no homages to raw-meat dresses and gold-plated wheelchairs here. Instead, writer and director Alistair Newton uses the House of Gaga as a pathway into the history of the notable performance-art stars that came before her in the pantheon of queer iconography, and how she is and isn’t a construct of all of them put together.

It’s entirely possible that an early work by the next Atom Egoyan or David Cronenberg will screen on Wednesday night at the TIFF Bell Lightbox. With the 2013 Student Film Showcase featuring the best from post-secondary schools around the country and the Next Wave Presents: Jump Cuts Young Filmmakers Showcase kicking off the evening with Toronto-area high-school students’ films, the night will be a coming-out party for a new crop of talent. Judging by the polished creativity of some of the entries, it’s safe to say that young people are more prepared than ever to start telling stories on film from an early age.

Photo by Empty Quarter from the Torontoist Flickr Pool.

Metrolinx is unveiling their strategy for raising $34 billion for new transit on May 27, 2013. They’ve asked for the City’s input. But today at City Hall, council’s executive committee, composed of Rob Ford and many of his closest allies, voted to hold off on deciding what advice to give Metrolinx…until May 28.

For several months momentum has been building towards one specific date: June 1, 2013. That’s the deadline for Metrolinx, the regional agency responsible for transit planning in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area, to unveil the strategy it wants to pursue in raising the $34 billion we need to build a major round of transit projects, called The Big Move. (Among the projects on that list: a new major subway line for Toronto.) A few weeks ago Metrolinx announced that they would be making their strategy public a few days earlier, on May 27. They have asked all the municipalities in the GTHA to offer advice: their best thinking on what new revenue tools, what particular mix of taxes and levies, would work best and be fairest for their residents. Today’s vote at City Hall, in effect, was the executive committee declining to participate in that process at all, choosing to give no advice rather than pass this issue along to city council for a full debate, and then passing the results of that debate along to Metrolinx as the City’s official position on the subject.

On the executive committee’s planned agenda for today: a major report on the future of transit funding, written by the City’s top civil servant [PDF]. That report endorses the idea that the region should introduce new revenue tools, to create a dedicated source of money to build major transit projects, and includes a set of recommendations about which of those tools would work best for Toronto. The executive committee could have passed that report along to city council without recommendation, or they could have passed along other recommendations to council; if they’d done either, then council would have debated this issue at their meeting on May 7-8.

Our Conversation with Kathleen Wynne About Her Plans for Transit

This matter isn’t settled, however: council could still find another way of holding their debate. A councillor could introduce a motion at that May 7-8 council to re-add this issue to their agenda; that is tricky, since it would require a two-third majority. Potentially simpler: if a 50 per cent majority of councillors signs a petition, they can convene a special meeting dedicated to this issue specifically. Even before executive voted, it became clear that there is momentum building in one of these directions, with many councillors convinced we need new revenue tools, and several more who have reservations, but are convinced the City cannot pass up the opportunity to share its thoughts with Metrolinx.

If some councillors do make that move to re-add this to their agenda, they can safely expect Rob Ford will be their staunchest opponent. The full text of his speech at executive today:

I’m moving this deferral for a number of reasons. As we know there’s a provincial budget coming down on May 2, and we don’t even know if we’re going to have the same government in place in a month’s time. If the province wants to move ahead and be heroes and implement new taxes, go right ahead. Guaranteed, hell will freeze over before I support any of these new taxes.

You look, every single day almost, there’s something going on. $275-million scandal at the gas plant; millions—and we still don’t know the number—on Ornge helicopters; the eHealth billions of dollars; in our own backyard here just a few days ago thousands in hand sanitizer. And you’re going to turn around to the working person in the city and say “You know what, we don’t have enough money to spend on transit. We’re going to take the easy way out and implement new taxes.”

Talk about legacies—that’s a complete disaster. That’s not a legacy, folks. Let’s get every level of government in line and efficient and running like a well-oiled machine, and then you can go to the taxpayers and say “You know what, we’ve tightened up every single screw on this car. There’s no more tightening.” Folks, we’re far from that. We’re far from that.

If someone wants to hold a special meeting to implement new taxes, go right ahead. Have a special meeting. But folks, this is not the way you do business. The smart thing to do is see what happens with the budget. And like the Premier said, she’s going to go ahead and implement them no matter what, so I have no idea why we’re trying to be the heroes and say “I want to be the first one in line to implement new taxes on the backs of hardworking people in this great city.”

A study just came out today from the Fraser Institute, says the average family spends more on taxes each year than it does on necessities of life. That’s problematic, folks. People cannot afford the taxes, that’s what it comes down to. You might want the best transit system in the world, but the average person can’t afford it, and I’m sorry, we can’t move ahead. We have to find alternative ways to do this. Implementing new taxes is not that way. We don’t even have a say in all this—that’s a separate issue in itself.

This is completely ass backwards, how we’re doing things.

Votes on the motion:

In favour of deferral: Rob Ford, Norm Kelly, Frank Di Giorgio, Cesar Palacio, Gary Crawford, David Shiner

Opposed to the deferral: Paul Ainslie, Peter Milczyn, Denzil Minnan-Wong, Jaye Robinson

Absent: Michael Thompson, Vincent Cristanti, Doug Holyday

What is a “special meeting” of council?

Council meetings are planned and scheduled on an annual basis; the rules state that council must meet at least 10 times each year, and that the schedule must respect religious holidays. Special meetings are ones that are called outside of this regular schedule.

There are three circumstances under which a special meeting can be called:

• At the request of the mayor, who can call for a special meeting at any time and for any reason; he or she must give 24 hours notice.
• In case of emergency, in which case the mayor can call a meeting without 24 hours notice, so long as all members of council are individually informed about the meeting and a majority of those councillors agree to it.
• At the direct request of councillors, by way of a petition signed by a majority of councillors. The petition must include “a clear statement of the meeting’s purpose” and the meeting must be held within 48 hours of filing the petition with the city clerk.

If council were to hold a special meeting about this issue, it would be of this last type. If this sounds vaguely familiar, that’s because we’ve seen it before: it’s what happened in February, 2012, when councillors led by TTC Chair Karen Stintz called a special meeting to debate the future of several planned new LRT lines in Toronto.

The alternative: if a two-thirds majority of councillors agree, they could re-add this item back to the agenda of their next regularly scheduled meeting, on May 7-8.

If there’s a safe place for a mayoralty in our post–City of Toronto Act era, it’s the executive committee. This is essentially a handpicked committee whose job is to help mould and massage a mayor’s agenda into fighting shape. Differences are ironed out, a unified front formed.

There should be no unpleasant surprises sprung on a mayor at executive committee meetings. Whipping a vote is unheard of. Unanimity on items isn’t an absolute necessity, but split decisions are a red flag. To paraphrase ol’ blue eyes, if a mayor can’t make it there, a mayor’s not going to make it anywhere (“anywhere,” in this case, being city council).

So, no. It should’ve come as no surprise that the executive committee pushed forward a “yes to casinos” motion on Tuesday. The surprise would have been if it hadn’t. It might be hyperbolic to suggest that Mayor Ford’s political future depended on a yes vote, but currently in Toronto we’re living in the age of hyperbole. Even Councillor David Shiner’s (Ward 24, Willowdale) motion to defer the casino item might be considered to have been a serious setback for the mayor.

A mayor doesn’t lose control of a key item at Executive Committee. Once that happens, all that’s left is the pomp and circumstance that comes with the chain of office. He’s no longer actually running anything around City Hall.

Which is why Mayor Ford’s staff was so in evidence in the committee room on Tuesday. It was a show of force, a display of firepower. The casino vote had to break in the mayor’s favour. Any sort of rebellion by the crew needed to be nipped in the bud.

The real surprise at Tuesday’s meeting wasn’t that Mayor Ford won the vote, meaning the casino debate will move on to city council next month; it was that he had to struggle at all to ensure that he won. This wasn’t just some regular monthly executive committee meeting where there were disagreements between members over a parks-and-environment item. It was a special meeting called by the mayor to deal with one item and one item only. Casinos.

Executive Committee Recommends Aggressive Casino Expansion

That only nine of the 13 members voted in the affirmative almost guarantees the item’s defeat at council. The mayor doesn’t even have the support of one of his staunchest allies, Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong (Ward 34, Don Valley East), who delivered perhaps the most heartfelt, genuine speech I’ve ever seen him give—one that, frankly, I didn’t think he was capable of.

“I don’t think casinos represent the values of the City of Toronto,” the councillor said. “I don’t believe gambling and all the things associated with it represent the values that I have, and I don’t think it represents the values of the constituents in my ward.”

Councillor Jaye Robinson (Ward 25, Don Valley West) spoke out against a downtown casino as forcefully as she did about Councillor Doug Ford’s ferris-wheel plans for the Port Lands. And, furthering his recent drift away from the Ford administration, Councillor Paul Ainslie (Ward 43, Scarborough East) said he didn’t like the numbers he was seeing—neither the hosting fees nor the job figures. The chair of the planning and growth management committee, Peter Milczyn (Ward 5, Etobicoke-Lakeshore), was the fourth vote against the mayor’s casino plans.

One of the main advantages of being the mayor and having an executive committee is that on important items there are 13 votes pretty much locked up going into a city council meeting. That means only ten more will be needed to push that item through. That’s 10 of the remaining 31 councillors, or less than one-third.

On the casino, Mayor Ford hasn’t given himself that head start. Even granting him the nine votes from the Executive Committee—and some of those are very, very, very conditional—plus brother Doug (Ward 2, Etobicoke North), Speaker Frances Nunziata (Ward 11, York South-Weston), and Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti (Ward 7, York West), he’s still looking for 10 votes. Throw in Councillor Mike Del Grande (Ward 39, Scarborough-Agincourt) because he sees only dollar signs and, let’s say, Councillor Michelle Berardinetti (Ward 35, Scarborough Southwest), who might go along to get along with the mayor. Plus Councillor Mark Grimes (Ward 6, Etobicoke-Lakeshore), well, just because.

This leaves seven votes to pull in, and we scraped the bottom of the Team-Ford-loyalty barrel to arrive at that number. If the mayor doesn’t pull something out of a hat to entice councillors over to his side, if he can’t build momentum in favour of a casino, his votes will evaporate. No councillor will want to be on the losing side of such a divisive issue.

Every way you look at this, the council casino vote seems DOA. To most politicians, near-certain defeat on a cherished item would be cause for concern. But as we all know by now, Mayor Ford is not most politicians.

None of this is about good governance or even rational political maneuvering. Losing council votes is a viable strategy if you’re looking to embrace a certain us-versus-them martyrdom. The mayor simply needs a wedge issue to take into next year’s campaign. He’s currently trotting some out to see how they fit. Transit. Island airport jet expansion. They have nice left-right, downtown-suburban dynamics.

The problem with casinos is that the votes won’t fall that way. There’s no ideological or geographic split on the issue. Tuesday’s vote at Executive Committee showed that. The outcome suggests this will just be another millstone for Mayor Ford to wear, further proof that he is unwilling or unable to lead this city.

Rob Ford on the campaign trail in 2010. Photo by {a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/dcronin/4979789781/"}Dan Cronin^{/a}, from the {a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/torontoist/pool/"}Torontoist Flickr Pool{/a}.

The 2013 City budget process is entering its final stretch, and Mayor Rob Ford, who campaigned on his supposed fiscal smarts, is naturally going to be doing everything he can in coming days to take credit for any cost reductions. This is especially true now that there’s a chance he’ll be forced into a byelection—assuming there’s a possibility he’ll lose his conflict-of-interest appeal.

This morning on Facebook, Ford released the text of a speech he delivered, also this morning, to his executive committee, which met today to discuss the budget. It reads like a stump speech, so let’s analyze it like one. How truthful is Ford being when he says things like this?

After two years of hard work and heavy lifting, we’ve turned the tide.  Our 2013 operating budget is balanced for the first time ever—without using any prior year surplus. Once again, we have held the line on spending.

This sounds great, except it’s not exactly right. Toronto is forbidden, under provincial law, from ever running a deficit, so the City’s budget is actually balanced every single year. And although the recommended 2013 budget doesn’t use prior-year surplus, it does contain a hefty one-time draw from the City’s reserves, which is exactly the type of unsustainable spending Ford has railed against.

Our 2013 gross operating budget is basically the same size as last year.

This is true, but it’s not as impressive as Ford seems to think. The gross operating budget is the total amount of money the City plans to spend on its operations in a given year. It includes revenue and transfers from higher levels of government.

The net operating budget is the part that’s actually funded by property taxes, and it continues to rise under Ford. Metro columnist Matt Elliott pointed this out back in September. “Cutting the gross budget is as simple as scaling back some programs funded by user fees or insisting that no prior year surplus money go into program delivery,” Elliott wrote. In other words, it’s more an accounting trick than a genuine achievement.

Last year, Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday, Executive Director Bruce Anderson and Chief Negotiator Bob Reynolds worked with union leadership to achieve phenomenal savings of over $150 million in our new four-year collective agreements. We avoided a labour disruption and gave city managers the flexibility they need to improve customer service while managing costs. Our employees deserve thanks for doing their part too.

Even Ford’s worst enemies will concede that his administration deserves credit for wrangling affordable contracts with the City’s unions, but the $150-million figure cited here is misleading. It’s the total amount of savings expected over the lifetime of the contracts. Not all of that spending reduction will be realized in 2013.

We also privatized garbage collection west of Yonge St. saving $88 million and improving customer service in the process.

Again, this would be over the lifetime of the contract. The $88 million mentioned by Ford will take seven years to accrue, assuming it’s even an accurate figure.

The City Manager will tell you how 84 per cent of our growth in net expenditures in the last decade is due to Police, Fire, EMS and TTC. This year, our police service came in with a zero-increase budget. Perhaps, the first in its history. Well done. Fire and EMS have also been asked to largely hold the line.

Sure, if you call a budget full of postponed spending and unallocated cuts “flatlined.” All the Toronto Police Service has done is buy itself some time, possibly in the hopes that a new mayor will be along soon.

Transportation is also a major concern in Toronto. I campaigned on making the investments necessary to improve our network of roads, trails and transit. For almost a decade, City Council neglected to maintain the Gardiner Expressway, which now needs a major investment just to keep it safe and functional.

Blaming your predecessors really only works, in politics, if you weren’t one of them. Ford has been on council since 2000. He bears no more blame for the state of the Gardiner than anyone else, but he sure didn’t campaign on fixing it. The expressway was crumbling away for months while the mayor led the City through a doomed attempt to reorient its transit expansion plans towards subways.

If this is the type of rhetoric Ford plans on taking to voters in a few months, he’ll be giving his opponents plenty to work with.

You can read the rest of Ford’s speech here.

Councillors Michelle Berardinetti (left) and Jaye Robinson were the only two women on the city's executive committee before Berardinetti's recent departure. Photo by Desmond Cole.

In the 2010 election 15 women were elected to city council, out of 45 members in total. But since Rob Ford took office, only two have served on the influential, 13-member executive committee.

This week, council had a chance to at least maintain the status quo: they were debating the mid-term shuffle of committee appointments, and there was a vacancy since Berardinetti had decided to leave the committee. Deputy mayor Doug Holyday (Ward 3, Etobicoke Centre) recommended councillor Frank Di Giorgio (Ward 12, York South-Weston) to fill the spot, and Janet Davis (Ward 31, Beaches-East York) rose to ask about the lack of women on the committee, specifically in light of the significant number of women serving on council.

Holyday replied that gender was “not the issue,” adding that “we need to get the best qualified people we can possibly get here. I would love to have more women on the executive—I think certainly there’s a benefit to that. But we have to have people on the executive who are going to follow the mayor’s agenda. Unfortunately we weren’t able to find people to make that commitment.”

Councillor Jaye Robinson (Ward 25, Don Valley West) is the only woman remaining on executive, which sets the municipal government’s strategic priorities and includes the chairs of the other major council committees. Fewer than three weeks ago, Councillor Michelle Berardinetti (Ward 35, Scarborough Southwest) made good on a vow to leave the committee. Berardinetti and Robinson had both emphasized a lack of consensus-building and strategic planning over general opposition to the mayor’s agenda, and said they would leave if the issues persisted. Robinson, who decided to renew her appointment and recently became chair of the Community Recreation and Development Committee, told us in an interview that Berardinetti’s departure “firmed up my decision to stay on.”

“I felt that we need diversity on executive, as we do on council,” said Robinson. “I was disappointed Councillor Berardinetti decided to go… She had her reasons and I respect that.” The North York–area councillor noted that women who live in her ward tend to emphasize pedestrian safety, greenspace, and public health issues. “We need moms involved, women involved… we need that perspective at the table,” she said. Citing “different challenges within our neighbourhoods,” Robinson added that no woman in office can fully represent the diverse range of women’s concerns.

Berardinetti, who also spoke with us this week at council, rejected the notion that women ought to be selected to executive merely because of their gender. “I’m not at the table because I’m a woman—it has to be based on your qualifications.” At the same time, she emphasized that “without a doubt, there are gender perspectives at the table.” Berardinetti cited examples of women councillors as “consensus builders,” including councillor Ana Bailao (Ward 18, Davenport), who recently chaired an affordable housing working group that successfully convinced the Ford administration to scale back an initial plan to sell over 600 Toronto Community Housing properties. Data assembled by civic activist Dave Meslin also suggests more collaborative voting tendencies by council’s women on issues debated in the current term of council.

Councillor Berardinetti highlighted efforts by Robinson and herself to mitigate cuts the Ford administration proposed during the 2012 budget process. She applauded a motion on Tuesday to replace outgoing executive committee member Giorgio Mammoliti (Ward 7, York West), who has voted in line with mayor Ford on major issues, with Pam McConnell (Ward 28, Toronto Centre-Rosedale), who has regularly criticized the mayor’s agenda. “It’s fine if [McConnell] is at the table,” Berardinetti said, and described her colleague as “obviously qualified.” She also suggested it’s futile to exclude dissenting views from executive committee, since executive decisions “are going to be assessed and reviewed on the floor of council anyway.”

Holyday told us in an interview that it was “underhanded for [Councillor Davis] to try to portray that as a feminist thing… it certainly wasn’t.” Holyday insisted that McConnell would merely “try to gum up the works from inside” if she was appointed to executive. He defended the mayor’s appointments, saying, “We did try to put a couple [of women] on, we put a couple of rather inexperienced ones on, really. They were rookie councillors who did support our agenda.”

Holyday described Berardinetti’s resignation as “unfortunate.” When we asked if the mayor’s agenda or tactics might be alienating women on council, he replied, “I don’t think there’s anything that we’re putting forward that’s detrimental to women in any way, shape, or form. That would be a foolish position to take for any mayor or executive group.”

Prabha Khosla, a representative of the Toronto Women’s City Alliance, told us in an interview that women are uniquely affected by the provision of City services. “For example, 64 per cent of the ridership of the TTC is female,” Khosla said. Given that women are more likely to earn less money and therefore rely on public transit, “having access to a frequent, accessible service has more meaning for us.” Khosla also cited attitudes displayed in public council deliberations that may deter women from speaking up. “A lot of the behaviour is sexist and abusive,” she said.” If you’re going to be yelled at or told you’re not qualified to speak, that’s not an encouraging sign.”

During an executive committee meeting last year at which hundreds of residents gave deputations in response to Mayor Ford’s core service review, Holyday interrupted then TWCA representative Jennifer Arango (who now works in Ward 9 Councillor Maria Augimeri’s office) after she criticized the committee’s lack of female representation. Holyday, who was not chairing the meeting at the time, demanded loudly, “you’re here to tell us how we’re supposed to be made up?” After her deputation, when Arango was asked what might happen if women’s voices were excluded from the executive, she shot back, “Well, I think you’ll have more men yelling at deputants while they’re trying to make their point.”

CORRECTION: November 30, 2012, 3:45 PM This post originally identified Maria Augimeri as a Ward 8 councillor. In fact, she represents Ward 9. Also, this post misidentified a meeting at which Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday had an exchange with a TWCA representative named Jannifer Arango. It was an executive committee meeting, not a budget committee meeting.

Mayor Rob Ford with fellow councillors at a public-transit press conference near Eglinton and Victoria Park avenues, earlier this year. Photo by {a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/photopia/6806540073/"}HiMY SYeD{/a}, from the {a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/torontoist/"}Torontoist Flickr Pool{/a}.

Let’s look at yesterday’s Executive Committee meeting not as a glass-half-empty scenario—as a group of councillors unable or unwilling to deal with some seemingly intractable problems faced by the city that elected them. Instead, let’s think of the glass as being half full.

With two of the biggest files on the table yesterday—those being transit and the Toronto Community Housing Corporation (TCHC)—Mayor Ford and his closest allies reached a compromise with his council opponents. Yes: compromise, Mayor Ford. Mayor Ford, compromise.

Apparently those three words can exist together in one paragraph.

So when the City CFO’s report on long-term strategies for funding transit and Ana Bailão’s special-housing working group’s report on selling public housing passed through the Executive Committee with much debate, but without substantive meddling, we may well have witnessed the Ford administration turning a corner.

Consider where both items started.

Soon after he assumed office, with the TCHC awash in a chocolately mess, Mayor Ford and his council approved a one-man replacement board, Case Ootes, who near the end of his tenure came out in favour of selling 900 or so TCHC houses. The proceeds were to go toward alleviating TCHC’s massive backlog of much-needed apartment repairs, or maybe into the city’s general revenue as part of the annual operating budget. Either way, the city was looking to divest itself of a chunk of social housing.

The mere appointment of middle-of-the-road Councillor Bailão (Ward 18, Davenport) as chair of an affordable-housing working group earlier this year represented a major step back from the fire-sale plans the mayor originally had in mind. Her report, published last month, recommends a much more modest approach. It advocates for selling far fewer homes and seeking a more collaborative direction with tenants and other levels of government—more collaborative, at any rate, than one normally associates with Mayor Ford. That this essentially sailed through the Executive Committee suggests Mayor Ford is starting to figure out how to pick his battles.

Gone are the days of issuing mayoral decrees: “I have a mandate.” “Transit City is dead.” “Make it so.”

That lasted for a little more than a year or so, gummed up the works, delayed the inevitable, and only really served to sideline Mayor Ford. Now, his influence has waned so much that yesterday his Executive Committee was actually talking about revenue sources (i.e., taxes) for building public transit. The mayor has made no bones about his outright disagreement with the notion of creating new taxes for this purpose. But, in the end, he voted with the majority of the committee’s members to consult the public on the possibility.

It’s fascinating to watch the mayor’s evolutions on the issues that are important to him. He starts off with an extreme position—a massive sell-off of homes, say, or a major rejigging of a transit plan—falters on the follow-through, meets resistance, and, ultimately, finds himself having ignited a debate that runs absolutely opposite to his intended direction.

Hardly what you would call the delicate art of compromise. Although, to be fair to the mayor, Councillor Bailão’s report isn’t a complete refutation of his position. Properties will be sold off. Some of the remaining stock will be tended to. Mayor Ford can be seen as making something of a positive contribution to that process.

It’s a start. He should be applauded for that. (And genuinely, not the slow-clap kind.)

But there’s a long way to go, not just for the mayor but for all of council. What yesterday’s Executive Committee meeting revealed, most of all, was that on these big files, like transit and social housing, Toronto cannot go it alone. Higher levels of government have to come back to the table with both money and ideas. Like they used to do.

Otherwise, mild compromising at the municipal level won’t suffice. We’re talking radical solutions for entrenched problems that both Queen’s Park and Ottawa have ignored for the better part of two decades. They’ve had a friend of sorts in Mayor Ford, with his assertion that all the City’s problems are caused by overspending. But even he’s starting to wake up to the fact that cutting spending isn’t going to get the job done.

Maybe these conciliatory baby steps should be seen as something bigger. Maybe Ford’s administration is starting to come around to the point of view that the City’s difficulties— especially in paying for big-ticket items, like public transit—are not self-inflicted, not the exclusive result of our own maladministration.

At least, that’s the way it seems, looking through the half-full glass.

Photo by Laura Godfrey/Torontoist.

6:24 AM: Now, bed. Analysis tomorrow, once we’ve had a chance to process a little.

5:18 AM: All motions have been unanimously approved. Nobody is completely sure what this means, but it seems to be the case that many of these cuts have been put off but not definitively taken off the table. Some may be considered again in November, when the budget meetings actually commence.

5:05 AM: Summary: Shiner’s motions take certain cuts off the table; Mammoliti’s push them back to later in the budget cycle.

4:55 AM: Thompson moves to remove Riverdale Farm from list of farms and zoos for sale (at least for now).

4:49 AM: Milczyn has one motion: create a “strong” Heritage Toronto by consolidating it with museum services.

4:47 AM: “Mr. Mayor, happy birthday to me.” Mammoliti says he has 20 motions. Many of these are moving recommendations from the City Manager’s proposed set of cuts.

4:39 AM: Now onto motions. Shiner wants to reject proposals regarding snow clearing, grass cutting, TTC, library, and community grants cuts.

4:29 AM: “I can’t imagine what would represent more of a contemptuous process for our democracy today.” Kristyn Wong-Tam. Fragedakis, Layton, McConnell all chiming in with profound concerns as well. Worth noting: they were no obligation to stay here. So far all those speeches were by visiting councilors—Executive Committee members haven’t spoken yet.

4:17 AM: Gord Perks: I get two seconds to speak to each of 89 recommendations.” [Pauses two seconds]. “That was daycare.” Goes on to say that the City is seriously lowballing revenue projections, and forcing a vote before actual revenue figures are available—the cuts may not be necessary at all. “This is not governance, this is the thing that governments do when they are not doing their job. This is wreckage.”

4:15 AM: Adam Vaughan: “I’ve been around this place for 25 years worth of budgets. I have never seen a document that is so short of facts… I have never seen a budget process more corrupt. Not corrupt in a legal sense, but corrupt as a process… This is the most sinister piece of legislation that has ever been in front of this city council, and it needs to be stopped.”

4:06 AM: Ana Bailão: What we’ve learned from these mtgs is that “Torontonians care about their city…. They want a moderate approach.” And another voice joining the chorus, Josh Matlow: “We are not well informed enough to make these decisions today.”He goes on to say that people want more than just the services the City is absolutely legally required to provide.

4:05 AM: Mary-Margaret McMahon: “I will not blindly slash and burn and cut things that make our city great.” (Note: she doesn’t vote today, as she is not on the Executive Committee.)

4:02 AM: “I don’t even know what these cuts mean”—Janet Davis. She lists all the pieces of information they don’t have.

3:58 AM: Mihevc: “This is not a debate among Torontonians. Every single meeting has been a rally…to maintain a strong city.” And then: “What these three reports represent is the most massive change to city government in 14 years… This does not even come close to the information we require to make wise and intelligent choices.”

3:57 AM: Questions of staff finished. Speakers now—councillors each get three minutes to state their views.

3:42 AM: By the way, that $774 opening pressure on the budget? City manager now softening his language, saying it may be $600 or $500 million.

3:35 AM: For a process expressly designed to ensure councillors are able to make informed votes, this is a travesty in several ways at once. Trying to decide on $100 million in cuts based on two minutes of questioning. Where’s the fire? No reason—none—not to allow councillors the standard allotment of five minutes per item (instead of two minutes for three items).

3:32 AM: Also, if we don’t know how much individual items will save, this raises the question: how on earth did they arrive at the total??

3:29 AM: Well, here’s a twist. We know how much the slate of cuts is supposed to save total. No idea how much individual items will save. Informed voting is not even in theory possible, if you want to consider cuts individually rather than the whole set.

3:24 AM: These questions of staff are going nowhere fast. Dozens and dozens of items to consider. Streamlining is one thing, but no intelligent Q&A possible in two minutes or less.

3:12 AM: Procedural outrage! Councillors only get two minutes apiece to question staff on all three agenda items—not just the budget cuts, but also the user fees, and the staff reductions.

3:07 AM: And…we are done deputations! Total: 173 deputants spoke; 3 in favour of cuts, 1 in favour of user fee increases. Now, councillors begin debating the proposals before them and considering any potential amendments.

2:55 AM: “My name is Andrea Calver, and I love Toronto. Mayor Ford, I have never heard you say why you love Toronto.” Deputant 352.

2:39 AM: The red bow-tied Jon Catzel, number 342, suggests Ford cut his own salary to $10.25/hr, like private sector trash collectors.

2:27 AM: Overall, this meeting feels less rambunctious—and less slumber party-like—than the last marathon session. On the other hand, this group showed up knowing they’d be here til all hours.

2:26 AM: “Rob Ford, you are a liar! You promised us no cuts! Where is the gravy??!” Paul Choi, deputant 329. Deputation stopped for being unparliamentary.

1:57 AM: Alicia Pang is deputant number 190. She begins by turning and facing the assembled deputants and speaking to them rather than to the councillors. “How would you like if we turned our backs to you,” ask Mammoliti and Holyday. That, presumably, was her point. Pang then turns around and continues to speak, now facing the councillors. “This whole process is disrespectful. None of you is listening to what I have to say.”

1:44 AM: Shelley Carroll gets the eggs. Yes, we are jealous.

1:39 AM: Dan Eldridge, chair of Riverdale Farm Advisory Council. He brought eggs from the farm! Also, says that animal care only cost $30,000 year—figure has been significantly overblown by KPMG report. “I’m not egging the deputant on!” says Shelley Carroll, as she asks Eldridge a question.

1:26 AM: And now, Bob Kinnear. “Toronto has the most economically efficient transit system in North America…I do not understand why this well-known fact is meaningless to you… By cutting transit you are on the wrong side of history. There is still time to be on the right side of history. There is time to stop the crazy train.”

1:18 AM: Math! Deputants: 149 (#266 on list). Pro cuts: 3; pro user fee increase: 1; worried about fluoride: 5; opposing cuts: everyone else.

12:43 AM: It is Giorgio Mammoliti’s 50th birthday. There is pie and singing over here in the Exec Cmte meeting. “Nothing makes me happier than to be here with all of you today,” says Giorgio. “Even the unions.”

11:39 PM: “Go low and go for the knees.” Stephen Braun, deputant 227, who says Rob Ford coached him in high school. “And I see nothing has changed.” And then a minute later: “Mayor Ford, you are running this city like you coached me in football—like the schoolyard bully.”

11:09 PM: Joe Mihevc (Ward 21, St. Paul’s): “Thank you Santa, for coming all this way. Do you feel Torontonians are getting Scrooged?”

11:04 PM: Next deputant: Santa Claus! (aka Carolyn Johnson, deputant 214). She is here to talk about the Xmas Fund, and Del Grande is personally offended. “This is a joke.” “So is this meeting!” “Don’t be a Scrooge!” And then Adam Vaughan: “Any chance you’d give us a preview of who is on the naughty list?”

10:52 PM: Math! By our count 119 deputants have spoken; up to 210 on the list (due to no shows). Pro cuts: three. Pro user fee increases: one.

10:45 PM: Mayor’s back!

10:39 PM: “If TCHC keeps going the way that it’s going, some of those buildings are going to fall down.” Kenn Hale, director of legal services for the Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario and deputant number 208.

10:26 PM: Mary Fragedakis (Ward 29, Toronto-Danforth) tweets: “My mum just arrived to the all-nighter with homemade Greek biscuits in Cmtee room 2.”

10:13 PM: “Big round of applause for Elizabeth, number 200!” Doug Holyday, who is chairing in Ford’s absence. At this rate we’ll be done deputations before dawn.

9:46 PM: Roy Mitchell, deputant 191, offers the mayor—who has sadly left the room—a Unity Award, for uniting Torontonians in their opposition to budget cuts.

Deputant number 191, Roy Mitchell, offers the mayor a Unity Award.

9:24 PM: “I’m wearing black because I’m watching the death of my democracy.” Deputant Jason Robins (184). Can hear whoops across the hall.

9:21 PM: First media care package of the day over at Exec! Timbits, juice, and coffee. If you’re thinking of coming down and checking things out, we spied bagels and cream cheese in the other room, too.

9:17 PM: Committee Room 1 is ful, and there’s a good presence in two overflow rooms. The meeting overall feels more subdued than the last marathon Executive Meeting, but at least as determined. Deputants showing up knowing they were going to be here all night.

7:59 PM: “You have eliminated sources of revenue. You are the source of the problem.” Sonja Greckol, deputant 153.

7:54 PM: We—and the Executive Committee—are back up and running. On deputant 151 of 361 registered. So far: three in favour of cuts; five worried about fluoride.

To help deal with overflow, the Executive Committee meeting is being screened in the City Hall rotunda.

6:27 PM: And now Doug Holyday and Mark Ferguson, head of CUPE 416, are fighting about whether or not they had scheduled meetings that may or may not have been cancelled. Considerable shouting. And with that, we break for dinner! Back at 7:15.

6:01 PM: Reverend Maggie Helwig, appalled that affordable housing cuts are on the table. “We have a housing crisis in this city.” As she hits the two minute mark and Ford cuts her off: “We have a choice! We have a choice!” Applause.

5:57 PM: First resident to address Riverdale Farm, surprisingly. A “cultural jewel” says deputant 128, Lisa Brylowski.

5:48 PM: “You can’t ask the province to make the TTC an essential service and then two months later kill bus routes.” York University student Sonia Stramaglia. She tells Ford she wants to have his job one day, and wants there to still be a city left to run. A surivor of a random sexual assault,” she describes the 25 minute walk from the nearest subway station as the worst thing she needs to do.

5:31 PM: According to the list, we’re at deputant number 115. Actual deputations given: 69. Of those, three were in favour of the budget/service cuts, four were very concerned about water fluoridation, and the rest are opposed to service cuts.

3:34 PM: Debbie Field, executive director of FoodShare, now up. Says one of their programs would be cut because it is so small (gets $10,000 from the City) because it is run by volunteers. Among the proposed cuts are community grants that are $10,000 or less. Also in danger: the Good Food Box program, which delivers locally grown produce to residents across the city.

3:31 PM: Time for a tally! 46 deputants have spoken (they are on #69 on the list, due to no-shows); 43 opposed to cuts, 3 in favour.

3:08 PM: Jaye Robinson and Michael Thompson to the rescue! “Thank you for joining us,” someone from the deputant gallery shouts out.

3:07 PM: And…no quorum in the room at Executive. Need seven members minimum, have only six. If nobody shows up in 15 minutes, the meeting will be automatically cancelled.

2:49 PM: Susan Crocker, chair of the Toronto Arts Foundation, and Karen Tisch, president of the Toronto Arts Council, depute back-to-back. Both emphasize the importance of City grants as providing seed money which enables arts organizations to then find private sector donors to come on board with funding as well.

2:29 PM: David Greig lives in Etobicoke. He deputes, and then budget chief Mike Del Grande says: “You’ve provided us with no good alternative except to say “tax the rich.” Reply? “That’s a damn good idea!”

2:14 PM: Deputations continuing apace at City Hall. Feels like everyone is running on too much caffeine: much sprint, less substance.

2:05 PM: Now up: Margaret Smuk, who volunteers at one of the City’s long-term care facilities. She points out that one reason the City runs these is that their facilities accept patients (such as those with mental disabilities) that privately operated facilities do not.

1:54 PM: 29th deputant is Matthew McGuire of Toronto Taxpayers Coalition. First to favour lower taxes at the expense of services.

1:43 PM: And, we’re back after lunch. On deputant number 26. Nicely, a bunch of councillors have pitched in to provide sandwiches and apples for the deputants who are waiting to speak.

12:28 PM: And, we’re done with the morning session. Thus far: 25 deputants; 24 opposed to budget cuts, and one mum on cuts but in favour of increasing user fees. Ford drank his coffee this morning: right now the pace of deputations all feels a bit breathless. The Executive Committee will be back at 1:30, and so will we.

12:18 PM: Ann Dembinski, president of CUPE 79, now up. Her first order of business: rejecting insinuations that union members “are not real Torontonians.”

11:57 AM: Yelly Granny is back! And she has some suggestions: “Let’s not destroy the city we love. We should be creating an age-friendly city for all Torontonians.” She would list some examples, but “can’t, no time.”

11:21 AM: Little kids singing to the tune of Old MacDonald: “T.O. island had a farm, E-I-E-I-O. Please don’t take away our farm, E-I-E-I-O.” So far: 11 deputants, 11 opposed to proposed cuts. 11th, up now: “I want to remind you that our mayor campaigned on a platform of no cuts.”

11:01 AM: Beverly Smith reads out human rights charter during her deputation, breaks down in tears.

10:55 AM: Final total on number of registered deputants: 361. At five minutes apiece (allowing for a couple of questions each), and assuming only 50 per cent attendance: 15 hours.

10:53 AM: “People will die” if we cut HIV/AIDS funding. Keith Hambly, deputant number five.

10:37 AM: Ford is now taking applause out of subsequent councillor’s questioning time. Clearly trying to run through list fast as possible. Second deputant, Ron McAllister, protests, “I need to speed read to make two points… I took time off work to try to make the city a bit better.”

10:22 AM: Wow. Two minutes goes by REALLY fast. These depuations are going to be a tough challenge for many who were expecting to have more time. Adam Vaughan (Ward 20, Trinity-Spadina) has one minute to question the deputant. He doesn’t even get to finish the question, much less does she have a chance to answer.

10:20 AM: First deputant: Michelle St-Amour, U of T graduate student union. “We take offence” at claims that people who have been deputing or answering polls are “not the right Torontonians.”

10:15 AM: Amazing resource: blogger David Hains has made a spreadsheet comparing proposed cuts to campaign promises.

10:05 AM: City manager Joe Pennachetti detailing proposed cuts; the ones on the table today will save approximately $100 million. (As other commenters have pointed out, this is about the amount of revenue the now-killed Vehicle Registration Tax and an inflationary property tax increase would have brought in.)

At the barricades outside City Hall, activists have clipped "don't hang us out to dry!" shirts as commentary on the proposed budget cuts.

9:50 AM: Mammoliti continues: “The last crowd that was here would from time to time erupt in applause or boos or whatever… It’s worth noting that any eruption will move into the deputants’ time.” Ford agrees, warns assembled residents to keep quiet.

9:48 AM: First motion of the day: Giorgio Mammoliti (Ward 7, York West) moves to cut speaking time to two minutes from the typical five, with councillors getting one minute each to question speakers. Passes. Deputants have until 10 a.m. to register to speak.

9:45 AM: Ford continues, “Even at a reduced speaking time, we are going to listen to every single deputant…We are going to sit here for 25 hours, like we did last time.” It’s official: #cityhallslumberparty2 is on.

9:38 AM: Mayor calls the meeting to order. This meeting, he says, is the next step in helping the City “address the long-standing structural deficit in its finances.” Says government has been adding programs since amalgamation, outstripping their capacity to pay for them. “We must find permanent reductions in our cost base, either by changing what we do or by doing it more efficiently. We must also begin to look for new non-tax revenues that can grower faster than our tax base.”

Photo by {a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/marcuskamps/6098762621"}marcus kamps{/a} from the {a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/torontoist"}Torontoist Flickr Pool{/a}.

The city is overwhelmed with City Hall talk these days: between budget cuts, revamping plans for the waterfront, and two polls that show a massive drop in support for Rob Ford, all eyes are on local government. Over the next two weeks a series of meetings will dominate headlines and political chatter. Here is a quick guide to what’s happening.

• September 19: Executive Committee (agenda). The Executive Committee consists of Rob Ford’s strongest allies, and it is by far the most powerful of the city council committees. Exec will first hear deputations from members of the public who have signed up to express their support for or concerns about those cuts. Last time Exec met to discuss the budget it ran all night; many are expecting today’s meeting to run similarly long. (At press time 324 members of the public had signed up to speak.) After hearing from the public the councillors who make up the Executive Committee will debate the proposals before them, and decide whether they want to amend any of the suggested cuts. The final package of budget cuts they approve at the end of the meeting will be considered by a meeting of the full city council next week.
• September 21–22: city council (agenda). This is a so-called “regular” meeting of city council, meaning that it will consider all manner of business that routinely gets discussed by all the various city council committees. The key item for debate will be the proposed changes to the waterfront development plans—taking control of development of the Port Lands away from Waterfront Toronto.
• September 26–27: city council, special meeting (agenda not yet published). This is a special meeting of council, convened specifically to discuss the core service review and the proposed budget cuts approved by the Executive Committee. Councillors will, as they do at every meeting, have the opportunity to further revise the plans that come before them.

In the aftermath of two polls last week, both of which showed a considerable drop in support for Ford among residents in all parts of Toronto, many are speculating that the mayor will offer compromises on both budget cuts and the waterfront revisions. Focus will be on the so-called “mushy middle”—centrist councillors who thus far have tended to support Ford but who are believed to be more moderate than him, and willing to switch their vote as the political tides change. (A handy guide to how councillors have voted on key items.)

We’ll be liveblogging all three of these meetings. Got procedural questions? Ask us in the comments!

The view from the Port Lands. Photo by {a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrew_snow/5188537209/"}Andrew Snow{/a}, from the {a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/torontoist/"}Torontoist Flickr Pool{/a}.

In April, reporters learned that there was a general consensus among Mayor Ford’s close allies that the City, in partnership with private companies, could do a better job of redeveloping Toronto’s shoreline than Waterfront Toronto, the arms-length agency created by all three levels of government in 2001 to do exactly that. Now we have some evidence that the mayor’s team meant business.

At its September 6 meeting, the mayor’s executive committee will be considering a new approach to development in the Port Lands, which is the City-owned stretch of land south of Lakeshore Boulevard, between Ashbridges Bay and the inner harbour. The plan would give the City—and, by extension city council and the mayor—more direct control over development in the Port Lands, and would also open the door to a much more aggressive development timetable, funded by private dollars.

Waterfront Toronto has spent a decade laying plans for the area, including a yet-to-be-realized $634 million project to naturalize and flood-protect the mouth of the Don River, to make the surrounding land viable for development. In 2004, they launched an environmental assessment of the Lower Don Lands, followed in 2007 by an international design competition whose winner was approved by council. The plan as currently conceived would result in the area being being built into a mixed-residential neighbourhood with parks, and would unfold over the course of 25 years.

The proposal that will be going before the executive committee on September 6 calls for a radical realignment of all these plans. It proposes altering the City’s standing agreement with Waterfront Toronto so that the Toronto Port Lands Company—a City-owned corporation that handles real estate and leasing on the waterfront but currently does not act as a development lead—would have control of development in the Port Lands.

The plan also calls for TPLC’s existing board to be replaced with a “strategically composed board” (yes, that is the actual terminology used by City staff) of nine directors, including five citizen members and two city councillors. Currently, TPLC’s board only has four members, all of whom are civil servants.

By changing the composition of TPLC’s board in this way, city council could bend the corporation’s decision-making processes toward almost any goal. What the goal may be, in this case, is not entirely clear, but the staff report (a type of document that city council uses to inform its decisions) that outlines the plan offers some hints.

The main reason for turfing Waterfront Toronto from the project, as described in the report, is the fact that the $634 million naturalization and flood protection project (and other remediation needed for the area) isn’t funded within Waterfront Toronto’s existing long-term budget and therefore, according to City staff, “it appears that Waterfront Toronto is not in a position to coordinate a comprehensive revitalization program for the Port Lands that would allow for significant development within the next ten years, at a minimum.” The terms of the City’s agreement with Waterfront Toronto allow them to renegotiate in cases where there is “insufficient commitment, financial or otherwise.”

Under the proposal, money for flood protection would be sought from the private sector.

Waterfront Toronto already partners with private developers, and so it would seem that this proposed realignment of the existing designs is calculated primarily to speed development up.

This would mean, at minimum, big changes to a carefully laid plan that was many years in the making. And the impetus is coming not from Waterfront Toronto, but from somewhere in City Hall.

Speedier development, coincidentally or not, is exactly the result Doug Ford told reporters he wanted, earlier this summer.

Waterfront Toronto’s media spokespeople were difficult to reach for comment, because when the City released the report, at about 4:45 on Friday, they had already left their desks for the weekend.

Think about that.

“All I can really say at this point is that Waterfront Toronto, in 2001, was given a mandate by three governments to revitalize the waterfront and the Port Lands, and to develop the Port Lands around this vision of a renaturalized Don,” said Marisa Piattelli, VP of communications at Waterfront Toronto. She thinks about $19 million of public money has been spent, to date, on planning in the Port Lands.

“If there is a desire for change in vision or approach, then there’s a desire for change in vision or approach,” she added. “And we take our direction from those three levels.”

If executive committee approves the plan on September 6, it will still need final approval by city council.

Read the full staff report here.