news
Newsstand: February 10, 2011
Illustration by Jeremy Kai/Torontoist.
Thursdays was the worst days, now we sip champagne when we thirsty—for news! Good Doug, bad Doug on the “jobs for life” rules, some York transit is in the mood for a Valentine’s Day strike, councillors old and new owe buckaroos, and the feds tell businesses to keep waiting for G20 compensation.
Rob Ford and his brood are targeting “jobs for life” (otherwise known as the job security provisions provided to City workers) contract guarantees in a bid that would ease the garbage privatization plan. Or are they? It’s a battle of the City Hall Dougs. In this corner: Rob Ford’s brother and closest adviser, Doug Ford (Ward 2, Etobicoke North), who says they’re going to give it a hell of a try to wrest that benefit from the unions because nobody should have a job for life. And in this corner: deputy mayor Doug Holyday (Ward 3, Etobicoke Centre), chair of the labour relations committee, who admits this would result in epic union resistance and wants to “talk to the experts before commenting.” Well played, Holyday. For the record, the experts are predicting a bitter showdown resulting in a massive strike or lockout in 2012.
York Region may usher in the strike season with a hobbler next Monday morning. If the two sides don’t reach an agreement in a bargaining round on Sunday, twenty-four bus routes, mostly serving Vaughan, could be out of service. The rest of the region’s transit would be running.
Former councillor Adrian Heaps owes the City heaps of money. So does Giorgio Mammoliti (Ward 7, York West), but that’s tougher to make a joke out of this early in the morning. Mammoliti owes lotsa moolah-liti? Shh, just go with it. In 2008, council voted to give the two over one-hundred-thousand dollars to cover legal costs stemming from audits of their 2006 campaign spending. But in a closed-door session, council voted to get the money back and repeal the bylaw that granted it in the first place.
Those of you who were waiting for your last paycheque to clear before putting in an offer on that castle for sale near the Rosedale Golf Club have been scooped. A “mystery European,” according to the Globe, snapped up the seventeen-and-a-half million-dollar home. The place was designed by the same architect responsible for Union Station, the Royal Alexandra Theatre, and the Royal Canadian Yacht Club. Wild conjecture based on the architect designing two things with the word “royal” in them: maybe Wills and Kate bought it and are coming home to rule us.
Almost four hundred businesses are still waiting for compensation from the federal government for losses incurred during the G20. Over ten million dollars has been claimed, with zero payments made so far, and as of January 5, forty-four claims had been rejected out of a pool of 371. The feds have advised those involved to be patient, presumably because they want to savour the anxiety and hopelessness before rejecting the claims.
And Toronto got a pretty good sustainability evaluation, for now. Many of the programs hailed in a new report may be on the chopping block of our new mayor. Low-flush toilet rebates and the tower renewal program are among the initiatives singled out by the Corporate Knights report, but to Ford they’re all just green-coloured gravy (ew). Sidebar: did we already mention how great Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi is? Just sayin’. (Stay tuned to Torontoist for even more on Nenshi’s awesomeness later today.)