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Newsstand: September 19, 2011
Monday has returned with nary an apology for its pervasive Mondayness. In the news: Executive Committee stocks up on Red Bull ahead of another marathon meeting, college support staff are back to work this week, GO Transit union still doesn't know what to do, and Josh Matlow accuses Doug Ford of trading council votes for appearances on his radio show.
Looking for something to do for the next 25 hours or so? The executive committee at City Hall is having another one of their slumber parties non-stop meetings. Like the July meeting that ran about 21 hours and saw councillors told over and over again that the service cuts suggested by KPMG were a bad idea, the mayor and friends will face more than 300 deputants who likely signed up to tell them they’re still not thrilled. Except this time the mayor may be blinking, as they say. Some Ford allies have already come out against individual cuts like those to windrow cleaning, libraries, and arts funding, and now a Rob Ford insider reveals the mayor will not include library or daycare cuts in his current cost-cutting plan.
Strike striking off the list of things Ontario’s community college support staff have to do this week. The Ontario Public Service Employees Union and the province’s community colleges struck a deal on Sunday night that should see workers back to work by Tuesday. So sorry college kids, the “the picket line made me late” excuse isn’t going to cut it anymore.
Meantime the union representing some GO Transit employees says talks with Metrolinx are chugging along slower than a train experiencing signal delays. The negotiations are over proposed wage freezes, changes to pension plans, and a possible move to declare some staff essential workers in the event of a strike. No strike deadline has been set.
In case, for some reason, you don’t regularly listen to talk radio (though we don’t know how that could be a possibility), let us catch you up on this weekend’s highlights. First, you should know that Josh Matlow (Ward 22, St. Paul’s) has joined the roster of radio talk show hosts with names that start with the letter J over at Newstalk 1010. So every Sunday Matlow talks to his council colleagues about council things live on air. This Sunday Matlow told everyone out there in radioland that Doug Ford (Ward 2, Etobicoke North) will only appear on the show if Matlow votes with him and the mayor on the Port Lands proposal. That spurred councillor Ford to call in and dispute Matlow’s accusations of vote buying. Ford simply said “I don’t believe in supporting someone that doesn’t support us.” Not the same thing at all. Then Ford brushed off renowned urban designer Ken Greenberg’s opinion on the waterfront plans because his wife is Adam Vaughan’s (Ward 20, Trinity-Spadina) executive assistant. That prompted Vaughan to call in and clarify that his executive assistant is in fact not married to Greenberg or TTC union head Bob Kinnear, which Ford had suggested when that was convenient. Then Ford said yadda yadda yadda, and by the way this radio show counts as public consultation. So if you didn’t listen to talk radio before, we bet you will now.