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Newsstand: November 22, 2011
Ever get the feeling that Tuesday's been keeping something, some weird thing, from you all this time? It probably has. In the news: Occupy keeps on occupying, elaborate G20 spy scheme unveiled, recycling restrictions voted down, charging churches voted up, and the ever stalwart library board puts off budget cuts.
Justice David Brown decided the City was within its rights to clear Occupy Toronto from St. James Park, and the Mayor kept swearing the eviction will be “soon,” but after all the huffing and puffing and promises to blow the yurts down, the Occupiers remain. Late last night police confirmed they would not be taking any action overnight. So as of about midnight the biggest problem for Occupy Toronto was the overnight temperature.
Let’s say you were the police and you were planning an elaborate scheme to ingratiate yourself to local activists ahead of the G20, what would you call that scheme? Ever so conveniently, the OPP and RCMP went with “Joint Intelligence Group,” so now we can say this: the JIG is up. The JIG involved two officers befriending an activist group by driving them around, buying them lots of beer, and even living with them. But all that creepiness was for naught, as we all saw when the summit went down. Though some of those betrayed by the beer-buying anarchists are standing trial for conspiracy to commit mischief, so there’s that.
The Executive Committee voted against the Ford-approved proposal to stop collecting recycling overflow. The proposal was to stop picking up any recycling that didn’t fit into the City-issued bins, which would have provided an estimated savings of $500,000—or two pennies per household, if you want to go all David Shiner (Ward 24, Willowdale) on it. But councillors said the proposal was more trouble than it was worth for that little bit of savings.
Executive Council also decided that potential eternal damnation was a price they were willing pay to collect a slightly heftier sum of $2.9 million. Yep, it’s the end of the free ride for churches, retirement homes, and all the non-profits that were getting free trash pick-up. Not anymore, freeloaders. Not any more.
The library board and a bunch of citizen library fans met last night to basically reaffirm that they all love libraries. The board rejected calls to cut 10 per cent from the budget by closing branches or cutting hours. Instead they voted to put off any of that unpleasantness until at least next week.
And a poll conducted by those commies over at the CBC shows that Canadians are generally willing to pay road tolls.