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Newsstand: December 13, 2011
Take some advice from us: grilled cheeses for breakfast, grilled cheeses for lunch, grilled cheeses for prime minister. Okay, now that you've got that figured out, on to the news of the Tuesday: library board refuses to cut the requested 10 per cent, those people who were arrested for a lewd act on the TTC, Byron Sonne trial officially gets underway, update on the five-cent bag fee, and Toronto Wildlife Centre is safe for now.
The tree house where we like to imagine the mayor’s elite, hand-picked executive committee hangs out, holds their planning sessions, and celebrates staff birthdays is about to feel awfully uncomfortable. At Monday night’s library board meeting, two members of the mayor’s inner circle essentially voted to hold the library’s budget cuts at 5.9 per cent, shy of the 10 per cent demanded. When board chair Paul Ainslie (Ward 43, Scarborough East) put forward a mayor’s office-supported motion to cut hours for dozens of branches, friends-o’-Ford Jaye Robinson (Ward 25, Don Valley West) and Cesar Palacio (Ward 17, Davenport) just couldn’t support the cuts to hours and helped vote down the motion. And so the budget will go, as is, back to budget committee and on to council.
Forgoing the traditional Sunday afternoon ritual of not putting on real pants and watching football and/or You’ve Got Mail on the W Network, one couple decided to mix it up and instead get incredibly intoxicated and do sex stuff on the subway. (Now that we think about it, we guess they got the “no pants” part of the equation right. A-zing!) The pair were arrested (and then hospitalized for intoxication) around 2:30 p.m. on Sunday after being booted from the train for doing it and then continuing to do it on the platform for 14 minutes before police arrived. Lots of people are saying weird and funny stuff about this incident, but we think TTC spokesperson Brad Ross wins with his culturally sensitive to a culture we’ve never heard of statement that “no matter what your background, it is not appropriate to have sex this way.”
G20 hacker Byron Sonne’s trial proper got underway on Monday, after Justice Nancy Spies ruled that much of the evidence the defence was arguing to keep out was admissible. And so began the actual trial of the guy who was initially threatened with a ticket for jaywalking, which led to 330 days in jail, a divorce, and now, finally, the trial.
A scientific poll conducted by the Sun shows councillors would not vote to abolish the five-cent bag fee.
And let the wild, broken-jawed frogs rest easy tonight, for the Toronto Wildlife Centre at Downsview Park is probably not being demolished when its lease expires next December. Staff at the animal rescue charity naturally thought that might be the case when park staff told the wildlife centre’s lawyer that the building would be demolished to make way for new stuff at the park. But now the park people are saying it was all a big misunderstanding and the wild animals can let their wild rumpus continue.