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Newsstand: May 6, 2015
It's New City Manager Day! Well, sort of. Veteran Ontario bureaucrat Peter Wallace has been named as the next in line for the big gig. Maybe he can celebrate his new role with a snack from his favourite local food truck, which also celebrated something of a triumph yesterday. That, and more, below.
It’s not every day you get a new city manager, so in that sense we might consider yesterday something of a mini holiday with the appointment of Peter Wallace as the city’s top bureaucrat. Despite five hours of debate at last night’s council meeting, councillors unanimously voted to name the former longstanding Ontario bureaucrat to the demanding role, putting him in charge of some 35,000 city staffers and replacing standing manager Joe Pennachetti in July.
Just like Shakira’s hips, numbers don’t lie: removing the eastern portion of the Gardiner Expressway would be a more economically advantageous decision than the “hybrid option” of partial removal and maintenance favoured by the mayor. A report by consultant HR&A for the City and Waterfront Toronto states that, in particular, the removal option allows for the creation of 4,100 new jobs—2,900 more than the hybrid alternative. But hey, marginally shorter commutes or something.
Our city’s draconian food truck regulations have relaxed, if only a little. Yesterday council voted 43-1 to move in the direction of pretty much every other cool big city and allow food trucks to operate within 30 metres of another restaurant. Food trucks will also be allowed to remain stationary for five hours per day instead of three, and can take up five square metres instead of just under three and a half. These may seem like such tiny baby steps that they’re more akin to, say, a baby’s first rolling-over on the mobility spectrum. But Chef Ramon of Blazin Cajun food truck points out that these tweaks will open up 1,200 new food truck parking spots throughout the city: “It’s going to give us a much bigger audience.”