Toronto City Council's Last Meeting

Was last week. No more opportunities exist for Councillors to exploit city business for political advantage in the upcoming election.

Councils past in Aurora have made no substantive decisions after candidate nominations close.Unless the matter was critical.

It was never formally adopted but the common understanding , after nominations closed no assumptions could be made about who would form the next Council.

An outgoing Council, could not saddle an incoming Council with decisions they had no part in making and might very well not support.

We received a memorandum from Town Solicitor last week explaining that if 75% of the incumbent council has registered as candidates, they have all the power they need to bind the Corporation to decisions.

Council is in the process of rushing through the 2c Secondary Plan ,the Fol de Rol Promenade Study and the Five Year Official Plan Review.

The 2C Secondary Plan as drafted so far, is already being challenged at the Ontario Municipal Board.It has to be included in the Five Year Official Plan Review which should have been completed months ago. Richmond Hill finished theirs last year and East Gwillimbury in May of this year.

Watching the election unfold in Toronto, I pick up bits and pieces of how they operate down there.

The Mayor does not preside at meetings. Council chooses a presiding member from among their number.

The Mayor appoints the Deputy- Mayor. That makes sense. Councillors are elected in wards. Highest vote count would not be relevant. But is that like appointing a successor?

The Mayor appoints his own executive committee. They have to vote with the Mayor or be replaced. I heard the executive committee is a majority of Council. Then I heard it isn't.

George Rust D'Eye told Aurora Council, we could appoint an executive committee composed of all but one Council member. And I suppose they could ,if they didn't have to explain it to the community. Anyway, they didn't. They adopted a prohibition bylaw instead.

Some Toronto Councillors have been quoted as saying it doesn't matter if Rob Ford gets elected.

They will find a way around him.

The most interesting aspect of the race though is that Rob Ford still has a comfortable two digit lead (15%) over the nearest competitor. Doesn't seem to matter how much the chattering class deplores the situation. However much mud they sling, people still seem to be responding to his message.

Taxes are too heavy. Councillors are shamelessly extravagant. People are hurting.

There are only four more days for a new Mayoralty candidate to come forward.

It's not likely.

People say David Miller could be re-elected. He thinks so too. But when he held a press conference last year, and declared he would not be a candidate for Mayor again, he sounded like a man who had been run over by a steam-roller.

Garbage stacked in the parks all summer was hard to ignore. The union contract settlement was not a victory. The pressure of those summer months must have been horrendous.

Etobicoke didn't have a garbage strike. They have a private contract. They managed that when Councillor Doug Holyday was Mayor . Rob Ford is an Etobicoke Councillor.

Etobicoke was a borough. Former Metro boroughs have long-standing grievances with Toronto.

Melding former boroughs and the city into a single community has been the challenge for whoever became or becomes the City's Mayor.

Whether or not it's possible to achieve still remains a question.

Mel Lastman barely made a dent. David Miller, the intellectual elite, didn't do much better. The computer scandal happened during his watch.

How did he come through that without a smirch.

If voters give Rob Ford a chance, how he rises to the challenge will be fascinating to watch.

Of course, I'm watching from a distance. I don't really know what I'm talking about. But... it's better than watching television.