Mayor John Tory taps veteran allies for top council posts

Thestar.com
December 13, 2018
David Rider

John Tory is tapping veteran city council allies for key posts in his second term as Toronto mayor, the Star has learned.

A source familiar with the mayor’s choices for the new cut-down council, to be made public Wednesday, acknowledged they include many of the suburban allies who supported Tory in his first term, but noted key roles for a couple of downtown progressives.

Tory will recommend Councillor Jaye Robinson (Ward 15 Don Valley West), who supported him on the Gardiner Expressway, Vision Zero and more as public works chair last term, become TTC chair.

Tory will name, as chairs of council’s four main “standing” committees: Ana Bailão (Ward 9 Davenport) for planning and housing; Michael Thompson (Ward 21 Scarborough Centre) for economic and community development; James Pasternak (Ward 6 York Centre) for infrastructure and environment; and Paul Ainslie (Ward 24 Scarborough-Guildwood) for general government and licensing.

Of them only Bailão was not a committee chair last term but she held a prominent role as council’s housing advocate. Thompson and Ainslie head committees that include elements of their old ones, several of which were merged after Premier Doug Ford forced the cut from 44 to 25 councillors.

Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong will return as “statutory” deputy mayor, empowered to act as mayor in Tory’s absence.

Tory will bestow ceremonial title on three other deputy mayors --Bailão representing the city core with a focus on housing; Thompson representing east Toronto with a focus on jobs; and Stephen Holyday (Ward 2 Etobicoke Centre) from the west returning as a deputy mayor, with a focus on modernization and governance.

Councillor Gary Crawford (Ward 20 Scarborough Southwest) remains budget chief. He’ll grapple with news that revenues from the land transfer tax, which has helped keep Toronto’s budget afloat for years, have slowed and will miss this year’s council-approved target by almost $100 million.

Tory has pledged to keep property tax hikes at or below inflation, amid calls for bigger increases to help pay for improved city services.

Crawford, Robinson and the four standing committee chairs will join Tory on his executive committee along with “member at large” Councillor Frances Nunziata (Ward 5 York-South Weston), who is city council speaker. Executive committee, which often shapes initiatives before they get to city council, is slimmed down to eight members from 13 last term.

Like last term, none of the standing committee chairs are from the downtown core. Bailão is the lone member of the Toronto-East York community council on executive.

Tory will, however, recommend council name downtown progressive Joe Cressy (Ward 10-Spadina Fort York) as his designate on the board of Waterfront Toronto, the city-provincial-federal agency overseeing a massive redevelopment of the east downtown Port Lands, plus negotiations with Manhattan-based Sidewalk Labs on the proposed “Quayside” high-tech test neighbourhood.

Ford’s government recently fired three provincial appointees to the board, and is expected to soon fill them, plus a fourth spot left vacant by a summer resignation, with like-minded Progressive Conservatives. Four federal appointees and three city citizen appointees fill out the 12-member Waterfront Toronto board.

Councillor Paula Fletcher (Ward 14 Toronto-Danforth) will be Tory’s designate on the board of CreateTO, the city’s new real estate agency established to manage Toronto’s vast land holdings and to develop specific site and buildings. The agency is expected to be key to Tory’s re-election campaign promise to create 40,000 affordable housing units over 12 years.

Tory will reveal picks for other posts, including seats on the police services board, Wednesday.

A year ago, in a year-end interview, Tory told the Star that if elected for a second term he would listen more to progressive councillors from the city’s core. During the election, however, he said progressive rival Jennifer Keesmaat was supported by “radical members of city council’s left wing.”

There is in fact no significant shift from that term to this term in terms of top posts. The source, who was not authorized to publicly discuss Tory’s picks, said the mayor worked hard to ensure all four main committees got representatives from all four community councils, and that more than 90 per cent of council members got their first or second choices of committees.

Tory is “is relying on many of the councillors who helped him deliver his agenda over the last four years,” the source said, but is open to working with councillors outside his conservative camp “who he believes he can work with on parts of agenda … that voters across the city elected him to advance.”