How I know what Rob Ford is going to be for Toronto, from experience

Dec 3, 2010

How I know what Rob Ford is going to be for Toronto, from experience

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I know what Rob Ford is going to be for Toronto.  Not just because of the right-wing platform he ran on.  But because I have seen it firsthand.  See I am from Winnipeg.  We have had a right-wing mayor for six years and what he has done is exactly what Rob Ford is going to do.  Sam Katz, the mayor of Winnipeg, and Rob Ford both believe in the same ideology and while they look completely different they are exactly the same.

Both ran on the fact that they are "one of us" and a political outsider.  Even though Rob Ford and Sam Katz are both millionaires which most of us are not.  Also, Rob Ford was a city councilor for 10 years and Sam Katz is active in the Conservative Party, hardly outsiders.  It is populism at it's worst.

I'll show what Rob Ford is going to do to Toronto by showing what Sam Katz has already done to Winnipeg. 

1) an all on attack on city workers.  Katz has set his sights on the city workers and has reduced their numbers through hiring freezes.  Luckily in the CUPE contract the workers have a provision that if their job is made redundant the city has to find another job in the city with equal pay for them.  If it wasn't for this provision our numbers would be even more reduced. 

2) privatizations and contracting-out.  Katz is obsessed with contracting out and privatizing.  It is part of his ideology and it helps his friends out.  Katz started by contracting out the rest of garbage collection.  This contract while it was tendered there was only one company that could do it, BFI.  So there is a monopoly situation in garbage collection in Winnipeg.  No one can challenge BFI.  While Katz has lied and said it has saved money for the city.  The opposite is true.

Garbage removal has cost more every year since it has been contracted out. In the most recent budget for the city, Solid Waste Removal was budgeted to cost the city 21.34 million dollars while in the 2008 budget it cost the city 15.9 million dollars. (2010 budget, pg.40.) This is even though the city has decreased the amount of full time positions in Solid Waste Removal to 12 from 26 in 2008. Though in the Solid Waste Collection Business Plan in 2005 the city said that if they contracted out both manual collection and autobin collection it would save the city 23.7 million dollars a year from the status quo (2005 Solid Collection Business Plan, pg. 25), which we can see is a complete lie. So did they purposely lie in this business plan to make contracting out look better than it actually was. Instead of saving the city 23.7 million per year it cost the city an extra 5.4 million from 2008 to 2010. Finally, in the 2010 budget the city says that there has been an increase of 1 million dollars in contract costs from the last budget. (2010 budget, pg. 40)

Also, Katz has privatized the largest park in Winnipeg, Assiniboine Park.  He did this by giving control of the park to a private, non-profit board.  A board that is unknown and chosen by who knows what means.  This means the park is no longer democratically controlled and the people have no say in what happens to the park.

Katz also contracted out snow removal, and all the major construction projects.  Both of which has increased in cost over the years and haven't saved the city any money.

3) patronage, no transparency, patronage.  Katz has completely eliminated any transparency at City Hall.  Decisions are made behind closed doors.  City councilors are kept in the dark about contracts the city has signed and then told to vote on it.  The city recently signed a contract, to privatize our waste and water system, with Veolia, a multinational corporation from France.

Veolia has been kicked out of contracts in New Orleans, because of 29 violations in one year, Lee, Mass., where the city and residents were kept in the dark about the contract and after opposition rallied against the proposal it was defeated.  They were also kicked out in Puerto Rico, where they racked up 695 million dollars in losses, 6.2 million dollars in fines, and more than 3000 operational, maintenance, and administrative deficiencies, Rockford, MA., where a Veolia employee was convicted of stealing $300,00 from the city by filing phony invoices, and Angleton, TX., where the city ended the contract and took Veolia to court.  They argued that Veolia violated the contract because Veolia failed maintain adequate staffing levels, not submitting capital project updates, and charging improper expenses.

Sam Katz kept city councilors in the dark about the contract and then brought it for a vote where the community rallied against the plan.  City council, even though they didn't know what the contract was, passed it. 

Katz has also given his friends high up administration jobs, with a large salary.  Even though they are not qualified for the position.  Katz hired his friend, Phil Seegel, to run the Planning and Property Department even though his only experience is being a real estate agent.  Also, Katz hired Alex Robinson as the acting Chief Administrative Officer after Katz pushed out the former CAO.  Alex Robinson used to work in the Mayor's Office.  Both Seegel and Robinson are now acting CAOs after the new CAO left.

4) a hatred of public transit.  When Katz got into office in 2004 he canceled a planned bus rapid transit system.  He then delayed the project by getting consultants to look at the project.  It wasn't until 2009 that part one of the system was started to be built.  Katz then decided he supported light rail instead of bus.  This put part two of the project at risk.  This was just a way to delay the project even further because Katz does not support public transit.

5) horrible fiscal management.  Katz ran, in 2004, on that he was a good fiscal manager because he has a background as a business man.  He has though shown to have terrible fiscal management.  The 2010 budget was only balanced on the city's lawsuit of Manitoba Hydro.  The city was assuming they were going to win the lawsuit and balanced the budget on that notion.  Even the most incompetent accountant would say that is not the way to go.  But it was revealed recently, conveniently after the election, that because of increased snow removal costs, a contracted out service, the city is most likely going to run a deficit.  The City of Winnipeg running a deficit is actually illegal by provincial law.

6) an attack on the most vulnerable.  Winnipeg was sadly known as the first jurisdiction in Canada to ban "aggressive panhandling."  This meant that people with little to no income could not ask people for money at bus stops and ATMs. The city issued tickets to people who violated the bylaw.  Yes, they issued tickets to people who had no means to pay for them.  This year the city also is planning to ban panhandling on boulevards.  Restricting even further the ability of the most vulnerable to get a tiny income.  Katz has also forced the amalgamation of community centres creating supercentres that no longer serve the community as they are too far away for some to go.  Finally, a complete lack of a anti-poverty strategy in a city that has one of highest poverty rates.

I could literally go on for a long time.  But this gives you a idea of what Rob Ford is going to do to Toronto because of what we have gone through in Winnipeg.  The only difference is the city council in Toronto won't completely bend to Ford's will like they have in Winnipeg.  Also, the community will hopefully put up a bigger fight against Ford's agenda where in Winnipeg there was opposition but not organized and not large.  Most of the people in Winnipeg are lied to and believe what they are told.