October 26th, 2010
Eight minutes is all it took once the polls closed. The electronic polling system worked fast enough to calculate within eight minutes the 64th mayor of the City of Toronto. And that mayor is Rob Ford.
“Toronto is now open for business,” said a happily relieved Ford when interviewed shortly after CP24 declared him the winner of the 2010 municipal election.
The people of Toronto sent a message last night — a desire for change at City Hall. While Ford fell just short of a majority of the vote (47 per cent) the remainder was primarily split between George Smitherman (35 per cent) and Joe Pantalone (12 per cent), allowing neither candidate the chance of catching Ford on this day. The desire to see change also resonated when Ford captured more of the vote than David Miller did in the 2003 and 2006 elections.
An anti-Ford sentiment had been growing among segments of voters, growing more and more as the election loomed and Ford’s campaign pulled into a commanding lead. Major candidates Sarah Thomson and Rocco Rossi dropped out to make way for a Ford-Smitherman showdown. But despite the polls, which suggested just a few days ago the narrowest of margins separating the two frontrunners, this election was not that close but rather a decisive victory for the North Etobicoke Councillor.
Ford ran a simple, straightforward campaign that involved hammering home his key talking points of cutting city spending, over and over again. The term “gravy train” has become a part of Toronto’s lexicon over the spring and summer. And Ford once again continued that message in his acceptance speech last night.
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October 25th, 2010
And there you have it, Rob Ford has been elected the 64th mayor of Toronto.
With 95% of the vote counted, Ford, the councillor of 10 years, is leading with 47.8% of the vote. George Smitherman is following with 35.1% and Joe Pantalone is carrying 11.5% of the vote. If you add up Smitherman and Pantalone's votes, well, that's still not enough to catch Ford.
To see the full breakdown by wards, and the final numbers for all the candidates, go here.
More to come...
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Anyone who has ever worked in retail knows that customer service is the number one priority, which means not only providing great service, but being approachable and friendly to boot. So with that in mind, which of the three mayoral candidates is the kind of guy you feel comfortable walking up to and shaking hands with? We decided to explore this exact topic with the three mayoral frontrunners.
In a profile on Rob Ford, Toronto Life called him the master of retail politics. Makes sense considering his repeated claims to have returned 200,000 calls over the last ten years, even showing up to his constituents’ doorsteps in his Etobicoke North riding. His election signs say: “Respect for Taxpayers,” and his platform promises improved services and higher standards at city hall. “Excellent customer service doesn’t cost a thing. All it takes is leadership and accountability, and that starts at the top,” his platform reads.
This “customer is always right” approach to politics has won Ford popular support from his constituency and beyond, demonstrated in YouTube videos and on Facebook message boards. One Toronto business owner described himself as “eternally grateful” to Ford for getting the water turned back on at his business after he was rebuffed by his own city councillor.
The messages on Ford’s Facebook page echo the same appreciation and customer satisfaction. Tom Napier wrote: “He's kind of like that old teacher from the good ol' days, that always seemed to have time, for you, for the high school teams and everything else that mattered.”
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If the media claims that it's the voice of the people, then it is doing a great job of representing the confusion prevailing in Toronto. Some are doing what many are doing: holding their nose and voting for George Smitherman, with enough disclaimers behind them to save face if he loses. Others have backed Rob Ford to the hilt, while Joe Pantalone’s support — sparse, but alive — comes from the heart. Spacing looked at the published endorsements — from mainstream, alternative and online publications — over the last week and came to the conclusion that the media seems to reflect opinion on the ground — no more, no less.
To start off with, the Toronto Star endorsed George Smitherman as the candidate they believe best offers "a combination of a fresh perspective and an experienced hand at the helm." It's interesting that they choose to dismiss the talk about Smitherman being the lesser of two evils as "arrant nonsense," touting his credentials and experience as something Toronto needs. While they do mention his faults, the Star's position is clear — solidly behind Smitherman.
(Or at least it was based on that endorsement; Saturday's edition proclaimed: "Ford or Smitherman? Neither" while columnist Royson James gave us, in his own words, "another reason for cynicism.")
The Toronto Sun also published its endorsement last Sunday, but went the other way, endorsing Rob Ford. The editorial argues he's the only person who can tackle the big job of cleaning up the mess at City Council. Like the Star, the Sun was quite clear with its choice, but differed in acknowledging Ford's weaknesses.
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October 24th, 2010
With Election Day tomorrow, an important question to ask is whether or not the message delivered by candidates resonated with Torontonians. With the city discussing the relationship between cars and cyclists for some time, we asked the general public for their take on the discussion, and how it relates to their view of Toronto's next mayor.
Every candidate released platforms including cycling in their transportation plans this election. It has been a discussed issue at more than a couple mayoral debates. Here is what you had to say about cycling in Toronto under a new mayor:
"Nobody wants to come out and make a big stand out of fear of dividing their supporters. No candidate has really come out and absolutely said, hands down, that they will represent bicyclists in the election."
—Trish Tervit, 44
"Their [cycling] plans are, I think, way down the list. Everybody's screaming about taxes and what to do with them and what not to do about them. And the cycling issue has fallen down the list of priorities compared to the debate that began six or seven years ago.
"I think out of necessity we will be reverting towards more scooters, more cyclists, and I think that's great. Fewer cars are fantastic."
—Michael Flaxman, 50
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October 22nd, 2010
Back in the summer, when Rob Ford carried a large lead in the polls, a lot of friends and colleagues would talk to me about the looming election with impending fear and angst. But each conversation would end with the comment, "Well, at least he is only one vote of 45," or "Luckily, the mayor doesn't have that much power."
While those may be comforting thoughts to Toronto progressives, these assumptions are naive at best and deluded at worst.
It is true that the mayor's vote is equal to all other councillors, but the chief magistrate does have much more power than many residents know. For instance, the mayor automatically has a seat on the Toronto Police Services Board (TPSB). He/she is also the person that represents the City in inter-governmental affairs. And the mayor sets the tone and tactics of any labour negotiations.
It is these powers of the mayor, I believe, that should sway the swing and undecided voters of this election away from Mr. Ford. And maybe even push Joe Pantalone voters towards George Smitherman.
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October 21st, 2010
The media has faced a fair amount of criticism in this election from various quarters for picking just five frontrunner candidates. The choice was relatively quick, and not providing any significant amount of coverage to the (literally) dozens of other mayoral candidates. At Spacing we have highlighted the role of the media in helping shape the direction of the election as well, first boosting Rob Ford and now George Smitherman. However, the ability of the media to fulfill expectations deserves discussion.
Last month, the Columbia Journalism Review's cover story, "The Hamster Wheel", tackled the issue of how the 24/7 news cycle and decreasing numbers of journalists was churning out less meaningful material, mainly copy from PR firms. The issue is that employment at news agencies has gone down while the number of stories has expanded tremendously, which means that journalists are producing more stories in lesser time. Since accuracy cannot take a hit (although whether it does is a different debate altogether), the content does. So now there are less in-depth interviews and more sound bytes, and shorter posts than ever (driven partially by the rise of blogs).
No one can do justice to the complexities of City Hall in 300 words, but the journalists asked to cover City Hall rarely have the time to write 2,000 words on the given topic, not to mention the needed newspaper space. Instead, they often scramble to cover political events as they're happening in the city, especially in election season when it is common to have multiple events in the same day.
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October 18th, 2010
With two of the frontrunners bowing out of the race in the past month, Torontonians are faced with three very different mayoral candidates to choose from — along with equally distinct transit platforms. The candidates have been feverishly debating (or arguing) on how to effectively connect and fund the city’s public transit system. But between subways versus light rail transit (LRT) and controversial funding options, the question must be asked: how well do the candidates fare?
With voters heading to cast their votes next week, let’s breakdown each candidate’s transit platform.
Rob Ford – Wants to scrap the Transit City plan and build more subways instead by using revenues from air rights sales.
Ford has been quite vocal about his opinion of Transit City and plans to scrap the plan and develop an extended subway plan instead. He has announced to extend the 12 km Sheppard subway line and convert the Scarborough Rapid Transit line into a subway. He proposes to use more clean buses to move the masses in areas where subways are not affordable. Ford plans to sell air rights to businesses as a new revenue strategy, but as we examined last month, Toronto may not yet have sufficient densities to satisfy this plan. What Ford fails to realize is that placing more buses on roads will add to traffic congestion. The main reason for streetcars and LRTs is to move a high capacity of commuters at a time at a faster speed. As Toronto's population grows steadily, Ford's intermediate plan for buses will not be enough to accomplish this task.
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October 15th, 2010
It’s been nearly a week since election signs for the Toronto mayoral race went up, and an ugly smear job has been unleashed against the two frontrunners, George Smitherman and Rob Ford.
Approximately ten election signs with negative messages appeared on the centre median of University Avenue at Elm Street with black-and-white signs that read: “Wife-beating racist drunk for mayor!”
Although there is no mention of any specific candidate on the poster, the vitriolic message no doubt refers to some of Ford’s infamous follies. These include a drunk driving charge in Florida in 1999, assault charges against his wife Renata Ford in 2008 (which were later withdrawn), and comments he made referring to Asian people as “Orientals.”
No one has claimed responsibility for the signs, and they have since been removed.
Over in Scarborough, Smitherman was also hit with a nasty smear when flyers appeared over eight of his campaign signs along McCowan Road with the message “REPENT FOR THY KINGDOM OF HEAVEN IS AT HAND,” no doubt a reference to the candidate’s sexual orientation.
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October 14th, 2010
Amid recent polling figures showing dipping support late in the race, Rocco Rossi has formally resigned from his campaign to be the next mayor of Toronto. By removing himself, Rossi leaves three major candidates remaining — George Smitherman, Rob Ford and Joe Pantalone, none of which Rossi is endorsing.
The poll in question, conducted over the Thanksgiving weekend for News 1010 by Ipsos Reid, has placed both Smitherman and Ford well in the lead over third place Pantalone, predicting a two-way showdown for the mayoral chair.
The figures show Smitherman in the lead with 31 percent of decided voters while Ford sits in second with 30 percent of the decided vote. Joe Pantalone registered with 11 percent voter support for third position. Rossi polled the lowest at four percent. It's of note, however, that 25 percent of Torontonians still remain uncertain which direction they will cast their ballot.
Rossi was a fiery candidate who spoke loudly and confidently at debates and challenged his opponents on a regular basis. Rossi consistently urged Torontonians to help change the culture at City Hall by electing a mayor who had not previously sat on city council. The three remaining major candidates have all spent time serving on council.
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