This page contained his City Hall contact information. Then it was blank. Now it has an email address.
Rob Ford has been a candidate for mayor for just over 24 hours. Here are his apparent transgressions thus far:
• Commissioning a poll (from a mysterious firm even he hasn’t heard of) to gauge support for his potential candidacy, prior to registering as a candidate. The Municipal Elections Act (MEA) states that “An expense shall not be incurred by or on behalf of a candidate outside his or her election campaign period,” and that that campaign period “begins on the day he or she files a nomination for the office.” As the poll is a service “on behalf of a person wholly or partly for use in his or her election campaign,” it would almost certainly count as a campaign expense. (If he hadn’t run, then it likely wouldn’t have mattered.)
Breakfast Television hosts Dina Pugliese and Kevin Frankish stunned by the sudden parade passing by their studio Thursday morning. (clip)
• The existence of signs and a website prior to his registration. Even though his family runs a sign-making business, the “value of contributions of goods and services” count as campaign expenses. Likewise, even if Thirdeye designed his website pro bono, there’s still presumably a value to that work.
It’s gone now.
• As reported by Toronto Election News, using City of Toronto stationery to mail out an invitation to his “Wine & Cheese.” If the night were indeed merely a celebration of his ten years on Council, this would be ironic but still kosher. But seeing as it’s now explicitly a campaign event (he has even stated that he’ll be unveiling part of his platform there), it’s in violation of the section of the Councillor Expense Policy concerning “Use of Corporate Resources during an Election Year” [PDF]. Itself broadly derived from the MEA, the policy states that the “City of Toronto logo will not be used in any campaign related materials.” When the Integrity Commissioner investigated a similar matter regarding the logo in 2005 [PDF], he concluded that the breach was in violation of the councillors’ Code of Conduct, the City’s copyright, and also the “Corporate Identity Program Principles for the use of the City of Toronto Corporate Logo” [PDF].
• Putting the City of Toronto logo and his City Hall contact info on his campaign site. These were taken down within an hour of the site launching, and after minimal prodding on Twitter. (Even though he’s a guy running on a reputation for being responsive, I was still impressed by the speedy deletions.)
17 comments
I hope you guys run a similar story for every candidate. I’m sure there have been other violations during this campaign. I’d hate for Spacing to start playing favourites so early on
The BTV photo makes me think, “The Texans are coming, the texans are coming…!”
Ford became fair game the moment he started pulling those cards out of his wallet http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dDfr89eRd0. If you’re going to get nit picky then you deserve to be scrutinized.
Well, these have been the most blatant oddities thus far, at least among the notable candidates running for mayor. Except for Sarah Thomson appearing on the cover of her own magazine, I guess, but a Star intern already did a pretty thorough investigation into that.
Wow, that’s just an awful website. No way to sugar coat this, Thirdeye needs to quit for the good of the internets.
I don’t know about municipal rules, but at other levels of government it is usually a no-no to promote yourself as “Mayor Rob Ford” (see the banner at the top of his website) as opposed to “Rob Ford For Mayor” unless you’re the incumbent.
Anyway, for a guy who’s made it his bread and butter to lampoon others for doing things that are questionable but actually allowed, that seems like a lot of pretty clear rule-breaking in a short period of time.
I’m with quijibo. Would hate to see Spacing’s reputation tarnished.
quijibo and Andrae: We’ll run similar articles on other candidates when or if we find problems with their campaigns. To date we’ve found very few if any. But this is a long campaign and many months to go. Don’t forget Pitfiled’s campaign web site plagarized Spacing in the 2006 election. So we’re acutely aware of these issues.
Though, TO Life has found a doozy in Thomson’s web site misleading voters about her past election results in Hamilton.
http://www.torontolife.com/daily/informer/mayor-may-not/2010/03/18/sarah-thomsons-slight-discrepancy/
Matt Blackett, Spacing publisher.
I am assuming City Tv has given you permission to use a still from their show. Maybe breaking copyright rules are ok
A TV still is fair use in a news story. No copyright laws broken. But distracting from the topic at hand — misuse of public funds — is what Ford and his peeps are after. He’ll be so much fun to watch this election because I don’t think he has enough feet to put in his mouth.
As long as you are not biased 🙂
Rob: I hope Spacing is biased at times. I don’t want partisan politics, but I want opinion and for Spacing to provide a perspective. Spacing is not the Star or Post or Sun which is meant to be unbiased. I don’t think Spacing has never not be open about being in favour of sustainable issues, like walk/bikes/transit. Mags present certain POVs. If Spacing wants to be an attack dog solely on Ford I’m happy for them to do it since publications that claim no bias, like the Sun, are in attack-mode constantly against anything that veers into centre or left of the political spectrum.I don’t want Spacing to be NOW, but I’m happy for them to hold naysayers like Ford to the fire if only to highlight his utter hypocrisy.
Frankly, I’d be surprised if Spacing didn’t speak out against Rob Ford. At a time when we need transit, improvements, cleaner and expanded public spaces, and better infrastructure for cyclists, he seems to be either hostile or indifferent.
But maybe we should give him a fair chance. That way, he can split the reactionaries.
Please keep updating this. I’m sure Rob Ford will continue to break the rules.
Thanks.
Finances are part of sustainability!
Picard102: What are you on? I think the website is clean and attractive. If you have issues with Rob Ford that’s one thing, but to slander a company for producing something their client asks for is just wrong.
Giambrone may have broke the same MEA rule if he paid something for his youtube “I’m ready” dance video.”. It came out before he declared his candidacy. It certainly had comedic value.