CITY COUNCIL
• City signs off on extra $47M for Pan Am Games [National Post]
• Toronto through the eyes of Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam [BlogTO]
• But What About the Children? [Torontoist]
• Inside Baseball, or: The Rules of Toronto City Council [Torontoist]
• What’s On the City Council Agenda? [Torontoist]
GARBAGE PRIVATIZATION
• Ford moves to privatize garbage collection [The Star]
• Private garbage collection more efficient: ex-mayor [The Star]
• James: Garbage math clouds the issue [The Star]
• Ford kicks off plan to contract out Toronto’s garbage collection [Globe & Mail]
• Plan to contract out Toronto garbage pickup is no cause for alarm [Globe & Mail]
• Chris Selley: Contracting out garbage first step in pushing against organized labour [National Post]
• City gives union notice on garbage privatization [National Post]
• Union trashes Ford’s contracting-out plan [The Sun]
• Levy: Ford moves to contract out trash collection [The Sun]
• Levy: Privatization savings fuzzy [The Sun]
TRANSIT
• Suburban station gets a hip, downtown facade [The Star]
• Hume: Thanks to streetcar, St. Clair is better than ever [The Star]
• The Fixer: TTC finally finds a shovel to clear sidewalk [The Star]
• TTC will increase workforce, but not by as much as it wants [National Post]
CULTURE & HERITAGE
• Hume: Where would Toronto hold its revolution? [The Star]
• Ping pong hot spot to open in club district [The Star]
• Empress Hotel fire ruled as arson [The Star]
• Police say arson caused Yonge fire [Globe & Mail]
• Empress Hotel fire caused by arson: Police [National Post]
NEIGHBOURHOODS
• In Regent Park, students become the teachers [The Star]
• Porter: A Cozy Corner that warms a Danforth community [The Star]
• Adam Vaughan wins small victory in battle with frats [National Post]
• With Starbucks on the way, is Gerrard East on the rise? [BlogTO]
• Don Mills seniors lose out to lofts [OpenFile]
• Symes Destructor not up in smoke yet [OpenFile]
7 comments
Would people please stop confusing “privatization” with “competitive tenders” when talking about garbage collection? The much-touted CD Howe report did not oppose public collection but rather monopolies.
In fact, the report warns that a poorly-structured private contract could easily lead to poorer outcomes if there is insufficient competition, as any user of the 407 toll road could tell you.
The report also noted, with approval, that in many competitive tenders, the public union won the contract. And why not? When you don’t have to pay shareholder profits, you can bid lower.
Congratulations (?) to the Star on poaching that paragon of journalism, Su-Ann Levy from the Sun.
Oh wait, that’s just a typo on the the links for the last three garbage privatisation stories. 😉
Someone should add the “war on pedestrians” to Toronto’s political rhetoric:
http://publicola.com/2011/02/07/the-war-on-pedestrians/?utm_source=RSS+Feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+publicola+%28PubliCola%29 .
@ John Duncan – thanks for the catch. Fixed.
Joe Mehivc’s observation that the increase in rent on St. Clair is indicative of the ROW’s success is ridiculous. He doesn’t account for the fact that his rents were probably depressed due to construction. He also omits the CVA capping plus budgetary increases in property tax.
Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam should worry more about Toronto leading the GTA, never mind the rest of the world. The latest economic indicators show…….
Unemployment (seasonally adjusted)
Toronto 9.6%
GTA minus Toronto 7.4%
http://www.toronto.ca/business_publications/pdf/2011-january.pdf
I thought the paragons of journalism resided at Now Magazine.