BOWERMAN: Doug Ford suddenly cares about local democracy?

In case you missed it: democracy is being usurped! At least, that’s what some of the loudest right-wing voices in Toronto are warning us. And it’s not because of American boots marching over the border to steal our northern riches.

No, the usual aviary of conservative pundits, special interest groups, and the office of the Premier are sounding the alarm because of a brief motion hitting Mayor Olivia Chow’s Executive Committee March 19th asking the City Manager to prepare a report on the possibility of creating an “Indigenous Member of Council.”

The Toronto Sun‘s Brian Lilley calls this “DEI insanity,” and claims that the position is unelected and that creating such a position would be “usurping democracy based on a race-based position.”

First of all, calm down. It’s a motion to suggest the Executive Committee, and then Council as a whole, ask for a report. Council fields these motions all the time, often dismissing them outright. Secondly, there’s nothing in the wording saying the position of an Indigenous Councillor would be unelected.

Finally, Lilley quotes a Doug Ford spokesperson as saying “people have a right to elect their representatives. We will always support that right.”

So Doug Ford is going to take this moment to defend municipal democracy? The Doug Ford who slashed the number of Toronto City Council seats in half and redrew the ward boundaries in the middle of the 2018 municipal election? Couldn’t be the Doug Ford who forced London, Ontario to scrap its ranked ballot election system, after its democratically-elected council approved it, and it had already been used in a previous election — and after Kingston and Cambridge voted in favour of implementing the system, and Barrie and Meaford were planning to hold referendums on the subject. And it certainly could not be the Doug Ford who is about to waste $48 million in taxpayer money ripping up bike lanes that were approved by the democratically-elected Toronto City Council.

Because if it’s that same Doug Ford now saying he values local democracy and the importance of elected local representatives, I would be forced to call him a hypocrite.

The fact is, Doug Ford doesn’t value local democracy, and he sees municipal councils as largely redundant, occasionally annoying, speed bumps in the way of his grand visions of an Ontario “open for business.” Or is it “not for sale?” It’s difficult to keep track.

The fact is also that we have no idea, yet, about what kind of process would lead to an Indigenous Member of Council. If we are serious about Reconciliation, it’s at least a reasonable question to ask. Is it possible, is it desirable, who would it be, how would this person be chosen and by whom? That’s what the report is for.

But this minor scandal re-opens a conversation we had when Doug Ford cut City Council in half. In 2018, I reported in Spacing on a number of ways to tweak local governance to compensate for the drastic reduction in the number of local representatives on council. These included adding “at large” councillors who weren’t beholden to a specific geographic constituency, and could work to end the petty fiefdoms some current councillors jealously guard. It could mean multiple, small community boards with appointed members who take the pulse of a hyper-local constituency and advise council on their findings. The fact is, Doug’s assault on local democracy was an opportunity to look at adopting any number of creative changes to our current system, but we never really had that conversation.

And, look, all of these things would likely be immediately scuttled by Doug Ford, who can’t seem to (to borrow one of his own favoured phrases) stick to his own knitting. But I suggest we take a page from his playbook and overwhelm him with these big swings. If he’s going to fight local government reform, make him do it every time. Make him wear that issue. Force him to admit that he, and his followers, don’t value local democracy at all.

And, if they don’t value local democracy, then why are they suddenly clutching their pearls at the mere suggestion of something like an Indigenous member of council? Feel free to speculate.

Glyn Bowerman is Spacing’s podcast host and former managing editor.

Photo by Dylan Reid