Preville on Politics

February 2008 Archive

The elephant in the room is a party animal

Posted on February 25, 2008 by

This blog will be on hiatus for the rest of this week. This means that there’s no point in checking out my take on tomorrow’s federal budget, because I won’t have one (and we will all be better off as a result). Nor will I bother having an opinion on what John Tory did for those three hours on Saturday, except to say that I hope he had a nice nap and that I’m not surprised by his final decision because I think he has a messiah complex: he believes his party needs him (apparently more than anyone else does). But before I go, I do want to sound off, briefly, on the rejuvenation of the “strong mayor” hullabaloo at city hall.

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Flaherty v. McGuinty: Many cans of whoop-ass later

Posted on February 22, 2008 by

Hot on the heels of Wednesday’s melancholy post about the rotten economy comes the news that federal finance minister Jim Flaherty and Premier Dalton McGuinty are going toe-to-toe over who is responsible for it. There are many conclusions to draw from this spat. The first is that the economy must be pretty bad for two government leaders to be so eager to pin blame. The second is that a federal election must be just around the corner. The third is that the stakes are high, particularly for the entire automobile industry and, in a roundabout way, my old pal Richard Florida.

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Toronto road toll report day

Posted on February 22, 2008 by

The board of Metrolinx meets today. Among the issues sure to be discussed: road tolls, which are discussed in Green Paper #4, which went online for public comments just this week. Mark my words, this one isn’t going away.

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A (vague) new plan for Toronto’s future

Posted on February 21, 2008 by

Ask a panel for unanimity and you get vagueness. The mayor’s fiscal review panel—made up of blue-chip businessmen, academics and labour—released its report at a packed press conference this morning. It’s an 86-page opus full of recommendations, the most concrete—and contentious—of which is a proposal to toll the city’s highways (more on that later.) Contrary to widespread rumour, it does not recommend the privatization of Toronto Hydro, although, to judge from what the panelists had to say this morning, I got the sense that at least some of them wish it did.

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House poor indeed

Posted on February 20, 2008 by

Anyone who feels trapped by their mortgage will want to read the cover story in the March edition of Toronto Life (which, alas, is not available on-line, but is on newsstands now). It’s worth the cover price. I mention this partly to plug my employer, but mostly because, between the magazine’s cover story and the articles in my morning newspaper, I feel like everything I read these days has been lifted from The Journal of Shrinking Living Standards. It’s hard to name a household staple whose costs aren’t rising.

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Five reasons Queen’s Park should take over the TTC

Posted on February 15, 2008 by

Councillor Karen Stintz must be enjoying the catbird seat today. Back in October, she was the first to say that the city should hand over the TTC’s subway routes to Queen’s Park. Now Premier Dalton McGuinty has pronounced himself in favour of the Stintz Doctrine. It would be unwise to underestimate the premier’s will on this one, because this is about more than just transit. Here are my top five reasons why Queen’s Park should—and probably will—take over all or part of the TTC.

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Face it, Toronto: it snows here

Posted on February 14, 2008 by

For the past two weeks, I have tried to resist blogging about snow, snowstorms, icy sidewalks and uncleared roads. To me, writing storm stories is like writing about growing grass. Snow and ice happen in winter. Eventually they go away, by one means or another, and the elderly stay indoors for a few days, while the rest of us trundle through—life in a northern town. Meanwhile, every other media outlet in the city can’t get enough of this stupid story. So I’m belatedly joining the fray, just to rub it in by letting everyone know how much I am really, really enjoying all this snow.

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In Toronto, users pay—but for what?

Posted on February 13, 2008 by

Now that the hysteria over recreation fees has subsided—a 21 per cent increase for city programs reduced to eight per cent, which is still more than quadruple the inflation rate—perhaps we can now have a sanguine discussion about the philosophical ramifications of user fees. Whether it’s for recreation or trash collection or anything else, the more the city charges for individual services, the more demanding residents will become, and the less sympathetic they will be when the city cries poor, as it so often does these days.

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The Toronto Lexicon, entry no. 6

Posted on February 12, 2008 by

Snow (sno:) 1. Frozen precipitation in the form of white or translucent hexagonal ice crystals presenting as soft white flakes. 2. A form of precipitation witnessed every year in Toronto, to great astonishment. 3. Precipitation that Torontonians pretend isn’t happening. 4. Potential cause for the implementation of martial law. (See also Cold.)

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The moral and political trappings of pet ownership

Posted on February 12, 2008 by

Church organizations have spoken out against bottled water. One city councillor has proposed a tax on the bottles. It’s bad for the environment, the common weal and your soul. But buy it for your pup.

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When every home is a waste-transfer station

Posted on February 8, 2008 by

I was wondering when someone was going to complain about these. A city that prides itself on its high density, and on its willingness to intensify further still, is issuing trash and recycling bins designed for suburbia. The big ones are the size of condos themselves.

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Raise property taxes all you want…

Posted on February 6, 2008 by

…but don’t mess with hockey. I am at home recovering from the flu, so I missed yesterday’s storm at city hall—but even from my recovery bed I could hear disaster brewing. Tuesday morning’s news of a proposed 18 per cent fee hike for ice time at city rinks was the main topic on The Fan 590. I urge you to pause and digest that information: the all-sports talk radio station—normally devoted to hockey, basketball, football, soccer, fighting, lacrosse and on down to tiddlywinks—was doing a call-in show about municipal user fee policy, and the lines were lit up like the ACC Jumbotron.

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Municipal parties: cast your vote!

Posted on February 1, 2008 by

My column in the February issue of Toronto Life argued that it was time to introduce a party system to city hall. You gotta buy the magazine to read my take, but there are other talented and insightful people besides me writing about it, too. Now the Spacing Wire is polling people on it. Go vote. Continue...

A call from Shelley Carroll

Posted on February 1, 2008 by

I got a call from Shelley Carroll’s office earlier this week, telling me I overlooked some key items in this year’s budget, specifically on issues I have raised previously. Here are two tasty points of crow for me to eat.

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Author Bio Pic

Philip Preville

Veteran freelance writer Philip Preville lived much of his life in Montreal and Edmonton before he was lured, like so many Torontonians before him, by the promise of more work and a better living. A National Magazine Award winner and former Canadian Journalism Fellow at the University of Toronto’s Massey College, Preville writes Toronto Life’s politics column. He lives with his wife and one-year-old son in Riverdale, just close enough to the Don Valley Parkway that he can hear it when he steps outside his house—but just far enough away that it doesn’t keep him awake at night. On his office wall hangs a 1938–39 press pass belonging to his grandfather, Elias Gannon, who wrote for the Montreal Star.


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