01) FORD ADMINISTRATION SUFFERS FIRST
BIG SETBACK
By Liz Rowley
The hard‑right
administration of Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was dealt a big setback on January 17.
After months of protests by community groups and labour,
the city's 2012 austerity budget was amended to add $19 million to rescue three
homeless shelters, three child care centres, school
nutrition programs, HIV/AIDS programs, city-owned homes for the aged, swimming
and wading pools, recreation centres, libraries, and
other essential services slated for closure, contracting out, or deep
reductions and big new user fees.
Dubbed by
some as a war on children's services, Ford's budget attacked everything from
housing to transit to health and social services, from the arts and libraries
to public assets like theatres and zoos, affecting almost everyone in this city
of 2.7 million. The public rose up in horror, from the trade unions to wealthy
arts patrons and supporters of the library system.
Committees
were formed, including the "Stop the Cuts Coalition", with its 27 neighbourhood affiliates, the "One Toronto"
coalition of arts and cultural communities, and the individuals and
organizations which came together to save libraries, swimming pools, school
breakfast and nutrition programs, the children's zoo, social housing, and child
care centres (Toronto has a waiting list of over
20,000 for subsidized child care spaces). There was wide opposition to cuts to
snow clearing, especially in the suburbs and in higher income areas.
A truly mass
movement sprung up almost overnight, starting in July after the KPMG audit and
proposed cuts. By September the polls showed support evaporating for Ford and
for Councillors backing his austerity measures.
A campaign of
petitions, demonstrations, meetings, blogs, emails, and phone calls to Councillors identified with the budget started to get
results in early December. Some of Ford's close supporters began to distance
themselves from the parts of the budget dealing with libraries, child care and
transit. The message was clear: vote for cuts and your political career is over.
Ford and most
of his Council allies represent areas where services were traditionally poorer
and the political representation more conservative than in the downtown core of
the old City of
But Ford's
budget cuts had a big impact on the suburbs, where homeowners and small
businesses hadn't bet on reduced services, only reduced taxes. The proposal to
cut 62 bus routes and increase transit fares by 10 cents would have hurt most
in these areas. More limited access to childcare centres
and spaces, and other services in the suburbs, highlighted the inequity of
existing services, and helped forge broad city‑wide opposition to the
budget.
But Mayor
Ford, his brother Councillor Doug Ford, his Budget
Chief Mike Del Grande, and the Executive Committee of hand‑picked right‑wing
Councillors, didn't or couldn't see that their base
was narrowing, and opposition was growing all around them.
They
responded with ham fisted attacks on their opponents, starting with Margaret
Atwood, who called on her twitter following to stop the attack on libraries.
Doug Ford's remarks about Atwood exposed him as boorish and threatening, not
the cultivated image of hard‑working boys from the burbs
taking on the downtown elites.
The huge turn‑outs
to time‑limited public hearings on the budget were slagged
as "communists" and "full‑time agitators", dismissed
as "the same 500 people" by the Mayor and Budget Chief.
Ford's image was further eroded by his
encounters with the CBC's "Marge Delahunty", by his wife's frequent 911 calls charging
domestic assault, and by his sister and her boyfriend, who face charges of
attempted murder and breaking into the Mayor's house.
As January 17
neared, a centre‑right group of Liberals and some Tories joined with
progressive Councillors to put together a
"lifeboat" of important services. The vote to allow the
"lifeboat" motion was the first signal that the Ford juggernaut could
be stopped. When the main motion to use $15 million from the 2011 revenue
surplus of $154 million passed by a vote of 23 to 21, it was greeted by a roar
of support inside the packed City Hall chambers. It was a roar heard across the
city.
In response,
the Mayor declared he'd won the budget fight, while del
Grande called it a defeat, and said he was resigning. In fact, it was a partial
but very significant victory for the coalitions and the people, and for democracy.
Partial, because of the deep cuts and job and service losses
that were passed. Significant, because this fight
showed many people they could fight and win, despite another three years with
Ford and Co. at the helm.
Outside,
The fight is
not over by a long shot. Many important services, assets including public
housing, theatres and real estate, the
As PV goes to
press, the City has received its no‑Board report, allowing it to lock out
30,000 city workers before the next issue of this paper reaches subscribers.
The Ford
administration is demanding massive concessions, including around job security,
which Ford and Co. have dubbed "jobs for life." The broad coalition
that came together to derail the budget cuts must understand that city services
and city workers go together, and that 15,000 city workers are part‑time,
with few or no benefits, and earning a little above the minimum wage.
The only fat
cats in this fight are on the throne in City Hall, and behind the scenes on
(The above
article is from the February 1-14, 2012, issue of People's