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Political Landscape of Toronto (including Ward Boundary Review)

animatronic said:
If it's just a 50%+1 override then the mayor wouldn't in practice have any special powers. Veto threshold would need to be 60% or 2/3 or something.
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He'd have the power to implement policy without Council approval, and all the politics involved in that. The point would be to streamline the process, allowing the mayor to "get things done" faster. Of course, anything the mayor approves will need de facto Council approval.
 
A simple psychological screening and mental competency test would do. You guys are complicating things. ;)
 
Gary Davidson said:
The surprising aspect is how fast Toronto is growing. It is going to grow by 600,000 over the next few years and at today’s ward average size that would mean 10 new wards but what we have to do is balance the growth in the core with some of the wards that are good neighborhoods but aren’t growing,” one of the authors of the report, Gary Davidson, told CP24 on Wednesday. “It’s really a balancing of those two aspects that we are looking to do.
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I'm not sure what to make of these comments.

My initial impression is that Davidson is suggesting that the City negate the rapid growth of the core by distributing wards in such a way that opinions of suburban voters carry greater weight. Perhaps this is to prevent the opinions of persons living in the core from overwhelming suburban voters.

The other way I've interpreted it is that he might be suggesting that the city redirects some residential growth to the suburbs. Though I don't know why Davidson would care about this, because it would be jurisdiction of City Planning.

Any thoughts?
 
TheTigerMaster said:
I'm not sure what to make of these comments.

My initial impression is that Davidson is suggesting that the City negate the rapid growth of the core by distributing wards in such a way that opinions of suburban voters carry greater weight. Perhaps this is to prevent the opinions of persons living in the core from overwhelming suburban voters.

The other way I've interpreted it is that he might be suggesting that the city redirects some residential growth to the suburbs. Though I don't know why Davidson would care about this, because it would be jurisdiction of City Planning.

Any thoughts?
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I think he's referring to balancing the area and the population of a riding...just like they do federally and provincially. For example, the riding of Kenora's population is less than 50,000 because the MPP/MP has to travel and serve hundreds of communities.

It's an interesting question with pro's and con's on both sides. Take for example proposed ward 319. The Ex to Yonge south of Front (plus the Island). It should be fully developed in 5 years or so. You can get to any community meeting in 10 minutes and its a fairly homogeneous community other than 500 people on the island. Not too difficult to manage (other than sports fans).

By using the population estimates from 2026 for the ridings they have given the growth areas less residents now so they can manage the development process so that removes the main complaint of some of the counsellors.

Then you go to one on the edges. You would have several long-term communities in subdivisions that are semi-wealthy, several lower income rental areas and industrial lands which the residents complain about. There may also be increased crime.

So I understand why some people would argue that certain ridings may need to have fewer people. But it flies in the face of equal representation.

My personal view...equal representation but increase the budget for the larger Wards so they have more help. The differences aren't as huge as Kenora vs Toronto that trumps the need for equal representation.
 
muller877 said:
I think he's referring to balancing the area and the population of a riding...just like they do federally and provincially. For example, the riding of Kenora's population is less than 50,000 because the MPP/MP has to travel and serve hundreds of communities.
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If you want like the federal, then just copy their 25 ridings.
Most people I talk to prefer this.
It also want no duplicate bureaucracy to draw up wards.

The province had the courage to do this 30 years ago. Putting some of their own MPPs out of work just to do the right thing.
 
BurlOak said:
If you want like the federal, then just copy their 25 ridings.
Most people I talk to prefer this.
It also want no duplicate bureaucracy to draw up wards.

The province had the courage to do this 30 years ago. Putting some of their own MPPs out of work just to do the right thing.
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The City also did that - the 44 current wards was based on the 22 ridings. Unfortunately we've gone back out of sync on all three levels.
 
Did the province not agree to adopt the new federal ridings (plus the one split riding) for the next election?
 
animatronic said:
http://news.ontario.ca/opo/en/2015/...egislation-to-ensure-fair-representation.html
Essentially yes - alignment in the South plus a few extra up North. Seems like a decent compromise. Note that re-alignment with federal ridings is no longer automatic.
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But unlike the federal process it's purely political for the Northern ridings. Based on the whim of the premier (one riding added in 2005, kept in 2015) they keep the Northern ridings even more disproportionately unequal than the federal independent review. Is the decision political? Hmmmm

I do like how the city is trying to keep it from being a political decision other than the number of politicians. It will be hard to jerrymander ridings because the maps are already out....just pick one of the 6.
 
muller877 said:
But unlike the federal process it's purely political for the Northern ridings. Based on the whim of the premier (one riding added in 2005, kept in 2015) they keep the Northern ridings even more disproportionately unequal than the federal independent review. Is the decision political? Hmmmm
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There's one additional riding in Northern Ontario at the provincial level. This makes sense given the remoteness of the territory; after all, the three territories each have their own MP. That's fine with me.
 
ShonTron said:
There's one additional riding in Northern Ontario at the provincial level. This makes sense given the remoteness of the territory; after all, the three territories each have their own MP. That's fine with me.
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By that logic maybe we should give an extra Ward or two to Scarborough and Etobicoke :)
 
ShonTron said:
Scarborough and Etobicoke don't have any fly-in communities, do they?
Maybe it should mean we give a ward for the Toronto Islands, though.
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If Duffy were the councillor for Ward 1 he'd probably claim living expenses for a condo downtown
 
Has anyone gone to any of the public consultations? By the sounds of it on twitter they have been practically empty apart from city staff.
 
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