Posts Tagged ‘Toronto’

Sarah Thomson dropped out of the Toronto mayoral race on Tuesday, throwing her support behind George Smitherman in an attempt to stop current front-runner Rob Ford.

Thomson held an early morning news conference at her campaign headquarters where she made the announcement, saying:

(Ford is) going to basically destroy transit, he doesn’t care about the social issues that George Smitherman cares about, there’s so many reasons … these reasons are very important to the long-term future of Toronto.

Some will applaud Thomson’s move, considering she was trailing in the polls and was not likely to win.

Sarah Thomson dropped out of the Toronto mayoral race to endorse George Smitherman.

However, there’s no doubt that others will see this as another blow to women in politics — losing the only woman who was considered one of the five front-runners will no doubt cause some people concern.

As a woman, I never really got behind Thomson because she was a woman — it’s not how I vote. This being Thomson’s first attempt at politics, it’s also hard for me to get behind her as a genuine candidate (who can forget the kerfuffle when she used her magazine, the Women’s Post, to announce her candidacy?)

The question really boils down to this: Can a woman really run Canada’s biggest city?

Well, they did before amalgamation, but since 1998, both of Toronto’s mayors have been men (Mel Lastman and David Miller). Has the city grown and changed enough that a woman would be unable to handle the portfolio?

Not necessarily.

Was Thomson that woman?

I don’t think so.

Sarah Thomson is a successful business woman, much like Belinda Stronach and others who have entered politics before. But I think she failed to really get the public’s trust before throwing her hat into a big, political job (much like Stronach when she ran for the leadership of the Conservative party).

In order to get a woman elected as mayor in Toronto, I think that woman has to be a councillor and prove herself to the electorate before trying to become mayor of Toronto.

And while even that does not guarantee anything (just look at former mayor Barbara Hall’s failed bid against David Miller in 2003 and former councillor Jane Pitfield’s failed bid in 2007), I think it’s something that will come with time.

It just wasn’t the right time and Sarah Thomson was not the right woman.

(Photo courtesy of Sarah Thomson’s flickr account. See more of her photos here.)

This post was edited on May 15, 2011 to change wording some considered to be offensive.

Toronto’s lack of accessibility has cost the city one of their greatest young reporters.

CityTV’s Tara Weber will no longer appear on Toronto TV — she’s headed west to a television station in Calgary. Mainly because, she tells the Toronto Sun’s Joe Warmington, Toronto is one of the most inaccessible cities she has ever experienced:

I hate to leave but it’s just not easy for me to live here. Ever since I came here in 2003 to go to Ryerson, I have found it so difficult to get around and it doesn’t seem to be getting better.

The 29-year-old burst onto CityTV a few years ago. I remember the first time I saw her cover a story clearly: I saw the wheelchair. That was the first and last time I ever noticed Weber’s chair.

She never let her accessibility issues get in the way of covering a story. True to City’s policy of being on the scene, Weber would go out and cover everything — you rarely saw her in a newsroom.

It is downright disgusting that Toronto is losing a good journalist because she can’t live in this city. This is not just about Weber being able to do her job, but also about getting around and living her life.

In order to try and make things better for those who come after her, Weber wrote a letter to Mayor David Miller, and those running for council in next month’s election, expressing her concerns:

I’ve interviewed you all and have enjoyed meeting every one of you. I just wanted to let you know that I’ve left my job and am leaving Toronto to go out west. A big part of my decision to leave is the lack of wheelchair access in this city. I’ve lived in various places throughout Canada and can honestly say Toronto is one of the least accessible.

How in 2010 can a city the size of Toronto, one that prides itself as the greatest city in the world, not serve all of its citizens properly? How can we just ignore one segment of the population and think it doesn’t matter?

This is not about elevators, or ramps, or buttons on doors — it’s about making this city the best city for everyone involved. It shouldn’t matter if you’re in a wheelchair or not, Toronto should cater to everyone equally.

I was saddened when I heard Weber was leaving CityTV — now I’m just angry. Here’s hoping her letter to council members does not land on deaf ears some good and someone starts doing something soon.

And here’s hoping Calgary treats her much better than we did — because she’s a great reporter who will be missed.

All the best, Tara.

To put it bluntly: I was skeptical when Rock of Ages debuted on Broadway. ’80s rock songs backing a musical? Really? Had We Will Rock You not already tried to do a rocking musical (and failed miserably at that?)? Had Mamma Mia not shown that pop songs can be a musical and it can be done right? Why bother trying? And don’t even get me started on using American Idol‘s Constantine Maroulis as the lead character in a form of “stunt” casting.

Then the 2009 Tony Awards came. Rock of Ages won best musical, but I still had my reservations (I didn’t even remember the performance for Rock of Ages from the 2009 Tony’s, instead all I remember is Brett Michaels getting hit in the head with the backdrop during the opening of the show).

Late last year, it was announced the show was coming to Toronto. The press had a field day. And the commercials for it played nonstop on the radio. There’s only so much of Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ that you can hear before you go crazy. So I decided I wanted to go.

Saturday night, I went with my family for my birthday. I was blown away.

It was nothing like I expected. It was far better than I expected. It may be one of the best things I have seen on stage in a long, long time.

Rock of Ages beats We Will Rock You for so many reasons, but the main one is because Rock of Ages actually has a story and character development something WWRY lacked, in my humble opinion (full disclosure: I saw WWRY twice when it was in Toronto and had problems with it both times).

To me, WWRY picked Queen songs and then tried to write a story around them. Book writer Ben Elton just reached too far, and didn’t spend enough time developing Galelio and Scaramouche (the two main characters, and no, I’m not kidding about their names), so we don’t really care for them all that much.

Rock of Ages, on the other hand, not only had a story, but knew there was only one way to get away with telling their story: break — no, wait, make that tear down — the fourth wall: Talk to the audience, and know what you’re doing is crazy.

Like Into the Woods before it, Rock of Ages knows it’s a show — or at least the narrator Lonnie does. He is often interacting with the crowd, talking to them directly, or as an aside. The character of Lonnie is by far the best part of that show. The characters in Mamma Mia sort of wink to the crowd that what they’re doing is silly, but they never really jump out and say it. Rock of Ages tells you from the beginning: This is a show, enjoy the ride.

Then there’s the dancing. Oh, the dancing. I’m not a dance person — can’t do it, don’t really understand it — but all of the movement in Rock of Ages would put any “real” Broadway show to shame. And you just don’t get the full effect of it by the video at the top or from their performance at last year’s Tony’s (it shows that TV really is crap at showing theatre, as Ben Elton said at the press conference for WWRY back in 2006).

Yvan Pedneault, who was in WWRY, kicks butt in this role. He is beyond fantastic as Drew. As for Elicia MacKenzie? One would never know this Sherrie was ever a Maria. I had my reservations when she won How do you Solve a Problem Like Maria?, but in Rock of Ages, MacKenzie knocks it out of the park.

And, while the content is not appropriate for children around the age of 9, it is hilariously funny. I won’t ruin any parts, because it’s more fun to be surprised (in fact, the program doesn’t even list the songs in the show, so that’s a great surprise, too). I can’t wait to go back with someone who has never seen it, just to see their eyes light up the way mine did.

And, like every great musical before it, you leave the theatre thinking dreams really can come true. Even if you are an ’80s rocker.

In case you have been living under a rock, Toronto is in the middle of a municipal election. Currently Councillor Rob Ford is leading the polls (as he has been for most of the race). It seems every week new allegations surface in order to try and knock him down a few knotches.

In a nutshell, here’s just a sampling of the criticism about Ford:

• He’s against gay marriage;
• He thinks Toronto’s population has maxed out and can’t take in anymore people: “We can’t even deal with the 2.5 million people in this city. I think it’s more important that we take care of the people now before we start bringing in more.”;
• It came out this summer he reportedly was asked to step down as a high school football coach after an altercation in 2001;
• It recently was revealed he was charged with driving under the influence in Florida in 1999 — he did community service (Ford had denied the charges until the Toronto Sun ran a story exposing it);
• He allegedly offered to help an ill Toronto man the painkiller OxyContin (Ford says he just told the man whatever he needed to to get him off the phone);
• Oh, and if you do a parody site about him, he’ll have it shut down faster than you can blink.

And he’s still in the lead.

A year ago, I would have wagered that George Smitherman or John Tory (if he had run) would be leading — that this race would have been there’s to lose. Instead, Tory’s still on the radio and Smitherman is a distant second.

People are shocked about this. The Globe’s Christie Blatchford had the city all in a tizzy on Saturday when she wrote a column saying that Rob Ford isn’t all that bad after all. She said in her column that just admitting that fact will cause people’s “heads to explode.”

And they did.

My Twitter feed lit up with people outraged and their heads exploding online in a series of tweets (some expletive-filled). But here’s the rub (as much as it pains me to say it out loud), it’s really not a shock that Ford is leading.

Before your head explodes, here’s why: Ford is a mayor from the boroughs. So while the downtown citizens express outrage about his lead, he’s getting the votes from all those in the boroughs who have been forgotten about (or felt forgotten about) for the last six years under David Miller.

Smitherman is not leading because he’s a downtown man, that’s it. Ford is the guy for those who feel they don’t have a voice anymore.

Can Ford be beat? Perhaps, if enough downtown residents come out and vote Oct. 25. But I wouldn’t be too surprised if he wins.

(Photo courtesy of denmar on Flickr. See more of his photos in his photostream.)

This is what we know for sure: There are three people who know what happened the night of August 31, 2009; one of them is dead; anything not said by the two in the car is just speculation.

In a lot of ways, nothing has changed since that night. Leah McLaren’s article in Toronto Life, Michael Bryant’s Very Bad Year, cannot change that because Bryant did not speak to her for the article.

As evident online the last few days, the main thing this article has done is open old wounds as an anniversary no one involved likely wants to remember approaches. Once again, cyclists are up in arms at what they see as another sympathetic portrayal of Bryant. A man, who some see, got away with murder.

Sarah Fulford’s editor’s note at the beginning of this month’s issue of Toronto Life introducing the Bryant story is spot-on. This city is still divided over the Michael Bryant accident. The two sides will likely never come together no matter how much time has passed.

In her editor’s note, Fulford writes:

Torontonians were — and still are — divided. Some think the courts were too quick to forgive the powerful guy with friends in high places. Others are sympathetic to Bryant and see the verdict as vindication. They’re convinced he reacted as anyone would have in an extremely difficult situation.

The memorial at the site where Darcy Allen Sheppard struck a mailbox on the night of the confrontation with Michael Bryant.

September 1 is my birthday. Last September 1 was when the news began to trickle out that Bryant — the former Ontario Attorney General — had struck and killed a cyclist with his car. I was appalled.

And as the sides began to split, I didn’t know what to think or who to believe anymore. I commended the justice system for bringing in a special prosecutor from B.C. to eliminate any hint of potential bias in trying the case. I could only imagine how difficult this was for those at the crown who used to work for Bryant.

But I believed in my justice system. I believed that right would prevail. Whatever “right” was. A man was still dead no matter if Bryant went to prison or not.

The first time I walked by the memorial on Bloor St. where Sheppard struck the mailbox that likely killed him (photo at left), I cried. No one should have to die on the street like that.

Almost one year later, have we changed at all? Has the city learned any lessons from the night that changed three lives forever? I’d wager a no.

Yes, we had bike lanes installed on Jarvis St., but drivers are still up in arms about that. This city is constantly the cyclists versus the driver. There’s no inbetween, even though neither side is right.

There are horrible drivers in this city that break the law, drive dangerously and don’t share the road. I know, I see them every day, too (and, as a pedestrian, almost got hit twice today alone). But there are also cyclists that weave through traffic, don’t signal and don’t obey their rules of the road. It cuts both ways.

And we will never see that. We will never fix that.

Does McLaren’s article lean toward a sympathetic view of Bryant? Yes, but it is a profile on Bryant — on his political career and aspirations that may have died that night. If August 31, 2009 had never happened, one wonders how different the Toronto mayoral race would be right now. Would Bryant be running?

All that is immaterial though when you remember Darcy Allen Sheppard is still dead. Whether he was the aggressor in the incident or not, he is still dead and that is the saddest fact of the whole tale.

Journalism is not meant to gloss over the ugly incidents in life. If anything, its job is to point them out for all to see, almost like ripping off a Band Aid — cause immediate pain in order to try and heal a wound.

It’s no coincidence then that this piece ran just weeks before the first anniversary of Sheppard’s death. It’s no surprise that outrage is greeting it. But the outrage and timing is no reason this piece should not have been written or should not have been run.

Perhaps as August 31 approaches, instead of bemoaning Michael Bryant being absolved of all charges or Toronto Life running an article championing Bryant, we should look at our actions on the road and see how we can make it safer for drivers, pedestrians and cyclists alike.

So that no one else will ever have to experience what Michael Bryant, his wife Susan, and Darcy Allen Sheppard had to last August 31.

(Photo courtesy of ppelisek on Flickr. See more of his photos in his photostream.)