We need a hero to fight Mayor Rob Ford’s tax dodge on transit: James

I asked Toronto’s city manager, Joe Pennachetti, for his reaction to the astonishing decision by the city’s executive committee to sideline a council debate on how to pay for a 25-year, $50-billion transportation plan called The Big Move.

Led by a bellicose Mayor Rob Ford, who dared city council to overrule the executive committee and broach the subject with a tax-averse public, the committee of Ford allies voted 6-4 to defer consideration until after the deadline set to provide input.

In other words, Ford and his allies declined to comment, all the while braying loudly about the evils of taxes and the sins of the Liberal government at Queen’s Park.

Hell would have to freeze over, guaranteed, before he supports any of the revenue tools Pennachetti recommended to council, Ford trumpeted.

The whole process is “ass-backwards,” he said cockily, explaining that every ounce of government waste had to be extinguished before there was any consideration of tolls, levies, fees and taxes to support transit construction.

Pennachetti has served in senior positions in Peel, Durham, York and now, Toronto. He has never seen such doctrinaire and mindless pigheadedness as that which guides the heart of the city region. But, good civil servant that he is, he has grown adept at biting his tongue.

But what did he think of the rebuff that is sure to set up a pushback from councillors and another transit war on the floor of city council, May 7 and 8? One word, please, sir?

“Disappointed,” the city’s top bureaucrat said immediately after the vote. “No, two words. Very disappointed.”

Pennachetti would later add, diplomatically: “But executive committee is the decision-maker.”

Thankfully, on that, the city manager is wrong. Council is the decision-maker. And the fact that 40 per cent of the mayor’s hand-picked cabinet voted against his ruinous motion suggests council will again muster the courage to rescue the issue and send Toronto’s advice to Metrolinx.

By now, all hope is lost that the Ford administration has any intent of building transit in Toronto or beyond the 416 border. The mayor talks subways, subways, subways, but buries every initiative that would deliver the same. He boasts about scores of corporations panting to build transit in Toronto with no tax dollars, but is unable to produce a single proposal.

Instead, he blocks every path toward transit expansion.

Queen’s Park has already committed the lion’s share of $16 billion for transit in the GTA and Hamilton. A further $34 billion is needed. The province has asked Metrolinx to recommend revenue tools to deliver the loot. Metrolinx has narrowed the list to 11 measures. Municipalities are to offer their advice to Metrolinx before its final recommendations to the province May 27. And Ford’s committee would defer city council’s debate until after the deadline, rendering Toronto mute on the subject.

Mississauga City Council did the right thing Wednesday, a day after Ford’s cowardice. It approved nine of Metrolinx’s 11 funding tools, stepping out in faith that further negotiations and deliberation will smooth out problem areas. Mayor Hazel McCallion led her council to that position even as Ford masterminded a treasonous uprising.

All pretense is now gone. Anyone who wishes to embrace a future of improved transportation options must dissociate themselves from the Ford regime.

If your name is CivicAction or the Toronto Region Board of Trade or a ratepayer association or business or labour or politician or citizen, it’s time to fight back and call the mayor and his allies to account.

It’s not a job for the faint of heart.

Ford and his re-election strategists have done the calculus. They figure that voters are so angry at government waste that they will punish anyone who suggests taxes for transit. Make my day, Ford is saying. Be the hero and put your neck on the line for taxes to fund transit.

If he sounds like a biblical Goliath challenging the trembling minions of Israel to a fight, that’s his intent. But is there a David out there?

Transit needs a righteous champion — someone fuelled by a just cause, determined and willing to seek an electoral mandate on a platform promising a radical future of transportation improvements.

Someone to expose the giant — and slay him.

Royson James usually appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Email: rjames@thestar.ca