Pasternak wins tight race with Augimeri
As she reflected on the end of her decades-long career as an elected official Monday night, Councillor Maria Augimeri also had a stinging rebuke for the provincial government.
“This was not the election that the people wanted,” said Augimeri of the Ford government’s move to slash city council wards from 47 to 25, which saw Augimeri forced to face off against neighbouring Councillor James Pasternak in a new mega ward, Ward 6.
Pasternak received 11,559 votes, beating Augimeri by over 2,000 votes. She gave her concession speech to a packed audience at a Downsview convention centre. She noted she won overwhelmingly in her old, precouncil-cuts Downsview ward.
“I’ve done this job as a sort of religion. For me, it’s been a calling,” Augimeri said, at times holding back tears. She said Ward 6 was now an “impossible ward” to represent given it’s size, but believed Pasternak, who she spoke to Monday, will try his best.
“James is a gentleman. I think we will be in good hands,” she said.
The new ward is a combination of Augimeri’s and Pasternak’s old wards, which stretches approximately from Steeles Ave. to the north, Highway 401 to the south, Jane St. to the west and Bathurst St. to the east. It’s population is just over 104,000, nearly 60 per cent of whom are visible minorities.
Big issues identified by the candidates during the campaign included traffic, development, community safety and infrastructure improvements, especially to help more residents with basement flooding. Affordable housing was also brought up as a key issue in a ward where more than half of dwellers are tenants.
Augimeri had committed to establishing traffic panels comprised of residents to recommend traffic calming measures, while Pasternak was promising to continue with the building of a library in his old ward as well as a community centre in Downsview.
Anti-violence advocate Louise Russo, who was Mayor John Tory’s special guest at his 2014 inaugural council meeting, said her number one issue had been community safety, promising to bring together residents at small, intimate gatherings to come up with ideas.
Edward Zaretsky had promised to appoint a “deputy councillor” if elected, as a way to ensure residents in the new, much bigger ward would have a better chance at being heard.
Zaretsky was embroiled in a legal battle with Pasternak during the campaign; a paralegal acting on the councillor’s behalf demanded that Zaretsky apologize for making allegedly defamatory statements about Pasternak on Twitter and in a flyer. Zaretsky told the Star he refused to apologize, while Pasternak vowed to pursue legal action.