Just when it seems like it can’t any get worse ...
Councillors moving to strip mayor of powers
Christie Blatchford sees Toronto mayor dig a deeper hole,
TORONTO Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne indicated the province is willing to step in if Toronto City Council asks for help in dealing with Mayor Rob Ford.
“The things we are seeing and hearing about Mayor Rob Ford are truly disturbing. Yesterday, city council voted to request the mayor take a leave of absence,” the premier said in a quickly-organized news conference. “If council were to clearly indicate that they lack the ability to function as a result of this matter, the province would respond to a request from council to be provided new tools, depending on what that request might be.”
Wynne said she would consult with other parties in the minority legislature “to see if our legislature could move unanimously if required.”
The premier was careful to say the province would not be imposing its will on the City of Toronto, but would be empowering the city to make its own decisions.
“It is up to the municipal level of government to address the issues they face. It is not the provincial government’s role, nor its intention to impose its preferences upon that government,” she said.
Toronto city councillors are mounting an extraordinary bid to strip Ford of a wide swath of powers, rendering him, in the words of one critic, a “mayor in name only.”
The move came on a day that began with the mayor making a near admission of drinking and driving and using sexually explicit language while on live television.
The day ended with 28 city councillors signing a petition to hold a special meeting on Monday to debate a motion that would delegate “all powers and duties which are not by statute” currently assigned to the mayor to his deputy, Norm Kelly.
The motion seeks to oust him as chair of his own executive committee and appoint the deputy mayor instead, and to strip the mayor of his ability to sit and vote on any standing committee.
It would also slash his office budget to the size of that allotted to a city councillor and reallocate the balance to the city clerk’s office, under the oversight of the deputy mayor.
Mayor Ford refused to talk to reporters about the new push against his leadership. Deputy Mayor Kelly also declined to comment.
“We have an extraordinary situation here that nobody ever foresaw,” said Coun. John Filion, who drafted the motions.
“I certainly move it with some unease and sadness, where we’ve come to that point where a vast majority of councillors would like somebody else to function as the mayor of the city because the mayor won’t step aside.”
The changes would be in effect for the remainder of his term of office, which ends in November 2014.
City council, by a large majority, passed a motion Wednesday asking the mayor to step down to deal with his personal issues. However, city council does not have any power to remove Ford from the mayor’s office.
Several councillors have called for the province to step in to remove Ford, which it can do through an amendment to the City of Toronto Act or special legislation.
Earlier Thursday, Ford said he is receiving help from health-care professionals and apologized for profane comments made earlier Thursday, but defiantly said his former staffers were “lying” about allegations of escorts and cocaine use.
He said he would not offer specifics on what the “team of health care professionals” are helping him with. Ford made the statement with his wife, Renata Ford, standing silently by his side in a rare public appearance.
“The revelations yesterday of cocaine, escorts and prostitution (have) pushed me over the line and I used unforgivable language and I apologize,” Ford said, referring to Thursday morning’s sexually explicit comments.
“(These) allegations are 100 per cent lies. When you attack my integrity as a father, and as a husband, I see red,” he said.
Police documents released Wednesday said a staffer believed Ford was intoxicated at the Garrison Ball event earlier this year and had his two children with him.
“I have tried to move forward. This has proven to be almost impossible. For the last six months, I have been under tremendous, tremendous stress. The stress is largely of my own making,” Ford said.
Earlier, Ford said he is taking legal action against the former staffers who made stunning allegations about the mayor in a police document, saying he consorted with escorts and made sexually explicit statements to a woman working for him.
The mayor said he would be suing his former chief of staff, Mark Towhey, former press secretary George Christopolous and former communications officer Isaac Ransom for the comments they made to police in court documents made public Wednesday.
Ford then said he never told a former female staffer he wanted to perform sex acts with her, an allegation contained in the court document. “I’m happily married, I have more than enough to eat at home,” he said, drawing gasps from the reporters present.
Statements made to police in the course of a police investigation are protected under Canadian law from defamation actions under the defence of privilege. The principle behind the defence is that the justice system would not be able to function if witnesses faced civil action over statements given to investigators.