Two key members of the mayor’s staff will soon be serving a new master.

Deputy Mayor Norm Kelly announced Tuesday afternoon that Earl Provost, the mayor’s chief of staff, and Sheila Paxton, the mayor’s policy director, will be moving to work under his supervision.

“I think efforts have been made to reach him, but he’s a moving target today,” Kelly said when asked whether Toronto Mayor Rob Ford had been alerted of the staffing changes. “I think staff have talked with him, that’s my understanding, so hopefully it doesn’t come as a surprise.”

The decision by staff members whether to stay with the mayor or move to under his control was entirely up to the individual employee, Kelly said.

“I did not force anyone, or entice anyone to join the new office,” he said. “This was done of their own free will.”

A total of 11 staff members will be moving from Ford’s office to work under his supervision, Kelly said.

The staffing changes at city hall come a day after an unprecedented meeting that saw council strip the mayor of many of his key powers.

Among the many changes enacted by council Monday, Kelly will become chair of the powerful executive committee and assume responsibility for hiring and firing staff. He will also oversee the staff transferred from Ford’s diminished office to the city clerk’s office.

Kelly, who said he had not spoken with Ford following yesterday’s special meeting, said that he wished previous conversations with the mayor had been acted on differently.

“I talked with him privately, publicly, candidly, gave him my best advice, advice that was in his interest personally and politically, and regrettably he didn’t take that advice,” he said.

Asked about concerns over his own political future following Ford’s statements that he would wage ‘war’ on his opponents, Kelly said it was nothing new.

“The political battlefield is no stranger to me,” Kelly said, “Politics is war without bullets.”

Fiscal conservative agenda to continue

Earlier Tuesday, Kelly met with city manager Joe Pennachetti to discuss the transfer of staff. Speaking with reporters afterward, Kelly spoke about the type of staff he’d like to see move to the clerk’s office.

“You want a good, collegial atmosphere where everyone feels they can make a contribution,” Kelly said when asked about which staff might make the switch.

However questions about who will set the agenda going forward remained murky.

“The mayor is the mayor,” Kelly told reporters when asked who the defacto mayor is now.

He added “the balance of power always rests with council.”

Kelly said that while Ford has been stripped of much of his power to control council, the agenda he set in motion will proceed.

“I think that there will still be a commitment to fiscal conservatism, but it may be expressed in a more cooperative and more sensitive to the arguments and positions of others,” Kelly said.

Kelly also spoke to the circus-like atmosphere of Monday’s meeting, which saw Ford mock another councillor about impaired driving and bowl over a female councillor on his way to apparently confront a heckler.

“I had never seen that before in any of the four forms of government I’ve participated in,” Kelly said. “I couldn’t tell you why he did it, but it certainly didn’t look good on him or this council or frankly for the reputation of the city.”

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