There’s only a week to go in the Greater Toronto Area’s municipal election campaigns. In Toronto there are a handful of important debates left that will give voters a last chance to grade the candidates for mayor.
There are 44 city council seats at stake in the Toronto municipal election. Sitting councillors are running for re-election for 37 of those seats. The common wisdom is that defeating an incumbent in a Toronto election is, if not hopeless, a daunting task.
For the past nine days the Toronto mayoral candidates have talked up their messages at photo ops, news conferences and, of course, debates. They’ve also helped out at a food banks, canvassed door to door and done as many media interviews as the campaigns can fit in. It’s a crowded, grueling schedule.
Yesterday was the first day of the advance poll in the Toronto municipal election. Today we learned the turnout was the highest ever with 28,046 electors taking the time to vote.
Two weeks from today, Toronto’s headlines will be reporting on the results of the 2014 Toronto municipal election and today the first votes were cast in the advance polls.
The campaign for mayor of Toronto hit a new low this morning and unfortunately I suspect Toronto will see much more mud and dirt slung about before the votes are finally counted on Oct. 27.
The Toronto Foundation released its annual report, Vital Signs, a snapshot on the state of the city. The report should be required reading for everyone running for any political office in Toronto’s Oct. 27 municipal election.
Four years ago Rob Ford rode a slogan - stop the gravy train - and a promise to cut the vehicle registration tax to an easy win in his run for mayor of Toronto. Two weeks into his campaign to replace his brother, Doug Ford today unveiled his tax cut to try to seduce voters away from John Tory and Olivia Chow.
The day after the big TV debate in a federal or provincial campaign it’s all about the sound bites that get replayed and banner headlined in newspapers. In a Toronto mayoral election it’s about honing the attack, getting up and doing it all over again in two more debates on the same day.
As he prepared for his first round of chemotherapy, Rob Ford today spoke to the people of Toronto in recorded audio message running just over three minutes.
Today’s episode in Toronto’s long-running political drama makes the Netflix series, House of Cards, seem like a predictable, boring bit of very conventional television.
Another day of transit plan bickering between the mayoral candidates in Toronto. Olivia Chow, Rob Ford and John Tory all took shots at each other’s plans. It’s a given that the jousting will continue at the mayoral debate tonight.
The media in the Greater Toronto Area is focused almost exclusively on the Toronto race for Mayor and that is leaving some big municipalities fighting for coverage.
There is one week left to get your name on the ballot for the municipal elections in the GTA and across Ontario. In Toronto Councillor Ron Moeser in Ward 44 still hasn’t registered to run but today the other hold out, David Shiner in Ward 24, filed his papers and will seek re-election.
Toronto’s four leading candidates for mayor lined up behind their lecterns this afternoon for a badly designed debate that was set up to deliver a shouting match and, sure enough, it did just that.
