A sobering afterthought on Monday's vote at Toronto City Council

In the previous post I talked about what happened on Monday at Toront City council.  While I agree that certain things needed to be done to curb the Mayor's behaviour, and action needed to be taken to show #mayorFord that things could not continue as they were, there are a few things that in retrospect were probably detrimental to the City of Toronto.

With the passing of the motion, Mayor Ford still remains mayor, retaining all of the duties and responsibilities legislated to him by the Province of Ontario.  He simply lost those powers granted to him by council.

In doing this however, the motion stripped  the Mayor of most of his budget and most of his staff.  There is an inherent problem here.  The Mayor still has most of his duties.  It is unclear whether he will be able to carry out his responsibilities with the minimal staff that city council left him, or with the extremely trimmed budget.  Whoever put these numbers together probably did not think very clearly about what exactly goes on inside the Mayor's office on a daily basis.

There were also a few items in the motion that seem on sober reflection purely vindictive.  Why for example does it matter if the Mayor chooses to speak first or last a a City Council meeting.  I mean really?  Was it necessary to include that in the motion?

One needs to remember that this was an amended motion that was quite complicated and put together over a weekend.  It was also introduced at 12:06 pm, debated, and voted on by 17:00.  It would have been much better if there had been a little more time for debate.  (I am  not disagreeing with the intent of the motion here, just pointing out a few flaws). 

I do understand however why the motion was rushed on Monday.  Watching the debate in Council, the Ford brothers were busy bullying other councillors and the meeting was quite heated.  There were numerous disruptions from the visitor's gallery.  Council probably simply wanted to get this over with.

There have been a few things that happened since then.  @pmharper and the #pmo have distanced themselves from #mayorFord.  Minister of Employment @kenneyjason spoke out openly and indicated that Rob Ford should now simply resign.  The Ford brother's new television show on SunTV was cancelled after only one episode.

One thing however that happened yesterday that I totally disagree with is that the Province of Ontario announce that in dealing with the City, they will only deal with the Deputy Mayor, @councillorkelly
That is outrageous.  If #mayorFord is still the Mayor, then he is still the Mayor and the Province should be dealing with him.  It might be distasteful, but it how it should be.

Remember @councillorkelly said yesterday "The Mayor is the Mayor"