Ford’s cuts agenda sparks resistance

by Pam Johnson

Anger is rising against Toronto Mayor Rob Ford and his supporters as it becomes clear that the “gravy” he vowed to find at City Hall is just not there.

In fact, KPMG—the consultants hired to find waste in the city budget—discovered that 96 per cent of what the city spends is on core services. Still, KPMG called for more “efficiencies”—tabling a report that recommends cutting everything from daycare and public health services to parks and libraries.

Even before the core services review recommendations, Ford’s bully tactics raised the ire of many: his refusal to attend the Pride parade while threatening its funding, cutting bike lanes, voting against free nursing care and social program funding, and proposing higher user fees.

Ford attacked city workers saying they won’t be able to “hide under their desks” doing nothing anymore. His proposed buy-outs of 17,000 workers are the same as cuts, since the services they provide will be eliminated.

The mayor and his brother Doug have no compunction about spinning out hyperbole and even lies to the public to make their case for cuts. Mayor Ford claimed that 80 per cent of the city budget is for workers’ salaries. The real figure is 48 per cent. By comparison, labour costs for the City of Calgary are 56 per cent. Not to be outdone by his brother, Doug Ford flippantly and falsely claimed there were more libraries than Tim Horton’s in his riding.

The budget shortfall figure of $774 million is bloated according to City Councillor Gord Perks. “[W]e
don’t have a disaster or a crisis on the scale that the mayor and the budget chief are describing,” he said. “They’re exaggerating the amount of work we have to do to balance our budget to create a culture of fear.”

At the same time as he rails against excessive spending, Ford has allotted $3 million to pay consultants for a three-part core review of city services. The cost of getting rid of the Jarvis bike lanes will be twice as what it cost to install them. These moves expose Ford’s hypocrisy around the question of reducing spending.

In a recent interview, Ford stated that he views only police, roads and garbage collection (which he would outsource to the private sector) as necessary services. He vowed to cut all of the grants that fund the Arts and community events and he questioned whether Toronto should be in the “zoo business.”

Ford’s real aim appears to be cutting the very public services that he vowed to maintain during his campaign. In his plan, the “gravy” will go to the private sector, which will profit at the expense of workers and the community.

But Ford’s bully tactics are starting to backfire as city workers, ordinary citizens, and even his own allies on City Council have started to push back. On April 9, over 10,000 people filled Dundas Square to oppose Ford’s cuts. City workers in CUPE 416 (which represents outside workers in Toronto) went door-to-door to build the rally. People jammed City Hall to protest garbage privatization. Hundreds of cyclists flooded Jarvis Street to protest cuts to bike lanes. Even City Council allies turned on Giorgio Mammoliti, who calls himself “Ford’s quarterback,” when he disgustingly videotaped women at the Dyke March during Pride celebrations, in a desperate attempt to find grounds to defund Pride.

Library workers are not waiting for Ford to recommend cuts in the next budget. They have started a campaign and circulated a petition to keep the libraries public. Thousands have signed already. Margaret Atwood tweeted it to her 225,000 followers who crashed the site.

As Ford increasingly reveals his real agenda to decimate public services through austerity measures, the resistance to “Ford Nation” is beginning to gather steam. As more people get on board, it will hopefully build into a real challenge to Ford’s slash-and-burn project.
All out September 26 to protest Ford’s cuts!