If I Was A Council Member I Wouldn't Want My Picture Taken

It must be difficult enough to live with the guilt about the incompotence,fiscal irresponsibility, lack of positive action and conning the local taxpayers without the fear that if taxpayers could identify us we might be in harms way.

Climate changes at City Hall
Hot air is normal, but now much more spending on the environment is set to spew forth
By SUE-ANN LEVY
February 20, 2007

When the guardians of all things green on the parks and environment committee meet today they won't be talking about how to tackle the $138-million repair backlog facing the city's $6-billion network of parks and rec centres.

They won't bother their pretty heads either with the fact that the repair backlog of this aging group of assets -- most more than 20 years old -- will grow to $266-million by 2011. That's despite a $19-million cash infusion this year.

A status report on the tree maintenance backlog? That's a non-starter. Ditto for a long-awaited policy on off-leash parks.

The self-styled green guardians will instead spend the morning on one thing: They'll spew hot air on climate change.

According to the meeting's painfully thin agenda, experts will attend to assist in the "scoping of an integrated climate change and clean air action plan" for the city.

Attached as background reading -- for those highbrow enough to understand it -- is a report called "Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis" from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Lawson Oates, the new director of the $2.5-million Toronto Environment Office said this comes as a result of Mayor David Miller's election platform to "advance the city's green agenda in relation to climate change and clean air quality."

He said seven experts have been invited to give their ideas on how the city should progress towards an action plan.

From today's briefing, his office will deliver a report to the March executive committee that will lay out a "blueprint or road map" to lead to that action plan.

After that, he said, they plan to hold consultations with the public and stakeholders -- union reps, BIAs, ratepayers associations, academia and so on -- modelled on the mayor's Listening to Toronto efforts. There is no budget attached as of yet, he said.

In June or July, they'll come up with Phase I -- that is short-term actions such as advancing the purchase of vehicles using natural gas. He added that a report scheduled for the fall will lay out "longer concrete measures" together with the associated costs.

Oates own office -- with a complement of 10 staff -- is slated to increase to 18 by year's end to develop the action plans.

Now don't get me wrong. I'm not at all against more of a focus by all levels of government on climate change and am aware of the urgent need to try to reverse the dreadful things we as a society have done to our environment.

But I can't help but wonder if this is more about the mayor trying to delude the public into believing he's another Robert Kennedy and less about actually doing what's right.

I can't help but think, like many socialist causes that have taken root at city hall, this too will become another growth industry.

Not only will the Toronto Environment Office mushroom to 18 staff by year's end, the mayor is also hiring a new minion in his office especially dedicated to the climate change file.

It's not as if we haven't already heard ad nauseum from many of the same suspects and groups slated to speak this morning. They've been preaching the same gospel (and benefiting from the city's largesse) for years with few results.

Take the Toronto Atmospheric Fund, a $25-million-plus environmental slush fund set up by former councillor Jack Layton. I remember many of the bizarre grants Layton handed out for solar wagons, car pools and cleaning projects all with the intent of reducing greenhouse gases.

That was in 1998. I'll bet the emissions haven't changed much, if at all, in the interim.

And what about Miller's handpicked Roundtable on the Environment or the annual smog summit that occurs every spring here at City Hall. Both have produced lots of hot air with few results.

While Coun. Denzil Minnan-Wong thinks climate change needs to be talked about, it's more important to talk about the city's capital budge and why community centres and parks are falling apart.

"I think those are important priorities," he said. "There's not enough discussion about addressing the sports and recreation needs of the citizens of Toronto."