While all eyes are focused on the Core Service Sideshow now being played out daily at Toronto City Hall, a quiet drama unfolding in the same building reveals the meanness and hypocrisy of the Ford regime.
The action began shortly after the municipal election last October. That was when veteran Ward 9 Councillor Maria Augimeri beat challenger Gus Cusimano by a narrow 89-vote majority. Cusimano, a Ford camp follower, then launched an electoral appeal based on technicalities. Though his motivation was clear, a lower court judge ruled that there were grounds for a re-election.
Normally, the city would automatically appeal such a decision, if for no other reason than to defend the integrity of its electoral process. But city clerk Ulli Watkis opted not to. Speculation, of course, was that she had caved to pressure from the Fords. And once Augimeri announced she would appeal the ruling, the city did indeed join in.
In the meantime, Cusimano also went after Augimeri’s election finances, demanding a compliance audit be done on her campaign expenses. On Monday, the case against her was heard and summarily dismissed. If that wasn’t enough, the city’s compliance audit committee then turned around and told Cusimano that in fact he would have to undergo such an audit.
Such satisfying endings are hard to come by, particularly under a regime that views Toronto as the enemy and its supporters as collaborators. No wonder former councillor Howard Moscoe, who helped put together the case against Cusimano, relished the moment.
“I don’t like what Cusimano did to Augimeri,” Moscoe told the Star. “It was a nasty election — and he lost. So he went after her in court to win some other way.”
Moscoe alleges that, in fact, “It was Cusimano who … significantly overspent” his campaign limits.
That has yet to be proved, but Moscoe, who helped frame the compliance audit rules, cites among the alleged offences not declaring computers and fudging the costs of printing pamphlets and posters.
And let’s not forget, the man Cusimano wants to be when he grows up, Rob Ford, is now appealing his own compliance audit.
But, Moscoe argues, the most egregious aspect of Cusimano’s trickery was his attempt to use public money to pay his legal fees incurred fighting against the election he lost.
For his part, the mayor has been fixated on unseating his backyard nemesis, Augimeri. He sent his campaign manager Nick Couvalis to work with Cusimano and pledged to unleash “Ford Nation” against her. He also appeared at a post-election fundraiser held to help out his losing ally.
What emerges from the murk of procedure and the fine print of regulatory legalese is a portrait of a mercifully inept gang of wrong-headed right-wingers who apparently believe they have the right to do whatever it takes to win.
Instead, they would rather tie up their opponents in court. An emboldened if not overly thoughtful Giorgio Mammoliti was heard whining recently that all these compliance audits represent some sort of “conspiracy factor.” One would expect no less from the man who recently suggested Toronto Island be turned into a red-light district.
The Fordites seem to believe that victory means you get to do what you want, where you want, where you want, regardless. Me right, you wrong.
Though they have yet to realize it, they will discover in the months and years ahead that the rules are in place to protect them as well as their enemies. Even they — Rob Ford and Gus Cusimano — are creatures of the city and civilization they would destroy.
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Source: Toronto Star
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