Needing to replenish our stock of incense, Sarah and me recently dropped by Shanti Baba.

Aside from being a perennially cool store packed full of intriguing paraphernalia, rare objects, and numinous curios (a sort of spiritual head shop), the longtime owner is pretty knowledgeable about the Queen West area and offers interesting tidbits whenever we visit.

This time around he wrote the name “KENK” on a pink Post-It and handed it to us with instructions to look it up. When I did I realized why the name sounded familiar: up until about a decade ago Igor Kenk had been a fixture in the neighbourhood and was widely recognized as “the world’s most prolific bicycle thief”.

I don’t know how many of the nearly 3000 bikes strewn across his properties Kenk was personally responsible for stealing but I suspect that his reputation is well-earned. He’s so notorious that TVO even decided to produce an interactive graphic novel about him. The guy has lived an interesting life.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, Igor Kenk no longer lives in Toronto but he definitely left his mark.

Most discerning travelers know that getting the full experience of a destination requires eschewing well-worn tourist routes.

And besides, who wants another boring guide about local eateries and “quirky” establishments? Haven’t you had your fill of “safe and friendly”? How about some real local flavour?

As you can see on the map above, Toronto is teeming with all sorts of engaging and exciting experiences, ranging from traditional holdups to fast drive-by snatches. You might even get to experience an authentic carjacking.

In fact, for the extreme adventure travel enthusiast there are really only 4 areas to avoid (5 if you include the Toronto Islands).

1. West Hill / Port Union

While the north-west portion of West Hill offers excellent opportunities for thrill seekers, its southern boundary with the Port Union neighbourhood is to be avoided.

2. The Bridle Path

Nothing here but the secluded mansions of rich and famous people. Skip.

3. Downsview Airport

Maybe it’s the area’s historical association with the Canadian military but very little happens on the grounds of this airport. Nearby neighbourhoods are worth a visit.

4. Etobicoke

This western chunk of the city is the traditional home of the Fords but now that the brothers have have either left or are in the process of leaving, it seems that the type of crime that they might attract is evaporating. Perhaps everyone got day jobs.

Luckily, if you take a short bus ride in almost any direction you’re bound to increase your chances of finding a compelling encounter!

I hope you’ve found this post informative and that when you’re next in Toronto you consider visiting one of our city’s many colourful, independent business people!

P.S. Too much data to include at the end as usual. Contact me if interested.

In the early days of TCL I pictured myself huddled over a keyboard late into the night, pounding out some shocking exposé for my audience as the rain outside my window made the flickering lights of downtown dance, fierce lightning illuminating the skyline’s silhouette during the particularly hard-hitting sections. With persistence I would become a gritty urban citizen journalist (coder by day).

And it kinda worked.

I mean, Sarah and me did break the Rob Ford coke story well before it ever made headlines but other than that I mostly just took pictures, ranted, and occasionally covered interesting local events. Turns out that getting good intel is tough.

But then a few weeks ago I remembered that I’ve been quietly tracking certain city services’ dispatch data. On September 7th it’ll be exactly two years since I started. Astute readers may have caught an experiment I was running in the sidebar with this data. ** Spoiler Alert ** I decided to pull the plug on that and use it for this project instead.

There are a few gaps in the timeline because some data feeds went into holding patterns while the associated city services tinkered with their sites. The data is mostly complete but it’s safe to say that in some cases the total numbers will almost certainly be under-reported.

Still, initial search results are surprising, the kind of information I imagined I’d be blogging about back in 2009. At the outset it’s not exactly gumshoe work but I imagine that an intrepid citizen journalist could do something more with it.

If you find the SPI series interesting I encourage you to share anything you find here on your own site, social media, etc. I ask only that you do me a solid and include an attribution (see bottom of the sidebar for details).

Finally, since it may not be obvious the acronym SPI stands for “Sarah Patrick Investigations”. Or “Salt Pepper Info”. Or whatever works for you. I don’t think we need to get too hung up on it.

Earlier there were eight cruisers and an ambulance. No news trucks. I guess it’s become so common that it’s not worth reporting on. Always something going down in this neighbourhood.

On Friday, York Regional Police and Peel Regional Police and the Canadian Bankers Association plan to hold a news conference in Aurora to publicize the $100,000 reward.

The robber is known at the Vaulter Bandit for the way in which he jumps over the counter during robberies, and he has been linked to about 20 bank heists over a five-year period across Canada.

…

He appears to work alone and may use rental cars.

“He’s probably pretty hush hush about it,” [Det.-Sgt. Mike] Fleischaker said.

He has used a silver Jetta and a Chevy Cruz for his escapes, and police are investigating whether they were rental cars.

“These are cars that are frequently rented out as economy cars,” Fleischaker said.

His method of robbery has changed over the course of his career.

Originally, he went into banks during regular hours and jumped the counter, taking whatever he could quickly from tellers.

Since May 2011, he has started to show up in the morning as employees prepare to open branches for business.

Last June, the Canadian Bankers Association raised the reward to $50,000 from $20,000.

http://www.thestar.com/news/crime/2015/05/15/vaulter-bandit-bank-robber-reward-jumps-to-100000.html

As I mentioned some time ago, I haven’t been sitting idly by and watching things around me unfold. I remain keenly aware of what’s happening each day in the over-the-top system we are subjected to.

Every day I read about more public gouging and fraud by corporations, media “pundits” defending absolute and unquestioning subjugation to the immoral “authority” of state who invoke their flimsy “won’t someone think of the children!” line at the same time as they actively work to undermine and criminalize those seeking to ensure children’s welfare (and everyone else trying to do some good). Every day the government ups the ante in contravening and violating rules, laws, and basic justice, directly suppressing people’s Charter Rights and access to the law. That is, of course, when they’re not busy arbitrarily making up new laws to hold us guilty of “crimes” that they invent on the spot.

And if those laws were ever intended as actual protection of citizens and their rights, it’s painfully obvious that they’re being used specifically to terrorize, extort, and control those same citizens and violate their rights — the exact opposite of their stated purpose. And worse, those laws are being perverted through the breaking and violation of other laws, a situation so repellent that it defies words. And the courts hold this aloft as being in all of our best interests while police go to work making sure we’re all “protected” under their benevolent regime. For this they demand our tax money, to be handed over to banking and corporate acquaintances that show a voracious appetite for control and dominance.

Beyond this I have my own decade-long history with the Canada Revenue Agency in a series of what I feel may fairly be described as omissions, lies, and possibly fraud — all documented in an extensive timeline on the government’s own stationary (i.e. stuff they sent me), often complete with signatures of the CRA agent, the timeline involved, authorizing supervisors, etc. It documents numerous Charter Right violations by them and other other members of the CRA. I can now actually claim to have reams of evidence: papers, transcripts, a long reconstructed timeline.

I can directly prove that the CRA has made, at the very least, an error in deciding that I “owed them” $20,000 for the year 2005, which they said carried over from 2004 where I “owed” $0.

Let that sink in for a moment.

If this was a problem, I was told, it’s on me to straighten out (and I’d better pay what they demand in the meantime!) Initially I thought this was related to the personal business I had started so that I could work as a contractor, but the longer it went on, the sketchier it became. I mean, I only made about $55,000 that year which, according to the math means that the CRA had expected me to remit 36% of my earnings (apparently just for EI alone — see below), a number that jumped far higher after numerous re-assessments (and I better pay that too!)

Ten years in and I still have no assessment, just a bunch of “Notices of Assessment” (tricky wording, huh?) that contradict each other and tell me very little in and of themselves. I’ve continuously demanded to know what the CRA claimed I “owed” them for, and only once did I receive the verbal response that it, the initial $20,000, was marked as “EI — maybe Employment Insurance?” somewhere in the history of the file. I asked for that in writing, as well as the agent’s initials or some other identifying feature to prove that this is the information I was asking for.

Eventually, I received yet another Notice of Assessment that notified me that I “owed” $20,000 from 2005, my 2004 “owing” was $0, and the agent’s initials appeared at the bottom (printed). Well, good, then. Guess that’s that.

So, now I’m sitting on many many copies of Notices of Assessments, many in French (a big indicator to me that someone was messing around with my info at the CRA), many with conflicting information (numerous re-assessments made before I ever submitted returns for any of these years), and still not a single one indicating anything except some sort of weirdness at the Canada Revenue Agency.

I deeply suspect the involvement of a since-acquired IT staffing agency at the outset (2004-2005). They refused to send me my T4 and would only provide me with a photocopy which had what looks like sloppy white-out applied to a conspicuous box. Combined with the fact that they demanded that I was an independent contractor even as they sent me a T4 and a Record of Employment (yes, I have these, plus signed contracts, etc.), suggests that they provided the CRA with some interesting “information” too, which the CRA may have decided was perfectly okay and probably also decided that, yeah, I should be treated as an independent contractor.

I’ve since worked for other large IT staffing firms that have similarly tried to circumvent Ontario’s labour laws, readily co-mingling “employee” with “independent contractor” (one place actually used both in the contract wherever they were expedient), treating ignorant contractors like employees and sticking them with the taxes that they should be paying.

I mean, back in my Henderson Bas nightmare I had to explain to my fellow workers that working 80 hours per week is not expected by law, so it’s not surprising that this kind of thing goes on regularly.

I’m assuming that this is how the situation started . The fact that the Canadian government ripped off Canadian taxpayers through the Employment Insurance system at the same time certainly adds a lot more spice to this whole thing — I suddenly owe twenty grand on what I can best ascertain to be Employment Insurance tax, on the same year as the government guts the system?

That “amount owing” quickly grew to $35,000 and by today I’m sure that it’s ballooned to well over $40,000 what with all the fees and extra bells and whistles they like to throw in. In the meantime, the CRA has frozen my assets in very strategic ways — typically on the last day of the month (when I get paid, pay rent, etc.) — because I didn’t cooperate with their extortion demands (which regularly encompass friends and family — “what assets do they have?” “We can seize whatever we need to!”, etc.) By assets, of course, I mean the gaping debts I have elsewhere in my life.

I’m  told I have the right to challenge this, I have the right to the correct information in a timely manner, etc. etc.

Right.

I would make arrangements to “repay” with agents only to discover that, a month later, those agents were no longer working on my file, and the new agents determined that I owed now and they weren’t going to wait one damn second longer!

Have you ever tried to remove a government-imposed freeze on all your bank/credit accounts? If you’re not experienced with the wonder of a CRA Requirement to Pay, I hope you never have to experience the stress. It could easily push you into abject poverty and a good deal of despair. Illegal? Not if the government does it! And don’t forget, if the government is preventing you from paying your bills, or rent, or buying food, or whetever, that’s on you, legally or otherwise.

You could always declare bankruptcy. The CRA will be happy to assist with that.

Also fun is when they decide that freezing our accounts is insufficient so they’re just going to start taking 55% of your income (I’m staring at last week’s sickly pay stub right now), and you’ll be notified about it two weeks afterward in a letter saying that you’ve had a fair chance to reply to this notice so now it’s our turn!

At least it’s better than the 65% they were seizing earlier!

But then I catch them fucking around with my records, deleting information (people I spoke to, have signed letters from yet who don’t appear anywhere in my CRA records), altering other information (I didn’t request half of my information in French, and yes, I have a record of the request too), etc. and I have to say, I’m not inclined to joke about this too much.

I have never been before a judge on this issue, I’ve never had a chance to plead my case to anyone, in fact wasn’t even aware of the machinations behind the scenes at the CRA, but I’ve been summarily and secretly convicted and have been paying for my “crime” for a decade now with no end in sight. My right to appeal is non-existent because the Canada Revenue Agency is allowed to openly violate this and any other rights we may have (plus whatever laws they feel are irrelevant). That they can use my own tax money (and yours), to extend their defense indefinitely and with resources I could never access in court is a further violation of Charter Rights — that is in no way a fair trial.

So what?

I could complain to the CRA Ombudsman who has the authority to ask the Agency to, pretty please, stop doing this and answer this man’s questions first. If they decide that they don’t want to — all within their legal right — I can take my complaint to the Tax Court.

I’ve been in touch with the Ombudsman and, in fairness, they helped me to get the CRA to release yet another unannounced account freeze, but beyond that I haven’t had any luck; the good times re-started shortly thereafter and have been around since.

In the Tax Court arena I get to go up against the limitless resources of an agency that takes my money without my consent to defend itself and prosecute me. Perhaps Wikipedia isn’t the best source of information about this but based on everything I know it seems accurate in its assessment of the CRA as body that “collaborates” with the Department of Justice to hand down arbitrary judgments against anyone they want money from. Accordingly, “the onus is generally on the taxpayer to prove its case on a balance of probabilities” (i.e. the taxpayer is guilty before proven innocent)

And the best result one can expect from the Tax Court is that they force the CRA to have another look at your case. They may re-determine that there was a mistake. But more than likely, they’ll determine that they were right all along. The Tax Court, in other words, is just another way of grovelling before CRA which has ultimate authority in any event.

This results in direct and disturbing Charter Rights violations, but because it’s the government, they’ll do it anyway. They know that even if the Supreme Court directly rules that they violated the law, they’ll be perfectly free to continue destroying peoples’ lives simply because they can — who will hold them to account? It’s just like when cops decide on a new “policy”; that “policy” is no way a law, not enforceable, and constitutes a direct violation of both law and Charter Rights when carried out by police – or anyone for that matter. Yet the police do it without a care because, obviously, when the cops violate the law it’s because they’re “protecting” us. And, of course, you’re free to point out that the cops are violating the law right there and then, but that’s called resisting arrest and your rights and more laws will be further and more egregiously violated because your only right is to be oppressed by Her Majesty’s representatives. In fact, they’ll be rewarded for cracking some uncooperative skulls, and the courts will back them up every step of the way.

You may call these exaggerations, I call them real and factual.

I have physical, tangible records of being rolled over by the very institutions claiming to be there to help me, from the time my license plates and car were stolen by the Pickering Honda dealership (a forged signature was involved in that one), to the most recent interaction I had with the Enforcement Unit of the Municipal Licensing & Standards Office who claimed (and I have this recorded), that they “aren’t responsible for enforcement” and if I thought that something wasn’t right with the situation I was calling about, I could file a complaint. That situation, being forced to sit in one’s apartment in -18 degree Celcius temperatures because workers have blocked the exits and the elevators aren’t working  (as those workers are ripping out all the windows in your home), apparently doesn’t fall under their purview. Maybe try the police if it’s an emergency, they say, but I might be charged with calling them spuriously, so best just to take it up with the landlord. After all, there are laws to protect me in such cases!

Turns out, there is no agency that ensures that your wealthy landlord, or any other faceless corporation, can’t indirectly kill you in your own home. It makes even less of a difference if you’re paying for the privilege — leases are not intended for your protection. Things like elevators aren’t your right, even if you’re paying for them, I’ve learned. Now, if maybe contractors messed up on the caulking so that the owners complained, that’d be a different story…

Well, maybe.

I say this because the Landlord and Tenant Board, apparently the only place to vent your life-and-death tales, is working diligently to make sure that organisations like the poor, mistunderstood Starlight Investments, have a chance to explain why they’ve been violating municipal law, TSSA orders, etc. for years in our apartment building (and, undoubtedly, others).

During the latest hearing, which has been ongoing for over a year, the judge hushed testimony as “irrelevant” by a witness for the tenants (also a tenant herself), who was recounting experiences in other buildings. Then in the very next sentence (couldn’t have been more than 10 seconds apart), the judge decided to allow exactly the same thing when one of Starlight’s pinstripe-suited lawyers asked the same witness about it.

In this instance, Starlight is being sued by many of the tenants of the building for the elevators — they don’t run much of the time, and when they do they can best be described as deathtraps — not stopping on some floors, stopping on others that weren’t requested, doors not closing, doors not opening, misalignment with the landings (sometimes as much as a foot or more), wobbling up and down of the car when it should be stopped, both floor indicator and ceiling lights going off (total darkness- fun!), exposed wiring (more than one person confirmed the wires were live), inability to go up from the ground floor (their solution was to post up a hand-written sign explaining that we just have to got to the basement first), etc.

The TSSA issued numerous warnings and finally a stop order because of the danger posed by the cars. Starlight’s response was to shut down the elevator (leaving the whole 17-floor building to one half-working death cage). In response to the no-work that Starlight did, the TSSA decided to lift the order, I guess, based on some promise that, no, really, they work great this time. Of course, within a month the same problems were noted again.

It apparently struck no one as odd that exactly the same problems were found after three individual inspections (in this specific case, each a month apart), problems severe enough to force the TSSA to shut down the elevators, and problems that miraculously re-appeared once again after the ban had been lifted. Is it likely that everything was fixed and broke down again in exactly the same way, or is it more likely that Starlight “befriended” the inspector and continued to ignore the problem in exactly the same way they had for years? The judge isn’t sure, so she decided she needed to hear from what I can only assume was a “character witness” for the faceless mega-corporation. And another 6 months’ worth of waiting for the next hearing is tossed out the window.

All of this is well-documented, and has been going on for literally years. And those involved in the lawsuit quickly realized that there are no laws to protect us from such obvious abuses, and even if there were, they wouldn’t be enforced. And even if they were enforced, the obvious glad-handing between Starlight and the court means that even that last resort would be futile. Of course it’s an absolute violation of the law. Of course it’s an abdication of the judge’s responsibility. Of course it’s all wrong. So what? The government is constantly green-lighted to violate laws and people’s rights, something that they can extend to characters like the team defending Starlight’s slimy abuse of their own tenants (I hate to judge a book by its cover but the corporation’s people even look like characters out of some greezy gangster movie).

On top of this, in another hearing before the LTB the tenants of the building are fighting an above-rate rent increase that Starlight is trying to foist on them to cover the cost of all of the renovations they did (I’m already paying the larger rent since I moved in later, but they’re trying to squeeze more money out of me in other ways); renovations like a new roof which leaked profusely into our top-floor unit the first major rain we had, blistering the ceiling and walls with giant water bubbles, and renovations like the window replacements I mentioned above that they decided to do in the middle of winter with absolutely no regard for the residents (I heard that other buildings where this branding make-over took place [it had nothing to do with energy efficiency, etc.] had the luxury of warming areas!) Oh, and the non-functional elevators, you know they want us to pay for “upgrading” those too…

And just to make sure we were all starkly reminded of how biased the judge is in our case, she pronounced that anyone who did not attend a hearing to testify about problems in our class action, problems like those with the elevators, would probably be disqualified because she can’t decide how much to award if she doesn’t know how people were affected as a result of Starlight violating everyone’s contract terms (we’re asking for abatement — rent reduction or refund — for those months where we can prove that the elevators were broken). Tough shit if you have a job in order to pay rent — the onus is on you. Of course, if you refuse to pay the rent and stand up in even this meager protest for your rights, the rental contract, the law, common sense, basic human decency, etc., it is you who will be hauled off by the cops. If the corporation endangers your life by exposing you to the elements (or asbestos, or black mold, or whatever), and furthermore violates contractual terms that they set out, it’d likely be you that’s hauled off by the cops for filing a complaint — at least that’s what the unhelpful lady in the “Property Standards Enforcement” (the people who don’t enforce stuff), unit said.

This assumes that there ever would be a ruling, which is realistically expected never so long as the judge continues to allow Starlight to produce “surprise witnesses” in post-post-post-postponed hearings. I’m not aware of any limitations or regulations surrounding “timely” cases (and that assumes that anyone would bother to enforce them).

Sure, those witnesses may not know anything about the situation, but, you know, the big-money people need their fair day in court. Those tenants who can’t be there, even though they’re being represented by a lawyer (well, a paralegal — it’s the best we could afford), and have all produced signed letters in their absence, are irrelevant. They court sure as hell isn’t going to postpone hearings for one more day to wait for those lazy assholes (or as the Starlight team put it, people who “can’t be bothered to show up”).

Besides all of this, I can’t even count how many times I’ve personally witnessed fraud and law-breaking at some of the companies I’ve worked for in the past. And every day I see cops openly violating the exact  laws that they’re “enforcing”. Then I listen to the media quacks drone on about the wonders of our illustrious and increasingly hard-line leaders, corporate saviours with “visionary” products and services, and wondrous celebrities at whom we should all gaze with adoration, and I can’ help but wonder…

What’s to be done?

So I gave it some thought…

If you read about the shit that Rob Ford’s buddy Gene Jones did, and allowed to happen, it’s no wonder Rob Ford is up his ass with every inch of his taxpayer-respecting love — they’re both cut from the same cloth:

An executive assistant for one of the City Councillors was looking for a
new job and approached a recruitment firm for assistance. The firm
contacted the CEO and informed him that the EA was looking for new
opportunities. She had previously met the CEO during the course of her
work.

With no job competition or posting of the job opportunity, the CEO
created and gave her a new manager position.

While he acknowledged that TCH “absolutely” required that all open
positions had to be advertised, the CEO stated he did not advertise for
this position because, “[I]t’s my prerogative when I want to give that
position to the best person with experience, internally or externally …”

The CEO promoted the manager less than six months later and
appointed her to be a senior director with a raise of $30,000.

Ford thinks this guy’s a straight shooter and we should all be sucking on his dick. No doubt, Ford conducts himself the same way — and what’s wrong with that?

Now consider that in 2014 Toronto, Jones walks away with whatever “executive pay” he’s dolled out to himself and his friends, and of course a healthy and well-deserved severance payment of $200,000, on top of $1.6 million in severance for all of the people he fired without cause; and then there’s Rob Ford (personally responsible for getting Jones his job), who’s openly admitted to buying and doing hard drugs, is connected to gangs and murders, has broken every rule and many laws out there, yet still hasn’t even been given even a lousy traffic ticket, and is in fact running for mayor again.

Oh, and Crean, the woman who detailed the latest Ford-linked shitpile in one-hundred and eleven pages is the actual waste according to Ford, who’s practically choked up by the fact that corrupt assholes like Jones and Lisi aren’t being thrown honorific parades.

My issue isn’t so much that people like this exist — I think that that must reasonably be expected in any society. What concerns me deeply is the fact that this is now systemic: we have a system that welcomes corruption and criminality (as far as I know, Ford & co. still have full access to City Hall, etc.), and has been shown to attack only those who expose it.

Take, for example, the fact that no one has been able to show very much harm done by Edward Snowden’s revelations (do you suppose most governments already knew?) yet he’s public enemy #1 at the moment in the US. The most obvious harm done was to the government’s claim of “authority”, honesty, trustworthiness, etc., and its image wasn’t great to begin with.

That politics are tied to money is no revelation. And law+enforcement collude with politics to make for a perfect trifecta of “do as we say … or else”. It’s good old-fashioned gangsterism.

How else do you explain the fact that the Supreme Court unanimously allowed the government to defraud all Canadians to the tune of $57 billion over a period of three years? (strange how there seems to be no web history dating back to 2008 for this story — almost like they didn’t want people to know)

Oh, okay, they didn’t use the “defraud” word, they said (did I mention that it was unanimous?) that the government “illegally” seized $57 billion in Employment Insurance from Canadians in 2002, 2003, 2005.

You call it “illegal”, I call it “fraud”.

But the Supreme Court didn’t order a refund or an apology. Instead they simply said that the EI system had to be changed to make sure this never happened again.

It took ’em a few years but they finally did something.

The government completely gutted the system and “appropriated” the money elsewhere (part of the original complaint), steeply hiked up the amount that all Canadians would have to pay into the suddenly poor EI system, and have profited from it and made their own lives cushy and comfortable while trying real hard to ensure no one else benefits – especially not the people paying into the thing.

If you’re working “legally” in Canada, you are literally paying (and more now than ever) for the “illegally” seized funds that the government took from you under false authority years ago. And this is all based on the unanimous assessment and continuing consent of Canada’s Supreme Court.

Rob Ford, as much of an asshole as he is, is merely the symptom of a very sick system.

We weren’t affected by the ice storm that swept over Toronto this past weekend. A couple of branches fell off the tree outside our building, and the sidewalks were frozen over, but unlike hundreds of thousands of people around the city we continued to have electricity throughout.

By hundreds of thousands, I mean around 300,000, or 12% of Toronto. As of today, that number is 50,000, about a 83% resumption but that’s still a sizable chunk left out in the cold and dark. That number fluctuates (and because it refers to “customers”,  i.e. billing addresses, that number is probably a lot higher), as additional repairs cause some people to lose power again shortly after they’ve finally gotten it back.

In any event, a number of 50,000 customers according to the specific Power Disruption (Electricity) Emergency Plan of the City of Toronto, is considered a “significant” power disruption emergency (according to all identifying characteristics).

A couple of people have somewhat carelessly died as a result of having to wait out the ice storm, but even being cognizant of the dangers wouldn’t have made this an ideal Christmas for anyone without power.

The fact that warming centers are currently used by about a thousand people per day (according to Robbie), would indicate that the vast majority of the remaining 50,000, or whatever the real number is, are making due otherwise. Many are staying in their homes (often those without the means to go anywhere else), but some will have moved in with relatives or are in hotels / motels. This is nearly five days after the storm, described as “catastrophic” by Toronto Hydro CEO Anthony Haines, declared “one of the worst storms in Toronto’s history” by Rob (what would classify as an emergency, I wonder … a worstest storm?), and we’ve had some snow fall since then.

Rob didn’t think it necessary to hand Norm Kelly emergency powers (or maybe it’s because he didn’t want to?), which would have allowed Kelly to ask for the province and feds for extra cash, which could have been used to hire private contractors to get the city back in order as quickly as possible. Instead, Ford has placated embattled citizens with the knowledge that some extra trucks had been asked to come in from out of the city.

Of course, despite the ongoing financial hostage-holding of the public by the Hydro monopoly under supporters’ public lines of old equipment not being able to withstand Toronto weather, among other things, for constantly increasing rates, and in addition to the outrageous sums being paid to unelected and apparently unaccountable Toronto Hydro execs, citizens are expected to shell out thousands for contractors to connect the final length of electrical lines to homes (assuming they can even find a contractor at this time) … and then await more government benevolence in the form of safety inspectors before even thinking about the welfare of themselves, their families, and their property (that kind of craziness is liable to get you in trouble with the law).

The fact that this is winter and it’s freezing outside makes this a vital matter — one of literal life and death. It’s why power companies can’t shut off your power in the winter — heat is considered vital and essential. Until everything is cleared, damage from the storm will continue to occur. Additionally, all those darkened neighbourhoods are good targets for vandals and burglars.

Tired, cold, frustrated people are getting pissed — at Ford — who maintains he can’t do more than he’s doing. But he says he understands the frustrations of everyone stuck in their homes; it’s not like he was able to take his family to a hotel or that, despite being hit equally hard,  his part of town already has its power mostly restored while others are still waiting.

According to Robbie, this is not an emergency because a “State of emergency is basically when the whole city is paralyzed, business can’t open, people can’t get out of their houses”.  Business not being able to operate, that’s an issue; people freezing in their homes, or having them vandalized / robbed / damaged, not so much (as long as they can leave).

In his path to cheapdom, Rob Ford seems to have abandoned his Scarborough constituency (subways! subways! subways!) most of all, but really all of Toronto; and it’s not like it’s his first time at bat either, and it’s not like people haven’t been warning him.

Can you blame him?

With the shit show crest that Rob Ford is surfing, it’s hard to imagine that he gets any peace and quiet at all. It’s a shock that he doesn’t just do like his brother, who correctly decided to just not show up at Council after setting the record straight with the maggots down south and at City Hall yesterday morning. I mean, why the hell should he be expected to do his job when people won’t stop asking all those damn distracting questions? Don’t they know he’s a human being with normal human feelings?!

The spectacle was ratcheted up again this morning as Robbie expressed his disgust at what was said about him in the updated court documents that were released yesterday. In those documents, Ford’s former staff say all sorts of unflattering things about the mayor’s reluctantly intoxicated conduct which, as we all know, is all HIGHLY improbable given everything we know. Granted, the mayor’s memory may be a bit sketchy on unimportant details like smoking crack in an infamous crack house, or his association with drug and gun runners, or his involvement in the Anthony Smith murder, but we can be absolutely, completely, and unwaveringly convinced of the mayor’s guaranteed honesty.

Let’s be real; if any crazy person can just say whatever they think they saw or heard when being interrogated by the police, and then have the police publicly release those statements via the courts (regardless of if that crazy person had any hand in, or knowledge of, the subsequent release), that’s clearly the highest form of slander and requires nothing less than the most vicious retaliation. That’s just sensible.

So it makes sense that Robbie would be going after his former staff, not to mention the ballsy Bier Markt and its staff, for saying such awful things about him. Impugning his honour by claiming that he made sexual remarks and was cavorting with a hooker — obviously such statements are a direct assault on the entire Ford clan who only want to live in peace and to be left alone like any other normal family. They’re practically begging for privacy, and yet the press hounds them incessantly. They media’s chutzpah knows no bounds; not even Rob’s exemplary kids are off-limits, and Doug’s innocent kids are similarly in the media spotlight as though they had some say in the matter!

Apparently having his wife appear beside him in a crowded and boisterous press conference isn’t enough to get this simple request through their thick reporter skulls, so Rob and Doug are taking to TV in their uniquely titled “Ford Nation” on the Sun News Network to let everyone know how revolted they are with their lack of privacy.

Thankfully, after the abhorrent remarks made earlier by police chief Bill Blair, the police are not taking any actions against Ford’s obviously tongue-in-cheek remarks about his driving drunk and buying illegal drugs (sure to be typified as admissions of guilt but the media maggots). And at least the cops are not intervening as the mayor asserts his right to a little personal space at his media scrums (sure to be typified as physical assault by the media maggots).

Ford, like his buddy Sandro Lisi, is finally standing up to the tidal wave of injustice and lies swelling against him. If he’s guilty of anything, it’s in being a fair and an honest man who works his ass off for the taxpayers of this city to save every last penny and eliminate taxes from the clutches of the corrupt and wasteful government.

Rob Ford and his brother sure do hang out with some interesting people.

For example, Allesandro “Sandro” Lisi, friend of the Fords, occassional driver and bodyguard for Rob:

“Toronto police are investigating attempts by associates of Mayor Rob Ford to retrieve the crack cocaine video.

One target of the investigation is Alexander “Sandro” Lisi, 35, a Range Rover-driving Etobicoke man with a criminal history of threatening and assaulting women, who has been acting as an occasional driver and security guard for the mayor.”
Toronto Star, August 16, 2013

***

“Alessandro (Sandro) Lisi, Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s friend and occasional driver, has been charged with possession and trafficking of marijuana, police confirmed this morning.

Police have also charged Lisi, 35, with conspiracy to commit an indictable offence and possession of the proceeds of crime.”
Huffington Post Canada, October 1, 2013

***

“Calls mounted Tuesday for Mayor Rob Ford to address reports that he and his associates are under investigation by Toronto police, just as new allegations emerged about an attempt by Alexander Lisi to swap drugs for the mayor’s stolen cellphone.

Asked about the reports, a jubilant Mayor Ford, en route to council to debate the proposed Scarborough subway, emphatically shook his head and chanted: “Subways, subways, subways!””
National Post, October 8, 2013

Then there’s David Price, Ford’s buddy, financial adviser, former football coach, and ex-“director of logistics and operations” at City Hall (a position created specially for Price by Robbie):

“Just before news of the alleged crack video broke, Price was accompanying Ford at an Etobicoke community council meeting, where a controversial condo project was being discussed. Mid-meeting, Ford suddenly went to the parking lot to place magnets on parked cars.

When reporters began following Ford to ask why he had left the meeting, Ford answered a few questions before saying he would take no more. Price then physically blocked reporters from pursuing Ford, and scoffed at the suggestion from a reporter that Ford should be attending the meeting.

“He can do whatever he wants. Putting magnets on a community event — what do you expect him to be, up on stage?” Price said.”
Toronto Star, May 31, 2013

***

“David Price, a senior staff member in Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s office, has been suspended after a phone call to a local newspaper.

The controversy comes in response to an exclusive CBC News story reporting that Price made repeated calls to Ford’s weekly radio show identifying himself only as “Dave” from various parts of the city.

The calls (there were at least six) would often praise Ford and his brother Coun. Doug Ford for their work at city hall. Price, a longtime friend of the Ford brothers, wasn’t on the mayor’s staff at the time the calls were made.”
CBC News, June 26, 2013

***

“David Price, Mr. Ford’s director of operations and logistics, allegedly yelled at a transit employee and damaged a door at the Georgetown GO Transit station on Aug. 27, a source told The Globe.”
The Globe and Mail, September 19, 2013

***

“Marc Surette, who owns the Trackside Cafe in the station, told the Toronto Sun Price missed a train that day and told the attendant to “fuck off” before slamming one of the stations wooden doors open, causing it to hit an outside ledge and crack. When Surette confronted Price about his behaviour, the Ford staffer replied: “Yeah, fuck you dickhead, what are you going to do about it?”

Price has not responded to a request for comment about the incident.

His boss, Mayor Ford, didn’t have much to say about the incident Thursday when he finally addressed it.

“It’s actually no one’s business what happens in my office,” Ford said after a press conference celebrating the one-year anniversary of his trade mission to Chicago. “I take care of the people that work for me and they do a great job, as you see.””
Toronto Sun, September 19, 2013

***

“Dave Price’s alleged hostile behaviour toward a female attendant and door-slamming has raised eyebrows at the normally quiet station, Surette said.

“He leaves you on edge when he comes in here,” Surette said. “The whole building goes quiet when that man walks in the door. It’s kind of crazy.”

Price has had at least two “major freak outs” in the past 10 months and at least four altercations with GO staff at the station because of his frustration over Metrolinx’s Presto card.

“I think he’s had two really big freak outs before this but also some smaller exchanges as well where he just gets loud and obnoxious with the attendant,” Surette said.”
Toronto Sun, September 19, 2013

Let’s not forget Gene Jones, personally appointed by Ford to replace then-TCHC (Toronto Community Housing Corp.) head Keiko Nakamura:

“And Mr. Ford said while he’s gratified the seven unelected board members took his hint and have left, he’d like to see the rest of the housing corporation’s leadership do the same. He hopes to have a brand new board up and running “probably within a month or so.”

“I’m glad that they’ve resigned. Now we can move forward,” he said. “We’re going to get this board back on its feet and restore the trust.”

The city’s auditor-general, Jeff Griffiths, whose reports found “pervasive” violations of the housing corporation’s own policies when it came to awarding contracts, is none too pleased himself. He said in a presentation to the TCHC’s board the flagrant disregard for spending policy was among the worst he’s seen in years.”
The Globe and Mail, March 3, 2011

***

“Mayor Rob Ford is sticking by Toronto Community Housing CEO Gene Jones  following a new report that claims the CEO is being investigated for his hiring  practices.

“He’s come in. He’s cleaned house. He’s done what he has to do. I support him  100 per cent,” Ford told reporters after touring a TCHC building at 3101 Weston  Rd. Wednesday. “So if people want to take shots at him, I’m gonna stick up for  him.”

A report Wednesday in the Toronto Star says city ombudsman Fiona Crean is  investigating complaints that Jones hired and promoted managers without allowing  other staff to compete for the jobs.”
CP24, September 18, 2013

***

“Ford urged the TCHC to investigate any possible corruption and fully backed CEO Gene Jones in the wake of news the corporation has a forensic accounting investigation underway into dealings with its subsidiary companies — HSI and 200 Wellesley St. E. —  that was spawned out of the forensic audit ordered by the board last spring.”
Toronto Sun, September 18, 2013

***

“While Mr. Ford attends to tales of leaky fridges, foul garbage chutes and hearing aids that have fallen down the drain, the city’s massive housing agency continues to be dogged by controversy.

Outside the 18-storey tower, the man hired more than a year ago to turn around the Toronto Community Housing Corp. tells reporters to expect more bad news after revelations on Wednesday that the organization is investigating yet more allegations of wrong-doing.

“There may be more,” TCH head Gene Jones said. “Hopefully not, but I’m pretty sure there will be.””
The Globe and Mail, September 18, 2013

And then there’s Payman Aboodowleh, a.k.a. Peter Payman, a.k.a. Pejman Aboodowleh, personally recruited by Ford to coach his beloved Don Bosco Eagles high school football team:

“Peter Payman was identified in game programs as a coach for Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School’s football team until the end of last season. But years before he joined the mayor on the sidelines, that same man served as an enforcer for Alessandro “Sandro” Lisi, one of the key figures in the illegal drug scandal that has dogged Mr. Ford’s administration, The Globe and Mail has learned.

…

Although he is called Peter Payman in the school’s football literature, his real name is Payman Aboodowleh, a 38-year-old who has a history of violent crimes, including assaulting a peace officer, assaulting his brother and breaking and entering.

But Mr. Aboodowleh’s violent history was not revealed to administrators in the Toronto Catholic District School Board, which says it was supplied a false name for his police records check, a requirement for anyone who volunteers in the board’s schools.

…

Mr. Aboodowleh also started the 2011 season as a coach and at that time also submitted a criminal records check application form, the board and police say. This time, however, his real name was provided, but before his background check was completed by the Toronto Police Service, he was asked to leave the team by the then principal because of a “nose-to-nose altercation” with a player at practice, Mr. Yan said. (Mr. Aboodowleh’s return to the team the next season was requested by the mayor, Mr. Yan said.)

Even if that 2011 reference check had been completed, it likely would not have turned up some of Mr. Aboodowleh’s recent convictions, such as his 2009 conviction for assaulting a peace officer and dangerous driving. That’s because he has yet another alias – Pejman Aboodowleh – that he has used during some of his interactions with law enforcement. That name happens to be the former name of Mr. Aboodowleh’s younger brother who was forced to legally change his name in 2003, two sources say, because his older brother Payman’s use of his younger sibling’s identity during encounters with police.”
The Globe and Mail, October 9, 2013

And these are just a few in a long line of characters who interact with Rob and Doug regularly, have unprecedented access to City Hall and undue influence over the mayor and his brother, and are presumably just the type of straight-shooting, honest, stand-up folks that the Fords and their “Nation” insist on. The trend is, after all, is hard to miss:

“As an Etobicoke dry cleaner under a cloud of drug charges sought to reassemble his ransacked shop and life, a Toronto police source confirmed that a special detail of investigators is indeed probing Mayor Rob Ford.

The squad, led by accomplished homicide Det.-Sgt. Gary Giroux, has also been delving into the affairs of the mayor’s associates, leading to this week’s arrest of his friend and sometimes driver, Alexander “Sandro” Lisi, for trafficking of marijuana, conspiracy to traffic, marijuana possession and possession of proceeds of crime.

Jamshid Bahrami was also rounded up in the same police operation that unfurled in a well-travelled plaza near Eglinton and Kipling avenues on Tuesday.”
National Post, October 4, 2013

***

“He [Rob Ford] talks about his sister, complaining, “the media never got it straight.”

How’s this for an explanation: “The killer wasn’t her ex-husband, it was an old boyfriend.”

As Ford tells it, Kathy Ford’s first boyfriend was Mike, before she married Jeff and had a daughter.

After divorcing Jeff, she lived six years with Ennio, bearing a son. She left Ennio and went back to Mike, and they rented a cottage up north.

Ford: In 1998, “from what I was told (by the kids), Ennio knocked on the cottage door and Mike answered it and Ennio shot him in the head” with a sawed-off shotgun. Charges were laid; Ennio went to prison for manslaughter.

In 2005, Ford says someone else “shot the top of her head off.” Press reports suggest it was an accident; two men were charged with firearms-related offences.

She’s functioning well, he says, living with her two children and on methadone for her heroin addiction.”
Toronto Star, April 21, 2010

***

“Mayor Rob Ford’s former brother-in-law, Ennio Stirpe, glared at a judge and cursed after hearing he had been sentenced to 18 years in prison for a knife attack that blinded a Vaughan woman in one eye.

He muttered the curse out of Justice Michelle Fuerst’s hearing range in Newmarket court on Friday.

…

Fuerst also ordered Stirpe to complete a manslaughter prison term for the 1998 shotgun slaying of the boyfriend of Ford’s sister, Kathy.

Stirpe was on parole at the time of the October 2008 knife attack in his basement apartment.”
Toronto Star, March 16, 2012

***

“As questions mount over why police are investigating the city’s mayor, Rob Ford’s brother on Monday said he was “mistaken” to have suggested police were conducting aerial surveillance on the family home in Etobicoke.

While Mayor Ford has yet to address revelations that he and his associates are the targets of a Toronto police investigation, Councillor Ford last week substantiated reports that a Cessna aircraft was used to track the mayor, telling the Toronto Sun he saw the plane over his mother’s home for five straight days in August. He said he “gave them the finger” and later called police, who told him the plane was related to an airport bust, but he did not believe them. “You know when a plane is surveilling you,” Councillor Ford told the Sun.”
National Post, October 7, 2013

***

“Doug Ford, Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s brother, sold hashish for several years in the 1980s. Another brother, Randy, was also involved in the drug trade and was once charged in relation to a drug-related kidnapping. Their sister, Kathy, has been the victim of drug-related gun violence.”
The Globe and Mail, May 25, 2013

***

“Consider what we have been told in media reports over the past four months. That an infamous photograph of the mayor that emerged with the alleged drug video was taken at a house occupied by a long-time friend of Mr. Ford, Fabio Basso, who has had brushes with the law.

That one of the men in that photo has been murdered and two others rounded up by police in a drugs-and-guns raid. That Mr. Ford tried to visit another friend who has been in trouble with the law, Bruno Bellissimo, at a Toronto jail. Sources told The Globe and Mail that police have interviewed members of the mayor’s staff about people including Mr. Lisi, and attempts to retrieve the alleged drug video.”
The Globe and Mail, October 3, 2013

***

“Doug Ford says that he does not believe the Toronto Star journalists who wrote about an internal police document describing the origin of a police investigation involving his brother, Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, and some of his associates.

…

Doug Ford said he believes the police, but not the Star reporters who cited the police document. He also said he is concerned that the police leaked the document, then quickly said he doesn’t think the police did so.”
Toronto Star, October 8, 2013

***

“Reporter: Is your brother under investigation? Isn’t that something you want to know?

Doug Ford: I think that’s up to the police chief to make his comments, but again I support the police but I’m very concerned; it’s very disturbing if the police are breaking the law, which I don’t believe they are for a second. That’s why I question Kevin Donovan and the Toronto Star.

…

Doug Ford: I support any investigation that took place. I support the police investigation. I support the police. That’s it. I just hope the police aren’t working hand in hand with the Toronto Star. That’s it.”
Toronto Star, October 8, 2013