Will John Tory’s ‘prudent’ leadership be tough enough to tackle Toronto’s big issues if he’s re-elected?
John Tory and his wife Mary are not going to stop the city of Toronto from growing as the city of Toronto. The mayor and his wife are going to fight for growth but they’ll also fight for the quality of life that keeps this city vital. They’ll fight for the quality of life of the people who live here and that means they’re going to fight – and they’re going to win – for every part of the city, from the neighbourhoods we’re in to where we are today.
John Tory has come to the task of leading the city in the wake of an unprecedented and untimely departure of the mayor’s predecessor, Rob Ford. His approach, and it seems ours as well, is to set out on the journey of leadership with the knowledge that this is a journey rather than a destination. The mayor has already spent the past year and a half building his team in an impressive manner.
Now that his team is in place and working together effectively, the challenge goes to the next step of leadership; how to lead this Toronto of 300,000 strong and get it to where it needs to go. The mayor’s priorities are clear and his mandate is to grow and grow and grow the city and that task is going to fall to him.
Now that the new council and the mayor have both been elected, it’s time to think about our next step forward. I’ll be attending council on Monday morning to hear from the other members what their priorities at the municipal level are. I’ll be there at Tuesday’s council meeting and I’ll report back then.
And so, John Tory is going to be hard at work to build his team as he prepares to lead his city as we try to grow and grow and grow this city.
Tory said on Friday that he hopes to see a mayor’s race in 2017. He’s a little late to the party – but he’s got that long-haul thinking thing