Another Toronto City Hall politics blog? Why?

Fifteen years is a long time to spend in one job. I was lucky enough to spend those years at Toronto City Hall working for some important Councillors during the reign of the most interesting Mayors (spanning Miller, Ford, and Tory) and the most substantial political upheaval since amalgamation. My newest endeavour has led to the world of consulting which has allowed me to stay involved in all things City of Toronto and introduced a different perspective on policy making.

Old habits die hard, and one of my main responsibilities working on the political side of City Hall for the last 15ish years was monitoring committee and Council agendas for noteworthy and important items, flagging those for my Councillor, preparing a strategy to try and get to the outcome we were seeking, and then -- once the item went through the decision making process -- write an update to the thousands who subscribed to my Councillor's newsletter. I still do much of this, but generally as a hobby, and no policy maker is witness to my constant stream of advice anymore.

I do not expect to have thousands as my captive audience reading these posts. I also do not want to repeat or copy the great work Matt Elliot does with City Hall Watcher and the Toronto Star. I will not have the subject matter expertise of Steve Munro on the TTC, or the very specific in depth housing knowledge of the folks over at HousingNowTO. What I envision for this space is an opportunity for me to continue to practice what I put into action when I was still at City Hall and share my insights and thoughts on the policy making process for whoever might stumble across my writing. This may include my opinion on how I thought the decision was arrived at, or it could include some insight into how the policy that was approved could have been...better.

In my writing I will be looking to share anecdotes from my experiences with issues I had a front-row seat for, and worked on, while at City Hall. My experience has been that many people under-appreciate the skillset and knowledge of those who work in Councillor's offices. I will admit that there are certainly a few people who work on the 2nd floor (where the Councillor's offices are located at City Hall) who have limited range, but those of us who excel and take leadership positions in these offices become excellent generalists, usually specializing in communications, public engagement, managing development applications, customer service , and leading a small (but mighty) team to manage a demanding and difficult work environment.

I will tackle the topic of our current Mayor in my next post, and reflect on my poor luck (in a career that has been quite fortunate!).