In today's Star we find out that candidate for mayor Rocco Rossi is neither left or right but pragmatic. Hopefully, more elected politicians can adhere to the philosophy of pragmatism. Liberal Prime Minister, Pierre Trudeau was an admitted adherent. Whether Rossi is a practicing pragmatist or just a practical man, time will tell if he is elected although we might suspect based on education, work as a business consultant and charity/political fundraiser he should be more the former than the latter.
He proclaims to be an environmentalist, cyclist and progressive who knows that the financial house must be in order. He sees the city needing to stick to its "core business" but sees the value of Toronto Hydro (selling it off) only in debt reduction opportunity?
As Rossi tries to escape a "right" side of the political spectrum voter perception, we can also see in the Star a report of the burgeoning 6-figure, $100K police force: many of whom say they must live outside the city_Toronto's too expensive for them. It raises doubts about police cost effectiveness or deficient cost containment.
According to this story Toronto's previous budget chief David Soknacki is currently putting together a study for the Toronto Board of Trade on police service financial matters. We should expect it to be a big news item_especially, if he can find a situation with news legs.
The story gives examples of police pay procedure for court appearances_ not the stuff of heavy crime but everyday ticketing for driving or car use offenses. There does not seem much "cost-benefit" analysis or even a concern that the city deserves a greater share of the ticketing revenue stream rather than the ticketing officer making the court appearance. (That is to say, the "overtime" pay for the officer or cost seems high_ 4 pay hours versus say a $200 ticket or less or city benefit.) Broadly, speaking it seems the C-B analysis needs to find some adherents in the TPS.
Pragmaticism and cost-benefit analysis should be engrained in both elected political office holders and public servants. They should be words found in a worthy candidate's election platform and form part of a city political party's reason for being. Rossi might be on to something_ it's time to drop the "left and right" hat thing, especially in city politics.
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