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The sunny, smiley newspaper Snapd intervened anonymously in the 2014 municipal election in Newmarket when it paid Canada Post to deliver flyers to thousands of homes in Wards 6 and 7.   

The imprint on the flyers claimed they were from NmktTownHallWatch - a spoof which mimicked the well known and equally anonymous NwktTownHallWatch.

We still do not know who wrote the text of the flyers but the two candidates targeted by Snap'd were both steamrollered, losing badly.

Did the flyers affect the result? It is, of course, impossible to know how much of those crushing defeats was attributable to the intervention of an anonymous third party.

But it begs two questions:

Was it legal?

And is it going to happen again?

Given the image Snapd projects (which is all Mom and apple pie) its intervention last time was clearly duplicitous, hypocritical and unethical. But it was not illegal.

As I tap this out, there is no evidence to show the campaign spending returns submitted by all the candidates in Wards 6 and 7 were anything other than accurate. If anyone has proof they are false they should present their evidence to the Town.

In any event, we can now be certain that what happened in 2014 will not re-occur in 2018 because the Municipal Elections Act 1996 has been amended to preclude it.

Last year, during the third reading debate on Bill 181 the then Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, Ted McMeekin, told MPPs:

"To increase transparency in municipal elections, we are proposing a framework to regulate third-party advertising... This would include setting contribution and spending limits. Third parties would also have to specifically identify themselves on signs and advertisements. Candidates would not be able to direct a third-party advertiser on where they should focus their efforts or what their advertisements should say."

The Minister explained the definition of third-party advertising would be changed so that it covers only advertisements supporting or opposing candidates during an election.

"It would not affect advertising on issues. So if you want to fight for a clean environment, you can do that. The proposed definition of third-party advertising will allow charities and groups that do public outreach on issues as a matter of normal business to continue their issues-based advocacy work throughout the election period."

Former Vaughan councillor and now Federal MP, Deb Schulte, told MPPs in the Bill Committee that, in her view, third-party advertising should be registered to an elector.

"Make it mandatory to identify all the flyers, emails and videos with an identifier so they can be traced back to the source..."

One way or another, I think we can be pretty sure no candidate running for Newmarket Council in 2018 is gonna get Snapd.

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Clock Tower developer, Bob Forrest, has told the OMB he wants his appeal heard "at the first available opportunity".

He says his latest appeal and the earlier one - which claimed his completed application had been lodged with the Town before the Heritage By-law had been enacted in 2013 - should be rolled up together and heard at the same time.  

Forrest's lawyer, Ira Kagan - who represented Marianneneville Developments at the Glenway OMB Hearing - complains Town staff have been dragging their feet, taking years to deal with the application.

Whoa! Not quite so fast.

This is a good example of Kagan's trademark bluster and swagger.

Forrest knew Town staff had significant reservations about aspects of his proposed development. As Forrest sought to accommodate these concerns, his project morphed over the years from nine storeys to six and finally settled on seven.

He thought he would bide his time, tweak the project as necessary and, eventually, with a few endorsements from important people, he would get his approval.

It didn't work out that way.

Staff concluded Forrest's final seven storey version could not be supported and brought forward their amended proposal. Both Forrest's proposal and the staff's recommended variation were rejected by councillors on 5 December 2016.

"Good planning"  Are you serious?

There is nothing in Ira Kagan's letter that comes as a surprise.

Even his contention that the proposed seven storey apartment block in the heart of the town's Heritage Conservation District represents

"good heritage planning"

didn't make me laugh as it might once have done.

These words are standard planning speak. A template to be used as and when the occasion demands.

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Updates will follow as more information becomes available.

You can read the appeal letter here. Scroll to the bottom of the page and open.

 

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The fragile and tortured Maddie Di Muccio has withdrawn from the race to become the Progressive Conservative Party candidate for Newmarket-Aurora in the forthcoming Provincial election. 

In this curious article published today she infers she is the victim (there's that word again) of sexism in the PCs with a Committee of Party grandees asking her all sorts of inappropriate questions such as how she could possibly combine being an MPP with motherhood.

Of course, these kinds of questions are totally off-the-wall and smack of ancient prejudices. So why didn't she face the old grey-beards down?

I think her outrage is a tad contrived. There are lots of able and personable women who have succeeded in politics. But Di Muccio's problem is her poisonous personality which repels people even in her own Party. She says terrible unsisterly things about other women. The evidence is everywhere.

She says she had the support of the Party leader, Patrick Brown, who, when told of all these shenanigans, advised her to stick with it. But she didn't. She quit.

But why? If she had recruited zillions of new supporters her path to the nomination surely would have been clear.

Not smooth necessarily. But clear.

But no. She threw in the towel and lost the chance of gaining an important platform to promote and promulgate her views - zany though they are.

I honestly don't know if I am surprised by what has just happened.

Probably not.

I'd like to think I saw it coming.

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Aspiring Provincial Parliamentary candidate for the Newmarket-Aurora Progressive Conservatives, Maddie Di Muccio, today deleted tweets claiming I am a paedophile.

Di Muccio liked tweets from the troll, TruckMafk TMTM. He has also removed a lengthy series of tweets alleging my paedophilia.

Derek HighwayMonitor, who, like Di Muccio, re-tweeted baseless allegations of paedophilia has also deep-cleansed his Twitter account.

I am still waiting to hear from Patrick Brown MPP, the Leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario, and from Derek Murray, the President of the Newmarket-Aurora PC Riding Association.

Yesterday I asked them to take whatever steps they considered appropriate to get Di Muccio to remove the Tweets. I also asked them to secure an apology from Di Muccio. In my letters to Mr Brown and Mr Murray I included screen shots of Di Muccio's smears.

Although the offending tweets and re-tweets have now been taken down - and I am grateful - the issue is not completely resolved until I get an apology from Di Muccio.

I shall post updates.

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Five days ago Maddie Di Muccio told her twitter audience she liked tweets linking me to paedophilia.

And Di Muccio's tweets are still up there in cyberspace, available to a global audience.

I have therefore written today to the Leader of the PC Party of Ontario, Patrick Brown, and to the President of the Newmarket-Aurora PC Riding Association, Derek Murray, asking them to take whatever steps they consider appropriate to ensure that Di Muccio:

  1. deletes her Tweets liking those from the troll TruckMafk claiming I am a paedophile
  2. expresses regret to Patrick Brown and Derek Murray for her actions which promoted the belief that I am a paedophile and apologise in writing to me.

In the absence of any expression of regret or an apology, I have urged Mr Brown and Mr Murray to advise Di Muccio to take her concerns about my alleged paedophilia to the police together with the facts she is relying on to support such an assertion.

Di Muccio is currently seeking the nomination to become the Progressive Conservative candidate for Newmarket-Aurora in the Provincial election in 2018.

I shall post updates in due course.

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