Random Access

Rumour: Former Ward 4 Councillor Larry Taylor is organizing a group of candidates to run for council in all 11 wards in November's municipal election under the NDP banner.
Juicy eh? Something that could actually add some real sizzle to the campaign.
That's the story that's floating around City Hall as the safest incumbent councillors in the world begin to fret about what string of cataclysmic events could possibly lead to them being unseated. ("Paranoia strikes deep... into your life it will creep.")
The rumour has a nice ring to it, but, it's dead wrong.
At least, that is, according to one Larry Taylor who was a force on City council for a dozen years until Frank Dale (with the help of a powerful ally with lots of big fish on her wall) unseated him.
"So they're worried about me, eh?" says Taylor, who has been selling real estate in Mississauga since his political demise. "I love it," he laughs.
Even if he were developing a left-wing cell in Mississauga, Taylor said, he'd never have anyone run under the NDP banner.
"I've always believed that municipal campaigns should be non-partisan."
We definitely don't need party politics at the municipal level. One of the beauties of Hazelville and most other cities in Ontario (except Toronto) is that councillors are free to exercise their judgment and use their own common sense, rather than consult the party platform to determine what they think. May be it ever remain thus.
"I did organize the NDP campaigns in all five ridings," in the recent federal election, said Taylor, who was an unsuccessful candidate himself in 2004 in Mississauga West-Brampton.
The latest rumour may have started because he's organizing what he calls leadership training sessions to teach people interested in being future candidates how to raise money, how to run a campaign and, maybe eventually, how to win a seat in Mississauga. The NDP has never won in the City although the late, great Reverend David Busby came tantalizingly close in Mississauga North in 1985.
"I'm an organizer," said Taylor, who's never really lost his yen for the game. "This is my opportunity to use my unique skills and knowledge. Training is something that, for some reason, has been abandoned by progressive individuals."
The idea is to develop a deeper and better pool of candidates for the party in future.
A deeper and better pool of candidates, in all parties, is something Canadians could use at every level of government.