Random Access

Nexavar saved Tony Clark’s life, and he wants to make sure it helps save other victims of kidney cancer too.
That’s why the Erin Mills resident was in Ottawa Monday, to watch his oncologist, Dr. Jennifer Knox, tell a dozen members of the Commons Health Committee that Canada is making a tragic mistake in not approving two new drugs, Nexavar and Sutent, that have shown remarkable results in clinical studies.
Given a year to live in June 2004, Clark and his wife Sharon went on a desperate search for help, and they found it in Nexavar, a drug that was just then being tested in clinical research programs at the Cleveland Clinic. It stabilized Clark’s kidney cancer, which is usually so highly developed by the time it is discovered in patients that little can be done.
Clark, co-founder of the Kidney Foundation of Canada, said today that Dr. Knox made a compelling pitch to MPs, telling them that our country, once on the leading edge of many medical breakthroughs, is in danger of being left behind.
The two drugs have already been approved for public funding in 13 countries including U.S., France, England and Italy and most Canadian private drug plans now cover it.
But a federal body called the Common Drug Review (CDR) has recommended that, despite approval from Health Canada, the drugs not be funded through provincial health care plans.
The main reason Nexavar is not accepted is that, believe it or not, it has done too well in its clinical studies.
Clark explains that when the drug was given to patients in its major trial it produced, “extremely compelling, positive results. The results were so good that Bayer felt, for ethical reasons, they had to cut the trial short. They felt that the people who were on the placebo had to be given the drug. As a result, the trial was not long enough.”
Talk about your Catch 22 — multiplied multifold.
Because Nexavar was so good at saving patient’s lives it had to be given, in all good conscience, to the patients in the study who were not receiving it. As a result, the definitive scientific proof that CDR requires to approve the drug can’t be produced. Nexavar is a victim of its own success.
These two drugs are just two of several so-called “orphan drugs” for rare disorders which are not being funded. Another Mississaugan, Guy Ashford-Smith was also in Ottawa last week to make a pitch on behalf of Myozyme, the drug that the support group for Pompe’s Disease which he heads, is championing. It is allowing older adults to live longer with the disease and saving lives of child victims, who rarely used to live to see their first birthday.
“I didn’t go over there (to Ottawa) for myself,” says Clark. “I’m no longer on Nexavar and I am grandfathered, so that I can get it again if I need it. But I am devastated for the other patients who are coming along behind me. There are 4,900 new kidney cancer patients per year. They are not going to be able to get any treatment.”
Dr. Knox told MPs that Nexavar, “represents a tremendous breakthrough after decades of research in the treatment for kidney cancer.”
It will only a breakthrough for average Canadians, however, when they can get access to it.

You know what I love best about the organic green bin?
Well just about everything, actually. But if I had to pick one thing, it would be that it provides a home for the guck that congregates regularly in the kitchen drain.
You do the dishes, you rinse the remains of the detergent down the drain, and there lies the toe jam of the kitchen: little bits and bobbles of your meal. A couple of hunks of pasta, a few strands of what may formerly have been green leafy vegetables and several dark, brown UFOs - unidentified food objects.
They used to go into the garbage where they worked their magic over time to create the symphony of obnoxious odours that forced you to move your garbage bag to the garage a couple of days earlier than planned.
Now, you just take a piece of paper towel, swirl it artfully around the drain and plop it in the beige baby bucket that came with your green bin. Voilà.
My “green daughter” and I have been looking forward for months to the dawn of the organic collection program and, yes, we are one of those who were hoarding for the occasion.
Now we can dump all the fat from cleaning the chicken, the silver skin from the pork tenderloin and the dregs of the chicken stock into the bin. The bacon fat, the old yogurt (which acquires the loveliest green tinges in its death throes), the facial tissues and the baked goods that are so far gone they can’t even be rescued for garlic bread, now have an appropriate final resting place.
At the press event before the Apr. 2 launch of the new program, Andrew Pollock of Peel’s public works program said that he didn’t think the “yuck” factor in disposing of organics would deter people from participating.
I’m not so sure, especially for “newbies.” Lakeview resident Brian Hruska explained this morning that he bought the clear compostable plastic bags to line his kitchen bin but finds they leak, creating a stinky mess. His neighbour is dumping cooked rice and eggs straight into his bin and is not pleased with the odoriferous results.
Dave Gordon, manager of waste planning for Peel, says that different people are finding different solutions to the potential mess. Some dump it straight into the small or the large bin with no qualms, although this obviously requires regularly scrubbing. The compostable plastic bags or paper bags work for others.
Lining the bins with newspaper works for us. You can use the tabloid editions of The News for the kitchen bin (the real estate section with all that colour adds a nice touch) and the broadsheet edition for the outside bin. When it’s time to transfer the contents from the kitchen bucket to the bin, just wrap them in a couple of big sheets of newspaper. Seems to soak up the leaky stuff and keep the smell down.
“The majority of people are using some sort of liner,” says Gordon. Visual inspections on the tip floor at the processing plant on Torbram Rd. just south of Highway 407, show compliance so far is good. People are keeping non-compostable plastics, which could really foul up the high-quality compost that Peel is aiming for, out of the mix.
Initial take-up was about 40 per cent of households, but that has already surpassed 50 per cent and may reach the 80 per cent that Peel has targeted in time. “We have 80-90 per cent blue box participation but it took a long time to get there,” says Gordon.
Maybe the best bit of news so far for the program is that it is diverting a lot more material from landfill than originally expected. “We were aiming at 90 kilograms per household per year,” says Gordon, “but the last couple of weeks it’s been running at 110 kgs. per household.”
In a world where every day brings new reports of potential environmental armageddon (yes, it gets tiresome), it still feels good to know you’re pitching in with your 110 kgs. worth.
If you can convince your neighbour(s) to join in, so much the better. You can even hum a little “It Ain’t Heavy, It’s My Pleasure” as you wheel your cart to the curb.
It it to be hoped that will not elicit little “yuck, yuck” sounds from your bin, at least not if you have wrapped your organics appropriately.

Why is this man smiling?

Received my first piece of campaign literature yesterday. No, not for the provincial election being held Oct. 10 but for the federal election, official date TBA.
Bob Dechert was nominated as the Conservative candidate in the riding of Misisssauga-Erindale March 9 for his third try at the seat. He has gotten the jump not only on his federal opponents but on most of the candidates in the provincial election with his first drop, a postcard with a brief biography and some quick policy hits.
Interestingly enough, it looks like a Liberal piece at first because Dechert is posed in front of a big Canadian flag and red is the predominant colour. The blue, or Conservative side, is on the back.
Stephen Harper’s little glitches with Afghan detainees and climate change (it’s always tough being the new kid on the block) mean a federal election this spring seems unlikely. That raises the disconcerting possibility of having overlapping federal and provincial elections in Ontario this fall, giving even more people the excuse to tune out because the whole process is too confusing.
Mississauga-Brampton South MP Navdeep Bains considers the possibility “highly unlikely” since Ontario will be a ket battleground in the federal campaign.
Most of us are still recovering from the municipal donnybrook in November and certainly don’t want to watch duelling banshees in September or October.
• • •
Here’s the latest in Tim (Peterson) bits from Mississauga South. Peterson held a get-acquainted gathering at his house last Sunday afternoon where he tried to calm the waters and introduced himself to his former opponents. About 50 people attended on a beautiful afternoon. Peterson gave a short speech. Several supporters of the candidate-the-party-wishes-would-quit Effie Triantafilopoulos were there. One long-time Tory who wants an open nomination asked the rent-an-independent if he would have stayed a Liberal and not crossed the floor were he not guaranteed the Tory nomination. He gave an honest answer, saying that he would not have crossed in those circumstances. The angry woman stormed out of the gathering.
By the way, there are rumblings that if John Tory and the Tories do an end-run around the riding executive, which has already voted for an open nomination, the lawyers may get into the act. Witness the federal Conservative nomination in Calgary West where a court ruled that Rob Anders’ nomination was not legal because the party did not follow its own rules. That decision is under appeal.
• • •
Congratulations to Pud originator Steve Nease (in photo above) and his cast of characters (the ones with whom he shares his Oakville home) on having the strip picked up in the revamped Saturday Globe and Mail. The strip that started in 1984 has allowed Mississauga News readers to get to know the gentle edge of Nease’s humour, as opposed to the rapier he often employs in his political cartoons. The strip explores the rites of passage of Pud (Ben) and Nease’s other sons Robert, Max and Sam.
Like so much “family” humour, it leaves you wondering who is teaching the life lessons and who is learning them.
Nease’s editorial cartoons are syndicated in newspapers across the country but this is the first national stage for Pud.
You can see his work, and the work of Lynn Johnston (For Better or for Worse), Patrick Corrigan of The Toronto Star, and Disney book illustrator, Sheridan College teacher and Mississaugan Peter Emslie at a current exhibition called Laughlines which is at Shoppers’ World Plaza in Brampton.
Nease will be appearing at 7 p.m. Wed. May 23 to talk about his work across the road from Shoppers’ World at the Visual Arts Brampton Creative Studio, in the Bartley Bull Plaza at the northeast corner of Hurontario St. and Steeles Ave.
• • •
Heading for the cottage Friday to rake leaves, unearth the garden and watch warblers. See you Monday.

Sitting at Convocation Hall Thursday night, you got a small taste of what it must have been like to sit in the audiences of the 1940s and 1950s and listen to some of the legendary Jazz at the Philharmonic (JATP) concerts.
The chance to see Oscar Peterson, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Sonny Stitt, Roy Eldridge, Buddy Rich, Coleman Hawkins, Bill Harris et al on the same stage on the same night at the same time must have been amazing.
Of course, the all-star concert concept is ubiquitous now, what with a new jazz or blues festival seeming to pop up (and then disappear) in every second cottage town every second month of the summer.
You would think that the life would have been bashed out of the format long ago... like the interminable and cacophonous drum solos that have ruined many a song and concert. But it ain’t necessarily so.
At least not judging by the vigour and variety of the performances Thursday in the third annual Jazz Lives Concert sponsored by Jazz.FM91.
There is always a fear that such a concert will be an infomercial for the sponsor and its flavoured artist of the month and, indeed, there was a parade of station “personalities” handing out and accepting awards that too often took the pace out of the music.
One is always wary that the “pick one from column A and one from column B” approach will be a disaster, giving a little taste of each jazz “sub-category,” satisfying no one in the end and killing any momentum.
Well, we certainly got variety, but it didn’t feel in any sense like a programming ploy.
Lost in what came later was a positively pulsating opener, What A Little Moonlight Can Do, from Emilie-Claire Barlow.
We had your folk-jazz with singer Kenny Rankin, who was in absolutely brilliant form on Mr. Tambourine Man, which was written by some scriffy guy Rankin worked with as a sideman on an album from the 60s called Bringin’ It All Back Home.
There was Latin from Amanda Martinez. There was your classical-jazz with solo pianist Adam Makowicz. There was your blues-jazz with Jeff Healey and Ross Wooldridge on Fine and Dandy, which they were. There was your future potential superstar jazz with tenor powerhouse Michael Rudy. And there was your pop-jazz with surprise special guest Randy Bachman of The Guess Who.
Bachman grew up in Winnipeg a street away from one of the many jazz poster boys in the category of “brilliant but troubled artist” — Lenny Breau. He performed a tribute to Breau, in the innovator’s guitar style(s) on a wonderful medley that brought broad, knowing smiles of appreciation from bassist Roberto Occupinti and guitarist Reg Schwager, part of the house band for the evening.
There was even New Orleans jazz and, yes, Mississauga gospel-jazz. A Nawlins-style 18-piece brass band made up of some of the Toronto’s stellar players brought the audience back from intermission with a bang.
Then the Mississauga Youth Orchestra spread across the front of the stage and pumped up the pressure with Oh Happy Day.
“I’ve been telling people for years that there is talent in Mississauga,” commented DJ Terry McElligott, a local resident.
The biggest disappointment came, interestingly enough, from the biggest name.
Kurt Elling has a wonderful voice and sings brilliantly (three-time consecutive winner of male vocalist awards from Downbeat and Jazz Times Magazines) but he brought proceedings to a close on a strangely discordant note. He sang two non-standard standards based on solos by Dexter Gordon, star of the movie Round Midnight.
Elling looks a bit like Richard Nixon and seemed to be emulating his high-handed style. His scat-rap-schtick closer, Body and Soul for which he has written new lyrics quickly lost its focus. He virtually demanded, and directed solos, from Occupinti and drummer Davide DiRenzo who looked a bit disconcerted by the experience.
Elling assured us in his closing lyric that he was taking the “old and creaky” and paying tribute in his own small way to the music’s pioneers by carrying on the reinvention and reconfiguration that is the essence of jazz. Right idea, wrong execution. In this case, we were left hungry for one of the classic readings of the standard.
The closing number notwithstanding, 2007 Jazz Lives was a reaffirmation that the music does, indeed, survive if not thrive, and is in very caring hands.
As to the eternal question of exactly what jazz is, here’s some advice from Duke Ellington, given to the late great jazz critic Whitney Balliett in an interview in 1970.
“I don’t think any music should be called jazz. Louis Armstrong plays Louis Armstrong music. Art Tatum plays Art Tatum music. Dizzy Gillespie plays Dizzy Gillespie music and, if it sounds good, that’s all you need.”

Anne Marie Langthorne and her nominator, social worker Wally Reinstein.

There are a lot of reasons why Anne Marie Langthorne was chosen as the recipient of the 2007 Florence Nightingale Award during this annual Nursing Week.
But it all begins and ends with the empathy she feels, and shows, for her patients.
“She is an exuberant, caring, sensitive person who talks to people from her heart and touches them,” says Wally Reinstein, who sent a moving letter of recommendation to the nomination committee in the annual event sponsored by The Toronto Star.
“She explains to people what’s going to be happening to them,” says Reinstein of the fourth floor palliative care work that Langthorne oversees as charge nurse at the McCall Centre at the Toronto West campus of Trillium Health Centre. “She makes people feel like people again,” Reinstein said a few moments after Langthorne accepted her award in a sunny alcove outside the continuing care centre. “Restoring a little dignity and quality of life is what makes a difference,” said Reinstein.
In her gracious acceptance speech, the 43-year-old Mississaugan, who has lived here since 1984, pushed all the right buttons. “The story of Florence Nightingale was the driving force of my interest and what has inspired me to become a nurse,” said the Oakville native as her proud parents, David and Marie looked on, along with husband Tom and sons Aaron, 5 and Christian, 3.
“As a young girl of 8 or 9, I vividly remember a book about Florence Nightingale and read and reread her story.”
The message was obviously absorbed. The Applewood Heights resident paid tribute not only to the medical team that provides service to terminal patients but to the laundry, pharmaceutical and dietary staff who, “play a role that binds our patients and families together within our hospital.”
In her concluding remarks, the nurse who came to McCall in 1986 put the emphasis back on those who are served, saying, “I gratefully and humbly accept this wonderful award on behalf of all the patients and families who have graced our presence throughout the years and invited us to share in their history and participate in their lives during very difficult times.”
In a later chat, Langthorne said it is inevitable that you form strong bonds with the dying, especially when you sit and listen to their life histories unfold over time. “I remember one woman who came over on one of the ocean liners that was sailing at the time that the Titanic sank. She was 12 years old. They turned around but they couldn’t get to where the Titanic was.”
What stands out most over her 21 years working at the centre, which is operated by Extendicare but operates in conjunction with the adjoining hospital, is the courage of the patients who stare straightforwardly into the eyes of death.
“There are very difficult times. You forge a very strong bond with some of them. When they pass on, you lose a piece of yourself to them.
“Dying is a part of life, and it is just as important as birth. We do a lot of talking and I do a lot of listening. The families know we offer a legacy, that they were comfortable and it wasn’t a scary experience for them.”
Perhaps the highest compliment paid Langthorne came from a family member who had watched the nurse care for her mother as if she were her own.
While the continuing care centre served her bodily needs and eased her physical pain, Anne Marie Langthorne was judged an “angel” by this woman because she had done much more. She had nourished and lifted her dying mother’s spirit.

Bob Dylan has the Never-Ending Tour. Effie Triantafilopoulos hoped to have the Never-Ending Campaign.
As seemed inevitable from the beginning, the Conservative Party is slamming the brakes on Triantafilopoulos, who refused to give up campaigning after Mississauga South incumbent MPP Tim Peterson crossed the floor to the Tories at the end of March.
The downtown brass sent a delegation out earlier from HQ to calm the waters among disgruntled locals.
They were greeted by an executive committee that, to its everlasting credit, didn’t want to just throw aside three legitimate local candidates in favour of Peterson, the guy who took the riding out of the Blue column for the first time in memory in 2003.
The executive voted for an open and democratic nomination in defiance of Leader John Tory who obviously expected everyone to genuflect before Peterson and the rules of the party, which (we are assured) state that a “sitting PC MP” gets a free walkover.
On Monday night, Blair McCreadie, the president of the provincial party dropped by to watch proceedings as the next stage in the battle was engaged. A group of dissidents had asked that the call for an open nomination be the subject of a special gathering of all riding members.
According to David Dawson, the man who signed the request on behalf of the dissidents, it was denied on a technicality. A legal opinion read at the meeting stated that there can’t be any “open” nomination because the central party has not approved any of the candidates, as must occur under 2006 revised rules. “They say there was never a formal approval given to any of them, just a tacit approval,” explained Dawson.
The group will launch an official appeal to McCreadie but after hearing him speak at the meeting, Dawson said, “I don’t expect any different result. Their position is quite clear.”
Indeed, McCreadie said this morning from his downtown law offices, that the rules mean that Peterson will join the Conservative caucus after the House rises later this year and he will be acclaimed as the South candidate before the Oct. 10 campaign begins. “That’s how things will roll out.”
The proposed resolution, “was felt to be in conflict with the party’s nominations process” McCreadie said. What he didn’t say was that the decision came down to a 7-7 deadlocked vote, with Riding President Dianne Lawson breaking the tie to carry the day.
Part of the decision was also based on, “the growing sense that enough is enough,” said the party president. “The party and the leader have decided how things will go forward.”
Then with a tip to the fact that the rules may not exactly have been devised to pave the path for floor-crossers, McCreadie said, “ I appreciate that it’s been difficult for some people to accept that decision but we have these rules for a reason, and we’re sticking to them.”
Triantafilopoulos is also sticking to her guns. A call to her office this morning confirmed that she was out canvassing. The membership chairman reported at Monday’s meeting that the new memberships she is busy selling are still coming in.
One member of the executive says that the fight is not over yet. There is still a possibility of a legal challenge. “It just goes to show that the party is really undemocratic,” the member said.
The longer this goes on, the worse it is for Mr. Tory and his party and the better are the chances of the Liberals, whose candidate will almost certainly be Charles Sousa, retaining the traditional Conservative seat.
Peterson undoubtedly joined the Tories, at least in part, because he thought he was improving his chances of winning re-election.
Instead of being greeted with the open arms he would have wished, however, the dissension that his move has caused in the Tory ranks is looking more and more like a burden that could cost the party it’s best chance at a breakthrough in a City where the provincial Liberals won each and every seat the last time around.
• • •
By the way, don’t play Tory trivia with McCreadie. He says that Peterson is one of just four men ever to cross the floor from the Liberals to the Tories. The first occurred in the early 1940s at the beginning of the Conservatives’ 42-year reign. Then there was Marvin Shore from London North in 1976 and J. Earl McEwen of Frontenac-Addington in 1984. Interestingly, the latter two lost for their new party.

Ron Starr calls it, “politics at its worst.”
After 25 years on the board of Enersource Corporation and its predecessor, Hydro Mississauga, he is no longer a citizen member of the body.
Why is he suddenly less qualified that he was for the past quarter century? “Because I didn’t win the election,” he says, referring to his defeat last November in the municipal election’s marquee race .
Starr says he’s known for months that he wouldn’t be reappointed because the victor in that campaign and the new heavyweight champion of Ward 6, Carolyn Parrish, wanted him off.
He believes his ouster was orchestrated by the former Liberal MP. “I guess they don’t want people to use the democratic process (by running for office),” Starr said this morning. “If you do, they’re going to use the democratic process to eliminate you. To some extent, I understand that. She won. But that’s not the way I would have done it.”
Starr thinks the Parrish-led revolt against the administrative structure of the Enersource board (the city manager removed, two councillors added), the review she initiated over board members’ pay and the subsequent search for fresh citizen blood on the board was “a charade” that was aimed specifically at making sure he wasn’t named to the board.
Since la Parrish sashayed into council chambers, there has been a distinct change in the tone of local politics, says Starr, a former ward 7 councillor. “There are more factions. Deals are being made. You vote for me on this and I’ll vote for you on that. That’s politics. But if they want to run it like a mini-Toronto — good luck.”
Part of Parrish’s modus operandi in adding two new councillors was that prospective candidates for the post, for which there is an additional salary of $15,000, would get the Ward 6 councillor’s support if they didn’t vote for his return as a citizen member, he suggested.
Parrish and Starr agreed on little during their campaign tussle and they continue to be kvetchin’ cousins.
The “rookie” Ward 6 councillor, who clearly knows the ropes already, says Mr. Starr gives her far too much credit for Machiavellian intent and “flatters himself.”
The way she tells it she and the other newbie on council, Sue McFadden, were hauled into the principal’s ... er .... city manager’s office after the election and told that they shouldn’t bother their pretty little heads with complicated things like wires and kilowatt hours. Things had all been taken care of, anyway, because the existing board members were all willing to return en masse without the necessity of advertising and interviews and all the other little niceties that are traditionally observed.
Was somebody trying to head off the involuntary retirement of Mr. Starr, as well-connected a figure as there could be in local politics? Probably.
The move fired up Parrish (as if she needed it) and led to a resolve among several councillors to shake up the status quo a little by a) getting some fresh blood on committees, b) better reflecting the diversity of the City.
In her defence Parrish says that: a rating system was used to rank the candidates based on qualifications and an interview by a council committee, and there was general consensus on the appointments to Enersource.
Starr was not the only long-time hydro commissioner who lost his job. Retired executive Alex Taylor, former chair and CEO of a multi-billion corporation also got his walking papers, she points out.
Gerald Beasley and Norm Loberg were returned to the board and the new members appointed are eminently qualified. Hasan Imam has extensive experience in the field, from handling mergers to managing electric systems in India, where an intricate system of rationing power was developed. Robert MacCallum is a retired Bruce Power employee who is a consultant to the MBA program at York.
Enersource was not the only place where there was a shakeup, argues the defence counsel from Ward 6. The committee of adjustment also has a number of new faces. The vice-chairman was not re-elected and long-time Chair John Keyser was appointed for only one more year, his 35th on the body.
“It was time for a change” on a lot of these committees where the same people get reappointed over and over, says the former Mississauga-Erindale MP and Peel Board chair. Her opponent last fall was not singled out for Starr treatment, she insists.
As for a new style of politics at City Hall, Parrish debunks the idea. “It’s not like I get on council and I run the show. There has been a slight shift, I’d say. We have some people of like-minds who vote together on some things. Sometimes people vote with the gang and sometimes they don’t, depending on the issue.”
With the possibility of Mayor Hazel McCallion leaving the scene after this term, (don’t hold your breath) some councillors are definitely feeling their oats more than they have for a long time.
There was a time when the mayor, who is a long-time friend of Starr’s, could have saved him with the slightest touch of her wand. No more.
There’s no doubt that McCallion is still the sheriff.
But it looks like one of the tenderfeet has appointed herself deputy sheriff and is busy rounding up a posse.

Mississauga gets a new MPP Oct. 10 when boundaries for federal and provincial ridings are brought into alignment for the first time. New boundaries and new riding names will match the current federal seats.
The five incumbent Liberals have already finished their game of musical chairs to figure out who is running where, although Tim Peterson found a way to throw a real wringer into the works after the deck was shuffled.
Since Mississauga Centre virtually disappears in the redrawing, the only real question was where Harinder Takhar and Bob Delaney would run. The Cabinet minister took Mississauga-Erindale and Delaney is running in Mississauga-Streetsville where he used to live. Wonder if he regrets moving out of Meadowvale a couple of years ago?
The new seat will be Brampton-Mississauga South, the vast preponderance of which is in Mississauga. You can check out the shape of the riding at
http://www.elections.ca/scripts/pss/Map.aspx?L=e&ED=35047&EV=99&EV_TYPE=6&PC=&Prov=&ProvID=&MapID=35047&QID=-1&PageID=27&TPageID=
You would expect the possibility of a new, open seat would create a lot of interest from would-be candidates but things have been strangely quiet in the run-up to the campaign.
Now we know why.
The provincial party has decided it will exercise its right to appoint a candidate there, one of the half-dozen or so ridings where it can unilaterally impose its will under the Constitution.
One of those who had already declared her interest in the nomination was Norma Nicholson, who was in the news just last week when she was profiled in The Toronto Star as one of 125 nominees for the Florence Nightingale Award — for the third consecutive year.
Nicholson is a senior nursing manager at Toronto’s West Park Healthcare Centre.
She would seem to have done everything right in preparing to run, taking political action courses through the Registered Nurses Association of Ontario, winning its prestigious “leadership in nursing administration” award, co-chairing Peel’s RNAO chapter and involving herself in the broader community in numerous ways, including serving as chair of the Peel Alzheimer’s Society.
Nicholson sent a letter of interest to the party, was one of a dozen women who went through the screening process, began selling memberships and hoped for an open nomination to test her mettle. Instead she got a letter earlier this month thanking her for her interest and announcing that an appointment would be made and she would not be the chosen one.
“I think all of us are a bit disappointed,” she said of the local field, “because it’s not the democratic process.”
Now she will wait like everyone else to see who will be showered with Dalton’s pixie dust. “I’m just hoping that person lives in the riding,” says Nicholson who adds that, “if this is someone who lives in Mississauga and knows us, I would be quite happy to be of help in running a winning campaign.”
She has lived in Mississauga since 1978 and in the Cawthra-Rathburn Rd. area of Brampton-Mississauga South for the past four years.
We will have to withhold judgement, as Nicholson has, until we see the appointee but this continues the very disturbing pattern of parties pulling the strings from afar and dictating the choice of candidates to local riding associations and communities.
There are at least two more nominations coming up quickly.
The Mississauga South Green Party will acclaim its federal candidate Wednesday night at 7 p.m. in the Texaco Room at Port Credit Library. Richard Laushway is a banking executive who lives in the riding and runs a solar energy power company on the side.
The Conservatives will elect a candidate to challenge Delaney in Mississauga-Streetsville next Tuesday evening, May 22, at the Mississauga Convention Centre.
Nina Tangri, an insurance company co-owner and manager who lost to Delaney in Mississauga West last time around and has also run federally, faces chiropractor Carlan Stants, a resident of the City since 1988.
Both think Delaney is potentially vulnerable in his new territory.

Talk about your mixed feelings.
Michelle Meghie is a long-time Mississauga resident, involved in her community (ward 5 council candidate in 2003, past president of the Mississauga branch of the Royal Canadian Sea and Navy League Cadet Corps, vice-president of Peel Sisters of Colour in Action Inc.), experienced (more than 20 years as a Toronto social worker, runs her own small home décor business) active in the Liberal Party (president of the Mississauga Liberal Women’s Club, vice-president of the Ontario Women’s Liberal Commission) and until very recently, a highly-qualified candidate for the Liberal nomination in the open riding of Mississauga-Brampton South.
Like Norma Nicholson, a nurse with similar outstanding credentials profiled yesterday in this space, Meghie has been informed that she will not be the candidate in the riding despite participating in screening interviews, doing some street-slogging and selling some memberships.
The Ontario Liberals will appoint someone, almost certainly a woman, to vie for the seat, which they have an extremely good chance of winning.
“I’m a little bit disappointed after I made such a big effort,” Meghie said this morning. “It’s too bad it’s going to be done by appointment. Our government has said they want to see more transparency and democracy but I’m not sure that will happen here.”
On the other hand, Meghie is an astute student of the politics of the riding she wanted to represent. She rattles off the numbers for Mississauga-Brampton South: 113,000 population, 53 per cent “ethnic” background, 24 per cent South Asians, with blacks and Chinese next in numbers.
Much as she would like to think she could win an open nomination, the reality is that she would not. “I know the black community and the Caucasian community and the South Asian community. The South Asians work diligently, they are politically diverse, they have the finger on the pulse of the community and they come (to nomination meetings) together. They always win.”
Although she is unsettled by the reality of an appointment, the part-time master’s student in community development concedes that the mechanism has its place.
“I really believe in proportional representation,” says the mother of one. “There are 103 members of the legislature and there is only one black person, the Honourable Mary Anne Chambers.
“Whether it’s me or Norma Nicholson, I think it’s time (for a black female candidate)” says Meghie. “Appointments seem like a very unfair process but it’s the only way that women can really be successful,” she adds.
It would be easy for her to be cynical after banging her head unsuccessfully against the wall but Meghie knows well that you don’t win the political game by walking away when things get tough. “I will continue to put my name forward. It’s important we represent our community in a big way. You can’t sit back and complain, you have to be part of the process.”
Which is exactly the lesson that the South Asian community has learned, and profited from.
You don’t have time to discuss the intricacies of groups “hijacking” the nomination process when you’re busy selling memberships and making sure your chosen candidate is selected.
• • •
Speaking of chosen candidates. Peel Police Chief Noel Catney, acclaimed April 19 to run for the Conservatives in Brampton-Springdale against incumbent Liberal Linda Jeffrey, has decided to step aside.
“I thought it over and evaluated it and, with the amount of time I am spending on other interests, I’ve decided it’s not for me,” Catney said this afternoon from his Brampton home.
“I knew it would be a daunting challenge,” he added, “and with the viability of it and the opportunities that are being presented to me in the private sector, I’ve made this decision” he said. “It would be unfair to take the position and not have the time to devote to it that the residents of Brampton-Springdale deserve,” he added.
There are lots of other qualified candidates to recruit for the Oct. 10 vote, said Catney.
With so many people scrambling for the chance to be nominated for mainline parties in other ridings, it seems awfully strange to see somebody handing one back — under any circumstances.

Note to sports announcers and sports section headline writers: Please, please stop saying that a player or a team, “can’t get untracked.”
Each time this erroneous term is heard or seen in my household, it unleashes a torrent of abuse from my spouse. Before acquiring the sobriquet of “She Who Must Be Obeyed” she was formerly known — in another life as an editor at a GTA community newspaper — as “The Hammer of Grammar.”
Tuesday morning started off as your ordinary day. Descended the stairs to partake of the usual – orange juice, oat bran with blueberries and toast with strawberry jam – and dined instead on regurgitated headline fricaseed and flambéed, courtesy of the aforementioned queen of syntax.
“Look at this,” screamed The Hammer (not to be confused with former Kansas City Chiefs’ corner back Fred Williamson, goat of Super Bowl I.)
Exhibit A was thrust in my face. A subhead on the front page of the sports section of The Toronto Star stated, “Sabres unable to get untracked as once-potent power plays hits 0 for 18.”
I surmised instantly that Janice was not particularly worried about Lindy Ruff’s dismal record with the man advantage.
This was confirmed instantly when she launched into a familiar lecture on what the headline writer really meant to say. Which was, “Sabres unable to get ON TRACK. If you get untracked, you are off the rails. You can’t go anywhere.”
The popularity of this (mis)take on the language seems to be growing in football and baseball parlance. Interestingly, you almost never hear a Nascar announcer say that a driver can’t get untracked.
Just once, wouldn’t you love to see a car land upside down on its roof in the middle of the infield, and hear an announcer say, “Well, he finally got untracked.”
The untracked/on track issue is gaining traction in our household pantheon of glaring grammatical grievances.
Although it is difficult to determine precisely, it appears to have moved into fourth place on the Hammer’s hit parade.
It still has a long way to go to catch lend/loan (lend is the verb, loan is the noun); “hopefully” (which frankly appears to be a lost cause); and the ongoing mystery of the purpose of the poor, abused apostrophe.
Once she completes her personal campaign to correct the ongoing public abuse of the spoken word, the Hammer plans to take on a much bigger challenge: making the world safe for the semi-colon.
All I have to say about that is this: Hopefully, she’ll loan me her rule book so I can get untracked on the apostropes’ misuse.
Man, I am so dead.

Driving to work this morning, the unusual sight of a man pushing a shopping cart along the side of the road caught my eye.
He was not returning from a 24-hour grocery store with illegally-obtained transport. What was out of the ordinary was that the well-dressed man was collecting liquor bottles and other materials from blue boxes as he strolled along.
Can changes in public policy that offer financial incentives/rewards result in a significant changes in human behaviour?
Yes and no would seem to be the answer, judging from this little vignette. The scavenger was changing his behaviour, removing bottles from blue boxes so that he could return them to The Beer Store and get the deposit back.
So the incentive to return the bottles was working for somebody.
On the other hand, the 20-cent deposit obviously did not have an effect on the homeowners who were still putting their alcoholic empties in the blue box, rather than returning them as part of the LCBO deposit scheme.
If you think about your 3Rs, the people who pick things out of the garbage before the trucks come by are to be commended for their perspicacity. People forget that recycling is at the bottom of the 3R totem pole. The scavengers are often reusing rather than recycling.
Since a much-higher percentage of the glass returned to the LCBO will actually be reprocessed for new glass, the guy with his shopping cart was doing his bit too.
In talking to Dave Gordon of Peel Region about what can, and what cannot, go into the new green bins, the subject of contamination necessarily arose. It is critical that people do not put any kind of plastic in the bins, other than the recommended compostable material that will break down. Otherwise, the quality of the high-quality compost that is the end product will be affected.
Although people have been using the blue box for years, it is obvious from watching my neighbours and my co-workers, that many of them — how can we say this politely — haven’t got the full knack of it yet.
You would not believe how many people have never gotten the message that the caps should be removed from plastic bottles and the contents emptied.
The empty bottles crush more easily. Half-full bottles of pop can cause major problems with processing equipment. “It makes it difficult for things to be sorted properly,” says Gordon.
The material is sorted manually to remove as many contaminants as possible. If the right material is in the box in the first place, it not only improves the quality of the recycled goods but saves on labour costs.
Later this spring or summer, Peel will be launching a public education campaign to remind people about how to load their blue boxes, including a prompt to rinse out jars to remove as many food contaminants as possible and to put something heavy on the top so that the goods don’t blow all over the neighbourhood.
Some things, unfortunately, still can’t be accepted in either the organic or the blue box stream, such as takeout cups. Specifically Tim Horton coffee cups and the accompanying lids.
Not to worry. Get yourself a travel mug and take it in when you need a friend along the way. They’ll even give you a five-cent break on your coffee in most shops.

Hugh Urquhart and his wife Diane are Clarkson residents who are members of The United Seniors Citizens of Ontario (USCO), which represents some 1,000 seniors clubs and 300,000 older residents across the province.
Something is really irking the Urquharts and the USCO, something that is also bothering a lot of Canadians of all ages: the lack of respect that political parties and individual politicians seem to have for the process they are part of.
Hugh Urquhart phoned this morning and sent along a letter that USCO sent off last week to the leaders of the province’s three largest political parties.
USCO President Marie Smith writes that her members are growing increasingly restive about some of the things that are happening in Canadian politics. “Democracy requires vigilance over how the electoral process works,” she says. “Belinda Stronach, David Emerson, Garth Turner, Wajid Khan and Tim Peterson are all recent examples of politicians who crossed the floor from one party to another, without participating in the nomination process of their local constituencies. Tony Clement was parachuted into the Parry Sound-Muskoka electoral district for the past federal election.
“In Mississauga South, the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party appears to be circumventing a fair and effective nominating process at this time,” continues the letter. “We want to end the practice of assured acclamation for electoral candidates within all political parties, both provincial and federal. Leaders of every party must respect the rights of the party participants in local electoral districts and ridings to conduct a fair and effective nominating process. Removal of the nominating process... has become too frequent in our democracy. This demoralizes the work of political volunteers and reduces voter turnout, which is already on the decline. We seem to do a great job of celebrating Vimy Ridge, but we are not carrying out the desires of the veterans of Vimy Ridge who fought for democracy and a properly-functioning electoral process.”
Hugh Urquhart stresses that the complaint of the organization isn’t with any singular party, but with all of them. “We’re non-partisan. I know Tim Peterson and it’s nothing personal. It’s just the process, which is so wrong. I don’t think it’s that people are apathetic about politics, I think they feel they’re being trounced on.”
While the USOC was at it, they could have mentioned a couple of other local examples, such as the pending appointment of a provincial Liberal candidate in Mississauga-Brampton South and the refusal of federal Tory officials to call a nomination in the federal riding of Mississauga South. Five local candidates have been waiting patiently there for a date to be called while rumours swirl about a potential parachuted “superstar.”
In an e-mail this week, Phil Green — the former PC candidate who was told thanks but no thanks when he sought to challenge Paul Szabo for the third time in the riding — said, “I hope the current nomination contestants, some of whom have been campaigning for more than six months, will receive a clear and immediate answer regarding their eligibility. There is still no date for a nomination meeting. As the next campaign is months (years?) away, I would hate to see all of their efforts be for nothing should the party rule at some future point that they too cannot run.”
The natives in all parties are growing restless. Manipulators of the parties’ machinery ... beware.
• • •
Ill health has forced Oscar Peterson to forego his much-anticipated local concert at the TD-Canada Trust Toronto Downtown Jazz Festival.
Because we are so familiar with the good doctor in Mississauga, and in Canada, we tend to minimize his enormous impact on the world’s musical landscape.
When Diana Krall and her husband, Elvis Costello, celebrated Oscar at his 80th birthday party in Toronto nearly two years ago, the singer was incredibly nervous in the presence of her “hero.”
In her high school yearbook, Krall was asked who she most wanted to be like when she grew up. Oscar Peterson was her answer. When she was 15-years-old she went to see Oscar and Ella Fitzgerald at the Orpheum in Vancouver. She rushed out to buy Night Train and “it changed my life,” she said.
In a new TV commercial for a car company,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=456ksLJu4Bo, Krall talks about how important that moment was to her as she listens to Happly-Go-Lucky-Local/Night Train on the car stereo.
Peterson has provided many moment of musical epiphany for artists and fans alike.
May the great doctor get well soon.

It is called Fritillaria Imperialis for good reason.
Everything about the crown imperial, or giant fritillaria, is outsized, regal and spectacular, from the huge size of the bulb that is supposed to be specially planted on its side, to its incredibly quick growth to a height of about three feet in early spring, to its cluster of weirdly swirling down-facing blooms on top of a single strapping stalk, to its unmistakable and most would say, downright unpleasant, odour.
From the first time one was spotted on a walk several years ago in my Erin Mills neighbourhood, it was something that just had to be tried.... and tried.... and tried.
The crown imperial was supposed to like heavy soils and clay, so it was buried first in the front yard, where it would impress the neighbours. Vanity thy name is gardener.
The planting instructions required it to be some impossible depth which was not unachievable in the concrete soil that was in place there at the time. Maybe that was the problem.
The bulb must be planted on its side, ideally with a layer of sand below it, to prevent rot. It has a huge hollow in its centre which collects rainwater if it is planted straight up. Perhaps that was not done properly.
It did start out wonderfully every year, pushing through the soil like a giant missile head, but it never bloomed. Sigh.
The first attempt was with the common plant with giant yellow blooms that really do look like bells because they bloom so close together and are slightly angled away from the plant, as if you had frozen them in mid-swing.
Other attempts followed before the crown imperials finally took in the backyard and actually bloomed. Emboldened, we tried another branch of the family, the Rubra. You can guess from the name that it is supposed to be red, but is actually orange. It was planted in the cottage garden.
One spring we arrived to find it at the absolute peak of its glory, a plant with a rich dark maroon stem, huge blooms that were twice the size of those on any other of the bulbs we’ve tried and a top-knot of strapping leaves that look like it was designed by a teenager with attitude and a hairdo to prove it.
One drawback of the plant for many people is the scent, which has been described as, “wet fur and garlic.” It is pungent, to be sure, but it grows on you. The smell gets sweeter every time you realize that it deters squirrels and other garden pests. Squirrels dash more gardening hopes than weather and thieves.
The Fritillaria even dies spectacularly, fading to yellow and swanning all over the joint before disappearing altogether, gone as quickly as it came. It is ideal to match with late-starting perennials as a result of this shooting star quality.
Crown imperial even has its own nickname in our household. Many years ago, my daughter took one look at the outlandish thing and came up with the perfect description — the “Dr. Seuss plant.”
Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store
Maybe Christmas... is a plant... that’s never a bore.

What to do if you are a school board and a community group comes forward and offers to buy a portable classroom that’s needed at a local school?
It’s not a rhetorical question. It happened at the Peel District School Board. It caused a dilemma at the time because there was no policy that covered the situation.
That’s why the board developed an amendment to policy number 5 partnerships/fundraising.
The amendment was approved at the March 27 board meeting. Trustees must have suspected that the new policy, which specifically permits fundraising for a new gym, auditorium, theatre or any other capital project, was going to draw a lot of attention.
And attention it got. According to Peel Board Chair Janet McDougald, it was not the precedent-setting, wedge-wielding, slippery slope of descent into chaos that it was made out to be in a series of debates in the Legislature and in newspaper editorials and advocacy group newsletters.
The Mississauga Ward 1 and 7 trustee says the new policy was developed to provide a “transparent, accountable way” to deal with offers such as the one to supply the portable. The board will not be out beating the bushes for funds. Any offer that does come in will be subject to a “viability study” by staff and school council members. Only projects that were already planned, such as a science lab, will be approved.
The first issue to raise its head, predictably, was equity. Rich schools will raise more funds and the advantaged will become more so, goes the argument. Poor schools will be left to wallow in self-pity.
“In a perfect world, there would be adequate money to provide everything to everybody,” says McDougald, who was first elected in 1988. “People just want to come forward and support their local community and their local school.”
She uses a non-capital analogy as an example of what she means. in the past, groups have come forward to propose that breakfast programs be established at their local school.
“That might not have been the school that we would have been our first priority but do we say no because all the other schools don’t have a breakfast program?”
The new Peel board policy was a handy piece of floating driftwood for various stakeholders, who have their own political agendas in this pre-election period, to cling to.
Depending on your point of view, the adoption of the amended policy proved either that the government is grossly underfunding school boards (Opposition parties) or that $567,000 in fundraising across the province is actually an “end-run” around the prohibition on boards raising revenue through local taxes (People for Education.)
Trustees weren’t trying to make any groundbreaking policy statements here, they were just trying to provide a mechanism to deal with offers of financial assistance for local schools.
If a gym burns down, as it did at Lorne Park Public School several ago and the community picks up the challenge and wants to pay for it instead of taxpayers, is that such a terrible thing? In fact, it means that a project that would otherwise not have been funded elsewhere could still go ahead; perhaps in one of those needy areas where parents don’t have the time, energy of expertise to fund raise quite as well.
Why is it OK to fundraise for computers, books or musical instruments but not the physical spaces to put them in?
Since the days of the one-room school house, trustees have tended to be practical folks who worry more about meeting needs than splitting policy hairs. As long as there are safeguards in place to ensure that the funds are being spent on legitimate projects, it doesn’t seem the end of the world to help the neighbourhood do its best for its local school.
• • •
The boundaries have changed, but the candidates haven’t.
Bob Delaney and Nina Tangri will tangle again in the upcoming provincial election. But rather than running against each other in Mississauga West, they’ll be contesting the new seat of Mississauga-Streetsville.
Tangri won a rather easy victory over local chiropractor Dr. Carlan Stants last night for the Conservative nomination at the Mississauga Convention Centre. About 500 members turned out to vote.

What may be the first-ever full-scale political fundraiser for an independent candidate takes place at the Mississaugua Golf and Country Club June 19.
When the planning started a few months ago for the $250-a-plate meal for Mississauga South MPP Tim Peterson, you can bet that the special guest speaker was not slated to be John Tory.
But such are the vagaries of politics.
Peterson left the Liberal caucus at the end of March to sit as an independent and held a joint press conference with Tory that day to announce that he would join the Conservatives and be their candidate in the election Oct. 10.
So who does the fundraiser belong to?
“They’ve taken our time, our place and our event,” says Dr. Boyd Upper of the Liberal executive, which is now about to organize a similar event for Charles Sousa, who will be acclaimed as the party’s candidate Tuesday at Lorne Park Secondary School.
One thing that will definitely be different than originally planned at the Peterson fundraiser is the guest list, laughs Upper.
If all goes well for the MPP, the House will rise before the event takes place, and he will be a Tory by then. That will ease the questions about why the Conservative association would raise money for a guy who doesn’t yet belong to their party.
The House is not actually scheduled to rise until the end of June, says Mississauga West MPP Bob Delaney, but that could change subject to negotiations between the House leaders.
A circumspect Dr. Upper wouldn’t come right out and say that Peterson’s defection has caused some Tories to switch allegiances to the Liberals. But he did say that, “we’re getting a lot of offers of help from people we’ve never heard of.”
• • •
Shaila Kibria was the cover girl for the debut of Aver magazine, the publication for Canadian Muslims that was launched by UTM student Tahmina Reza and a group of family and friends from Mississauga in September 2006.
The magazine included an article by Reza and Humaid Sohail called Party Politics. It stated, in part, that, “as citizens of Canada, we have the right to partake in the political system of our country. We care about the policies that affect our lives and the lives of others. It’s crucial for us not only to understand the features of our political system but to actually use the system to benefit ourselves and Canadian society at large.”
Looks like the cover girl read the article. Kibria was a University of Toronto Mississauga student for several years, leading the part-time students’ association, starting the child care centre on campus, speaking out about perceived racism at U of T and helping to organize a campus group called Bring Love In, Not Guns (BLING) that held a conference for alienated black youth in Toronto in january 2006.
Now Kibria, a vice-president of U of T’s Student Administrative Council, is considering a run for the nomination for the New Democratic Party in the provincial election Oct. 10 in the riding of Mississauga-Erindale. If she gets the nod, she will continue a recent tradition of current or former UTM students running for office in the riding. In recent elections in the same riding, UTM alumni Simon Black and Rupinder Brar both ran for the NDP, and Jeff Brownridge ran for the Greens.
• • •
The remainder of the power plant at Lakeview Generating Station is scheduled to be demolished at the end of June or in early July. The exact date for the big kaboom has not yet been set by Ontario Power Generation according to spokesman John Earl.
This will not be an extravaganza like the demolition of the Four Sisters, where Mayor Hazel McCallion pushed the button and the chimneys came tumbling down. “It’s going to be a very low-key event,” says Earl. “It’s just a big old powerhouse that’s coming down.”
There will be no speeches. Don’t expect to hear anything more about the details of a proposal for a gas-fired power plant on the site until after the provincial election.

No one ever worked harder in his alleged “retirement” than Mississauga freelance writer Gary McCarthy.
For the past six years, the Meadowvale resident has spent more time at the Hershey Centre than the Zamboni operator – ferreting out stories, chasing down rumours and giving the readers of The Mississauga News, both in print form and online, all the information they needed to know about their sometimes-beloved, sometimes-berated IceDogs.
In another life, McCarthy was a broadcaster, news editor, producer, executive producer and manager with the CBC National Radio news service. He left in 1999, spent some time monitoring free elections in Third World countries, then engaged his passion for minor hockey by signing on with The News to cover the IceDogs, and assorted other sports and political issues.
Gary made himself an authority on the Dogs and the Ontario Hockey League. In the past few seasons, he’s probably spent more time on air doing between-period interviews than anyone not named Dave Hodge, Dick Irvin or Ward Cornell.
Over the years, McCarthy has broken so many stories about the IceDogs, mostly to do with their five different sales, that you’d swear he must have been a fly on the boardroom wall. He had the story of Don Cherry selling the team first, had the story about the new buyer first, broke the subsequent Mario Forgione purchase and then his sale and then covered the Eugene Melynk Ice Dogs-St. Mike’s soap opera (As The Franchise Turns) from every angle.
In the past few months, McCarthy’s musings on the possible scenarios about the Dogs’ future kennel, posted regularly in his Big Dog Blog on this site, have been must-reading. He regularly had hundreds of hits for his entries as a result.
Somebody was obviously impressed, beside the readers. McCarthy has just taken on a new job as the director of communications and media operations for the new Niagara IceDogs.
If you ask Gary about his best memories of his time covering the Dogs, they are those of a hockey fan, not just a reporter. He cites the team’s first-ever playoff victory when Greg Jacina scored a great goal against Ottawa before one of the few large crowds the team ever drew at the Hershey Centre. And, of course, he cites their most successful season when they beat Toronto, Oshawa and Barrie before being swept by the Guelph Storm. “Hey, they were just four games away from the Memorial Cup,” McCarthy says.
That’s the thing about Gary: he’s a seasoned reporter who never lost the capacity to get intensely excited at the magical things a bunch of teenagers can do collectively on the hockey rink.
Whenever Gary blew into the newsroom — and never was a term more appropriate — there was inevitably a pause in the action for a good jaw-wag. A big paw would land on your shoulder and a welcoming hand would be stretched out in a greeting, with gripping gusto. If you were really lucky, there would be stories of Toe Blake, Sid Abel and Gordie Howe. There would be reminiscences of the press box on Opening day for Les Expos at Jarry Park and descriptions of the rabid fans behind the left field fence in “Jonesville.”
Mississauga, and the staff and readers of The Mississauga News, are really going to miss this man.

Sorry about the blog hiatus, but for the past two days, I have been in Courtroom 105 at Davis Court in Brampton watching the best reality show in town.
At the close of proceedings yesterday, Mr. Justice James J. Keaney, defence attorney Clayton Ruby and crown counsel Jennifer Goulin exchanged comments about how much they had enjoyed the experience. Such pleasantries are often obligatory and perfunctory, but in this case, they seemed entirely genuine.
Would have been even more pleasurable if there hadn’t been such critical principles at stake.
It was, of course, the case of the pothole poet, Antonio Batista, who is charged with the very serious offence of uttering a death threat against Ward 9 Councillor Pat Saito.
The defence cast the piece as a comedy, with the big bad state bringing its full weight to bear on a 75-year-old immigrant with prostate cancer, who was so frustrated with the slow response of his councillor to his various communications that he sat down and wrote a satirical poem in the fine tradition of Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope, writers the defendant had never heard of.
In fact, as we learned from his own mouth, Mr. Batista only learned what satire was when his famed criminal lawyer told him that would be the foundation of his defence.
Ruby’s star witness was esteemed Professor Emeritus Dennis Duffy who has a long and distinguished history as both a student and professor at U of T since 1961. His testimony — which will only be put on the record if the judge agrees to admit it when he passes sentence in late July — was that Batista’s free verse called Parked Cars and Potholes in the City of Mississauga may have been rudimentary and unsophisticated but was in the long and honourable tradition of hurling brickbats at our leaders. That goes back to the days when Aristophanes first told the world what an airhead Socrates was.
Asked if Batista’s literary allusion to a giant pothole that would make a nice welcome mat for Saito’s body should be taken as a serious threat, Duffy replied, “I wouldn’t think so.” It’s almost like political cartooning where you take one person’s feature and exaggerate it to ridiculous lengths, the professor said.
Duffy said absence of satire is a sure sign of oligarchical tyranny and noted that tongue-in-cheek dissenters who posted criticism of the Stalinist regime literally risked their lives to do so.
“Would you agree with me that Ward 9 in Mississauga is not in the Soviet Union?” asked crown lawyer Goulin in a question during cross-examination that had a certain satirical intent of its own.
The trial was like watching a tough, magical football game where both teams play their best and the outcome comes down to the last second.
A video of the interview that Peel Regional Police Detective John Mans of 11 division did with Batista when he was arrested Feb. 2, 2006 was a microcosm of the trial itself. At one point Mans asks a very evasive Batista the same question that Mr. Justice Keaney must answer: is the man who wrote this poem just somebody who was frustrated and wanted to take a verbal shot at Saito or did he really want to hurt her?
Ruby’s case rested firmly on his excellent closing argument, in which he invoked the Charter and cited cases where acquittals have been granted for words that threaten death much more directly.
“Governments are accountable through elections and not the courts,” he said, quoting from an earlier judgment. “Litigation is a form of force and government must not silence its critics by force. We have to be careful to protect a citizen’s right to criticize in public.”
Goulin more than held her own against her famous counterpart, concentrating on the burden of proof required: that a “reasonable person” would find Batista’s remarks to be a threat. Resident Neil Lawrence — designated the “reasonable person” of the case by the crown, certainly found them so. When he read the poem Batista had posted on a community mail box, he immediately notified Saito’s office because of his alarm.
In arguing against admitting Duffy’s testimony, Goulin said, “if we need an expert to understand that (the poem) was satire, then the reasonable person test fails.”
In her cross-examination of the defendant, Goulin was able to establish some important points. While Batista wrote, phoned and chased Saito and her staff for answers, he didn’t follow up in the same vociferous way to his unanswered letter to Mayor Hazel McCallion on many of the same issues. He testified that was because the mayor is 86-years-old and a very busy lady.
Batista did not know the name of the councillor who now represents him in Ward 10 either. In response to several of Goulin’s questions, he launched into a harangue about how Saito had failed to provide drinking fountains and washrooms in local parks, as they have in Toronto. His personal animosity to Saito was more than evident.
Most effectively though, Goulin simply read the offending words from the poem, which state that “We are going to dig a pothole about six feet and 3 feet wide and 5 feet deep to hide her body and God will take care of Her Soul, but we cannot forgive her for doing nothing. She can keep running at a good pace but We will make sure that She is in HEAVEN and out of the race. So please GOD take care of this SOUL for ever and EVER.”
Any reasonable person who read those words would have understood that they threatened death and would have been fearful, Goulin argued. Elected officials have the same right to be free of intimidation as anyone else.
Unfortunately for Batista, who has been in poor health, the judge’s decision was delayed for two months. The stress on him and his wife was clearly evident during the trial.
Even if he is convicted, it is highly unlikely that the crown will ask for jail time for Batista, and Saito has said that is the last thing that she wants.
Ruby has already indicated that if he does not get the acquittal he expects, he will appeal the ruling.