What’s Happening in Mississauga’s Municipal Elections (Part 2)

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Published September 26, 2018 at 3:41 pm

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It’s time for a quick follow up on what is happening in the municipal election campaign in Mississauga from last time, and a lot has happened. Let’s take a look.

There is (at least one) Mississauga mayoral candidates debate

It looks like in the absence of Rogers TV or other citywide organizations, the University of Toronto-Mississauga Students Union have organized a panel of the mayoral candidates running in the election to speak to voters on the issues.

According to UTMSU, the event is open to all members of the community and the candidates invited include Bonnie Crombie (the incumbent mayor), Scott E. Chapman, Andrew Lee, Yasmin Pouragheli, Syed Qumber Rizvi and Tiger Meng Wu, who is a UTM student.

Meanwhile, Crombie’s campaign office has been set up and it’s in a familiar sort of setting: 521 Curran Place, which is a former Amacon office, right across from the new ZenQ bubble tea / dessert cafe. When she first ran for mayor in 2014, Crombie’s campaign office was at the base of the new condo on Grand Park Drive and Burnhamthorpe Road.    

Are there party politics brewing in Ward 1?

There was a debate organized by the three resident homeowners associations operating in south Mississauga (Applewood Acres, Orchard Heights, and Sherway) at Carmen Corbasson Community Centre this past week. All Ward 1 candidates except Macro Pedri were in attendance; the entire debate (segmented into seven parts) can be seen here.

Not surprisingly, the Ward 1 race is breaking down somewhat along partisan lines. Brad Butt, the former Conservative MP, seems to have consolidated well known names who lean conservative judging by who showed up at his campaign launch: former federal Tory MPs Stella Ambler, Wladyslaw Lizon and Bob Dechert, whom all served with Butt in Ottawa. Also in attendance was former school trustee Jeff White, who ran as a provincial PC MPP candidate.

Former provincial Liberal finance minister Charles Sousa attended the kickoff for another Ward 1 candidate recently, Natalie Hart. Hart has been a veteran campaigner on several election campaigns for Liberals and several known Liberals are on her current team.

Sousa (left) with Ward 1 candidate Natalie Hart

“This is the thing I admire about her – that she’s not just there for political campaigns; she’s there because she passionately desires to see change that is an improvement to our community… There is no one better in my mind to continue to pursue that beautification, that economic revitalization and being a representative voice for us in council than (Natalie),” Sousa was quoted as saying.

Stephen Dasko said he worked on the late Jim Tovey’s previous two campaigns, but others have said that he also worked on campaigns for three former PC cabinet ministers as well as Patrick Brown. Dasko hit back, saying the only ideology he’s committed to is “founded in the strong belief in the inherent right of each community, neighborhood, and resident to be informed, engaged and consulted before decisions are made which affect their lives, their family or their property,” adding that his campaign team is made up of those from all political stripes. 

The other candidates, Terry Burke, Larry Mancini, Marco Pedri, Miles Roque and Sharmila Setaram have not indicated partisan affiliations, but one observer stated he thinks Roque is doing better than Butt in terms of presence in the ward, saying the young candidate may pull off third place. Mancini is playing off a bit as an environmentalist candidate, but saying “I don’t know how the planning rules work in Mississauga,” to a crowd very astute in development matters may not be a good idea.

If you want to hear more from these candidates, another meeting is scheduled on October 15 to take place at Clarke Memorial Hall at 7 pm, followed by another Ward 1 candidates meeting on October 17 at the Mississauga Senior Centre on 1389 Cawthra Road.

A lot is happening in Ward 6

Ward 6, which stretches from Britannia Road in the north to Dundas Street in the south, has an incumbent running but that doesn’t mean a lot hasn’t happened.

Engineer Elie Diab, one of the eleven candidates running in Ward 6, has been quite vocal on social media, calling out not only incumbent Ron Starr, but other councillors as well. Here is Diab critiquing the spending habits of Starr’s colleagues Karen Ras (Ward 2) and Chris Fonseca (Ward 3); both of whom are running for reelection.

In response, Ras says her expenses went to advertising on a free publication in south Mississauga, saying she spent 26 per cent of her allocated budget.

Diab also lambasted Starr for using $500 of taxpayers money to sponsor a golf tournament and Ward 8 incumbent Matt Mahoney for $100 per month for Highway 407 tolls. He’s also found a kind of rapport with another Ward 6 candidate, Al De Ascentis.

Insauga.com will follow up on Diab’s offer to shadow him or De Ascentis on the campaign trail to see if people are as “overwhelmingly disappointed’ in Coun. Starr as they claim.

While canvassing neighbourhoods another candidate, Joe Horneck, tweeted out what he has been hearing from residents using the hashtag #experiencematters.

The #experiencematters hashtag is a little dig at Starr, who also used it touting the councillor’s long tenure in business and city hall and how that is an advantage in comparison to his eleven opponents, but it seems Starr is not as well known in his own constituency as an incumbent should be.

And if you’re in need of help, then turning to some controversial people to help you put up lawn signs is a curious way of going about it.

This is Amin El-Maoued, the public relations officer for Palestine House. Last time he was in the news was having a community recognition award taken back by Mississauga MP Iqra Khalid after it was revealed that he participated in an ‘anti-Semitic’ gathering in 2017.

Insauga.com reached out to Starr asking if he was aware El-Maoued was helping on his campaign; the councillor said he would look into the matter.

Ward 10 Candidate Issues Apology

Following this video that went viral of a tense confrontation between himself and a homeowner over whether that homeowner stepped on one of his election signs, Ward 10 candidate Mazin Al-Ezzi issued this video statement offering an apology.

“The video was taken out of context, completely. I do not support violence and absolutely against violence, and anger to solve problems. The individual in question had taken my signs, stepped on it, vandalized it to the max. And many other things that were not shown on the video,” Al-Ezzi said. He also issued this statement of apology.

But the daughter of the homeowner posted this account of the incident on Facebook:

In any event, the video has gone viral and reactions to Al-Ezzi have been scathing to say the least, and incumbent Sue McFadden was most likely going to have no trouble getting reelected anyway. This incident probably serves to boost the councillor’s support to higher levels; McFadden was reelected in 2014 with 77 per cent of the vote.

Public school trustee news

During a campaign, candidates were advised they could not use city owned facilities to host gatherings or meetings related to their campaign. One school trustee candidate back in August had sent out this invite for people to meet her.

Insauga.com reached out to Mississauga city staff and this is what they said:

“Our Use of City Resources During an Election Policy does state that directly or indirectly booking a City Facility for any election purpose is not permitted during an Election Campaign Period. Our Bookings office has reached out to the event organizer to cancel the booking,” the staff said in their email.

In the future, it would be safe to just avoid community centres altogether, however trustee candidate Charles Chen did manage to book the Vic Johnston Community Centre for his campaign launch back earlier this month. Perhaps booking the Hazel McCallion Hall gives some special exemptions?

Ward 1 and 7 candidate John Walmark is a former trustee from decades ago, who said he was motivated to put his name forward after getting encouragement from several community members…including the outgoing trustee.

“John has been an active and committed community advocate for many, many years. His experience in Public Service will ensure he will be an effective Trustee for our students and The Peel Board,” Janet McDougald said in a statement endorsing Walmark.  

In Wards 3 and 4, there is actually an interesting candidate running for public school trustee against incumbent Sue Lawton: Norma Nicholson, the current Chair of the Peel Police Services Board. Nicholson, an author and motivational speaker, took up the chair role after previous chair Sue McFadden was removed  over the summer amidst some controversy.

And while it’s not common to see current or former city staff take a dive into the political side of things, it’s not unheard of. In Wards 9 and 10, LeeAnn Lloyd is running for public school trustee against incumbent Nokha Dakroub; Lloyd previously worked in Community Engagement at Mississauga on projects such as Vision Cooksville. She now runs her own independent consulting practices.

Municipal elections take place on October 22.

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