@colinmacdonald
Interested in local governments, sometimes random pop culture phenomena enthusiast, and year-round eggnog advocate. This is a personal account. My opinions on eggnog (or any other matter) do not reflect the views of my employer.
Vice President JD Vance gets roundly booed at the opening ceremony of the Milano-Cortina 2026 Olympics. "Those are a lot of boos for him, whistling jeering," says the presenter. US athletes receive a warm welcome from fans, though.
If I don’t get a CBC mini-series à la HBO’s ‘We Own This City’ about the recent organized crime bust in the Toronto Police Service, someone will clearly have dropped the ball
The one guilty go free side of this tree is bananas
I’m honestly shocked at how few questions have come up re: the MSC recommendation. It’s weird that such a complex recommendation (it’s very dense - 3 recommendations) has been given so little scrutiny or evidence to support its efficacy. People just seem to accept that it will accomplish something.
They also have to maintain compliance with international trade agreements.
Some municipalities have augmented the sustainability and local impact lens in their procurement evaluation process in response to tariffs. This tips the scale in favour of local due to transportation costs, but it’s also just a lens, it doesn’t bind them to a bad choice just because it’s CDN.
Will season 3 be Hurry Hard With a Vengeance?
Based the scale of city finances $30m is about the equivalent of a $100-200 to the average person. Would the full amount even be enough to alter behaviour?
So the Ontario NDP stance is that allowing 49,000 Chinese EVs into a country that buys 1.9 million new cars/year will kill Ontario automaker jobs?
I really doubt the Ontario plants making F-150s and Chevy Silverados are at risk of being put out of business by a shipment of Wuling Bingos
I’m no fan of Carney’s “Liberals,” but if you’re looking for an angle to differentiate, this ain’t it. Stick to criticizing his less than stellar approach to affordable housing and his complete abandonment of green initiatives.
The 2025 Headline of the Year Nominees
🧵
The leaked policy brief considered other options than reverting to TNR. Comic Sans was ruled out for sounding “too French.” Will be reconsidered after presidential order renaming font to “Comic Freedom”
You’ll never alleviate the what-a-mole problem, but you’d think the observations from that book would prompt parties to accompany this with longer term plans to assess complex problems then execute them quickly should they get elected.
*24
But brief election cycles, pressure from interest groups, and other pressures (e.g., 25-hour news cycle) often result in poorly researched, patchwork solutions aimed at immediate symptom whac-a-mole.
How Big Things Get Done is a book about how complex problems require significant and thoughtful planning followed by quick execution. Most of the examples are infrastructure projects or massive logistical endeavours, but I think #governments would do well to look at social problems the same way.
This whole ostrich cull story reads like a Canadian version of Burn After Reading with, remarkably, even lower stakes
The immense forces that shape municipalities are largely of Federal and Provincial government creation. Hearing other orders of government complain about municipalities being too rigid is absurd, especially when municipalities have just become the diamonds you’ve forced them to be.
Really about the only thing that’s funnier is the Province setting out to reduce the number of local governments in Peel from 4 to 3 and they end up creating a 5th local government entity instead.
I mean… the timing of this global recognition for Peel’s water and wastewater system couldn’t be funnier. peelregion.ca/press-releas...
The traffic death bill passed?
As with all policy choices, there will be winners and losers. I’m not convinced that the public will be winners under this model.
If this indeed the case the comms around it is downplaying that fact. Yes, they’re talking about alternative sources about financing, like it’s free money. Yada, yada, pensions and other institutional investors are going to throw money at this out of the goodness of their hearts, yada, yada.
My reading of the proposed Water and Wastewater Public Corporations Act, 2025, suggests that the entities will be ineligible for DC collections. A lot is still yet to be defined by regulation but barring additional info it looks like water rates in Peel are going to rise a lot.
Caveat: not a lawyer
This is a confusing interview. I’m imagining something got lost in translation between the interviewer and interviewee, but it does a poor job of explaining the MSC model at best and at worst misrepresents it as financing source (like IO) for municipalities.
nationalpost.com/news/canada/...
We used to build infrastructure where people lived and worked. Then, where people worked changed. Instead of learning a lesson about single purpose districts and getting creative, the best solution governments devise is forcing people to work where infrastructure is.
It's become a lost opportunity.
Does that mean jurisdictional scan bros are the new policy wonks?
The online discourse: "James Gunn's Superman is woke. Also his suit isn't tight enough. I should be able to see the Corenswet dripping down his abs."
Not saying mayors shouldn't have the power to propose, just saying that it's an area where people should be a little more vigilant, but definitely also take your point re: staff proposed by-laws and consent agendas. I'm now thinking maybe it's not an SM issue but a consent agenda issue.
