Ward 18 incumbent councillor Ana Bailao campaigns on Dundas Street in Toronto, October 16, 2014.J.P. MOCZULSKI/The Globe and Mail
Toronto may have elected a brand-new mayor, but most of the 44 city councillors voters chose Monday are familiar faces, with only one incumbent up for re-election, one-time Ford supporter John Parker, going down to defeat.
Many high-profile incumbents facing serious challengers were returned to office. In the end, there will be seven new faces on council, most of whom claimed seats left vacant by departing or retiring veterans.
However, mayor-elect John Tory should find plenty of votes for his agenda. For the most part, city council's political makeup remains the same, with more than a dozen conservatives and a large "mushy middle" of centrists likely to support Mr. Tory, plus a dozen or so left-leaning councillors expected to be more critical. But with the polarizing Rob Ford out of the mayor's chair, many expect councillors of all stripes to take a more collaborative approach.
Rob Ford, however, will still be at City Hall, but back in his old role as a city councillor. He won the Etobicoke council seat that had been occupied by his brother, Doug, who took over the trail of the mayoral campaign after Rob was diagnosed with cancer.
The only defeated incumbent is Mr. Parker, who lost his seat in Ward 26, which includes both affluent Leaside and the towers of Thorncliffe and Flemingdon Park. The erudite former Progressive Conservative MPP, elected to council in 2006, initially sided with Mr. Ford but later broke with him. He was defeated by local entrepreneur Jon Burnside, who enjoyed Mr. Tory's endorsement.
Paula Fletcher, the left-leaning incumbent in Ward 30, Toronto-Danforth, handily fended off a two-front challenge from activist Jane Farrow and TV personality Liz West, whom Ms. Fletcher only narrowly defeated in 2010.
"I hope [Mr. Tory] does count on the experience that a number of us have at city hall and that we won't have another four years like the last four years," Ms. Fletcher told CBC Radio on Monday night.
The controversial councillor Giorgio Mammoliti, who has represented Ward 7in northwest Toronto for two decades, held onto his seat with a 10-percentage-point edge despite facing a three-month suspension from council and a police probe over an $80,000 fundraiser.
In an acrimonious race in Beaches-East York, Ward 32, Mary-Margaret McMahon easily held off a challenge from the councillor she defeated in 2010, Sandra Bussin. In Davenport, councillors Cesar Palacio, Ward 17, and Ana Bailao, Ward 18, both held onto their seats despite strong challengers. So did former Ford budget chief Frank Di Giorgio, who fended off former Liberal MP and mayoral candidate John Nunziata in Ward 12, York-South Weston.
Most of the new faces came in wards without incumbents. NDP strategist Joe Cressy won easily in Ward 20, Trinity-Spadina, which had been vacated by Adam Vaughan, a Liberal who had defeated Mr. Cressy in the race to become the riding's MP. The colourful former mayoral candidate Sarah Thomson was a distant third.
Former Liberal MP Jim Karygiannis won Ward 39 in Scarborough, where Michael Del Grande, who also served as Mr. Ford's budget chief, stepped down.
In Ward 3 in Etobicoke, the winner was Stephen Holyday, the son of the former councillor, Doug Holyday, who left city hall to sit as a Progressive Conservative MPP. The seat vacated by mayoral race dropout Karen Stintz, Ward 16 Eglinton-Lawrence, went to Christin Carmichael Greb, daughter of Toronto federal Tory MP John Carmichael. Replacing retiring councillor Gloria Lindsay Luby in Ward 4 in Etobicoke is marketing adviser John Campbell. Real-estate executive Justin Di Ciano took Ward 5, which Peter Milczyn left vacant to become a Liberal MP.
Jeff Gray