Gordon Prentice at Large - Politics in Newmarket
- Details
- Written by: Gordon Prentice
I promised myself not to feel sorry for them but, increasingly, I do. 
I noted three years ago they were made for each other.
They see swirling conspiracies everywhere. People are out to frame them and defame them.
Now he is commenting at length on my recent blog about Snapd and its intervention in the municipal election in 2014. He is, once again, unhappy with the world.
I suspect I may soon see him panting and wobbling up my drive to hand deliver some document from the Newmarket Small Claims Court, accusing me of some calumny or other and claiming $25,000 in damages.
This is what he does when he is not selling insurance.
In the meantime, the days will pass and it will soon be 10am on 10 February 2017 - the date of their next rendezvous at the Small Claims Court in Eagle Street.
- Details
- Written by: Gordon Prentice
The highest paid Mayor in Ontario - and possibly Canada - Frank Scarpitti is considering whether to contest the riding of Markham-Thornhill which is now vacant following the appointment of John McCallum as Canada's new ambassador to China. 
I see Newmarket's Darryl Wolk, a Conservative, believes Scarpitti
"would be a star candidate for Trudeau and would hold the seat".
John McCallum won the seat in 2015 with over 55% of the vote with Conservative Jobson Easow trailing with just over 32%. On paper it looks like a very safe Liberal riding. And one that should be very difficult to lose.
But Wolk - who likes to hedge his bets - says he wants Scarpitti to run for Chair of York Region in 2018 - the first ever direct election for the position.
Scarpitti comes across - at least to me - as the archetypal municipal fixer and boss.
Only a few months ago he spoke against letting the cameras into York Regional Council telling his colleagues
"audio is more than adequate".
Is this the openness Trudeau is looking for?
Sunny ways?
Seriously?
- Details
- Written by: Gordon Prentice
The sunny, smiley newspaper Snapd intervened anonymously in the 2014 municipal election in Newmarket when it paid Canada Post to deliver flyers to thousands of homes in Wards 6 and 7. 
The imprint on the flyers claimed they were from NmktTownHallWatch - a spoof which mimicked the well known and equally anonymous NwktTownHallWatch.
We still do not know who wrote the text of the flyers but the two candidates targeted by Snap'd were both steamrollered, losing badly.
Did the flyers affect the result? It is, of course, impossible to know how much of those crushing defeats was attributable to the intervention of an anonymous third party.
But it begs two questions:
Was it legal?
And is it going to happen again?
Given the image Snapd projects (which is all Mom and apple pie) its intervention last time was clearly duplicitous, hypocritical and unethical. But it was not illegal.
As I tap this out, there is no evidence to show the campaign spending returns submitted by all the candidates in Wards 6 and 7 were anything other than accurate. If anyone has proof they are false they should present their evidence to the Town.
In any event, we can now be certain that what happened in 2014 will not re-occur in 2018 because the Municipal Elections Act 1996 has been amended to preclude it.
Last year, during the third reading debate on Bill 181 the then Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, Ted McMeekin, told MPPs:
"To increase transparency in municipal elections, we are proposing a framework to regulate third-party advertising... This would include setting contribution and spending limits. Third parties would also have to specifically identify themselves on signs and advertisements. Candidates would not be able to direct a third-party advertiser on where they should focus their efforts or what their advertisements should say."
The Minister explained the definition of third-party advertising would be changed so that it covers only advertisements supporting or opposing candidates during an election.
"It would not affect advertising on issues. So if you want to fight for a clean environment, you can do that. The proposed definition of third-party advertising will allow charities and groups that do public outreach on issues as a matter of normal business to continue their issues-based advocacy work throughout the election period."
Former Vaughan councillor and now Federal MP, Deb Schulte, told MPPs in the Bill Committee that, in her view, third-party advertising should be registered to an elector.
"Make it mandatory to identify all the flyers, emails and videos with an identifier so they can be traced back to the source..."
One way or another, I think we can be pretty sure no candidate running for Newmarket Council in 2018 is gonna get Snapd.