Rob Newman

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2010-05-03T10:21:00.001-04:00

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Better Ballots - Join us at a Town Hall - April 13, 20, 26 or 27

2010-04-09T12:09:00.001-04:00

I've been doing a lot of work with the Better Ballots initiative over the past few months. The purpose of Better Ballots is to expose Torontonians to some of the ways that we could conduct municipal elections in Toronto a little differently than we do now.

The upcoming Town Halls are your opportunity to learn about the various options and to provide us your thoughts on them. With your input we'll know what voters in Toronto are ready to support and what they think we could do without. I hope you can make it out to one of the events. You can sign up below.

Thanks!

Better Ballots announces Town Hall meetings across Toronto

Civic elections in Toronto are not meeting our expectations.

Turnout is surprisingly low. New faces on City Council are uncommon. Candidates can 'win' a seat with as low as 20% of the vote. And perhaps most importantly, our City Council does not reflect the evolving demographic of Toronto’s diverse population.

Should Toronto have municipal parties? Term limits? A lower voting age? Ranked ballots? Multi-member wards? Borough councils? Online voting? Finance reforms?

Join us at the Better Ballots Town Hall meetings to learn about fourteen specific ideas that could make Toronto's elections more inclusive, diverse and fair. What are the possible benefits and concerns for each proposal?

This is your chance to learn about options for election reform in Toronto and to join the discussion.

Website: http://www.betterballots.to/townhalls.htm

Facebook events:

North York (April 13): http://bit.ly/betterballots_NORTH
Scarborough (April 20) : http://bit.ly/betterballots_EAST
City Hall (April 26): http://bit.ly/betterballots
Etobicoke (April 27): http://bit.ly/betterballots_WEST

Let's raise our expectations and work towards a voting system that meets them.

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Better Ballots
http://www.betterballots.to
info@betterballots.to
@betterballots

Contraception is part of the solution.

2009-12-23T15:44:00.001-05:00

Contraception is 'greenest' technology

A recent study from the London School of Economics assert[s] that family planning is nearly five times more cost effective in mitigating global warming emissions than green energy technologies like wind and solar power.

And yet not surprising that this element of our impact on the planet was not part of the recent discussions in Copenhagen.

TD Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup 2008

2008-09-05T23:54:00.000-04:00

Adblock

I hope you can join me at David A Balfour Park on Sunday, September 21, between 12:00 PM and 4:00 PM for the annual TD Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup. You'll have tons of fund picking up tons of litter!

To register go to www.vanaqua.org/cleanup and look for David A Balfour Park in the sites for Toronto.

See you there!

What next?

2008-07-03T09:10:00.001-04:00

TheStar.com | Business | Auto crisis kills more GTA jobs

The storm engulfing the auto industry touched down in the GTA again yesterday and swept away more than 2,000 jobs.

OK, it's time to invest in a new industry. Well, actually, the time to invest in a new industry was four or five years ago, but today will have to do.

Unfortunately, by being complacent about the success we thought we saw from the auto industry we may now be in the unfortunate situation of not having the revenue available to invest in new industries. (Most of what we got from our investment in autos went back into autos and the infrastructure to support them.) We've missed the boat on using "old economics" to fund the next new thing, so now it's up to carbon pricing to provide the incentive.

The world is changing. Will we lead people into tomorrow or will we be dragged kicking and screaming? Looks like the latter so far.

Time to Look at a NEW Industry

2008-06-03T14:46:00.001-04:00

CAW to fight Oshawa closing

General Motors will halt production at its Oshawa truck plant next year and probably won't reopen it again because of the collapse of pickup sales in the U.S., chairman Rick Wagoner said today.

It's time for Ontario to begin investing in tomorrow's industries and help our workforce become less dependent on yesterday's industries. It would have been better to have started this a few years ago, but the next best time is to start today. Before anyone else loses a job without a new one to go to.

How about solar panels? How about scooters? How about subway cars and street cars? How about anything that recognizes that the cost of oil is only going to go up and that, thankfully, people are making different choices than they did 5 and 10 years ago. (That is, not Fiat! Same problem, different logo.)

Beyond a shift in what we make to sell to the world, we also need to be training our workforce to make a lot more of the stuff we need right here at home. The increasing cost of transporting goods means that the earth is a lot less flat than we thought cheap oil made it. A recent report from CIBC World Markets covered in the Toronto Star makes the point well.

We have two choices: we can plan now for where things are headed, or we can wait and be forced to change when it's too late. I prefer the first option.

Food and the City

2008-05-30T17:17:00.001-04:00

canadianarchitect.com - Canadian Architect - 5/30/2008

Our discussion will begin to assess the health of the city through examining the cycles of its food – the sourcing, production, buying, selling, cooking, eating and waste disposal of food. At its very essence, the city is what, where and how it eats.

I'm looking forward to this. Hope you can make it, too.

Finally, some vision!

2008-05-30T13:43:00.001-04:00

TheStar.com | GTA | Chop Gardiner, Miller says

No shocker, really, that I'm pretty happy about this. I've said before that the whole thing should come down.

What I love about this is the question from Denzil Minnan-Wong:

"Who's going to pay for it? We already have a $300 million backlog in road repairs, so it's logical to assume that this will come at a cost. What roads will not be repaired or repaved that are already falling apart?"
-- Denzil Minnan-Wong

It's almost funny that he can't see the answer staring him in the face. (Almost funny because this guy has a say in the direction of the city.) Well, just so Mr. Minnan-Wong doesn't hurt himself trying to think of it, here's the answer: The money to do this today will come because we won't have to pay to fix this part of the Gardiner tomorrow! And the road that will not be fixed if we do this is the Gardiner between Jarvis to the Don Valley Parkway!

On a sad note, I will miss this part of the Ride for Heart, but that's a small sacrifice to get back our waterfront.

Making the Circle Complete

2008-05-04T12:27:00.004-04:00

The shift to a green economy isn't just about guilt-free upper- and middle-class consumption. It is also a powerful tool to alleviate poverty.

Check out Green for All to learn more.

Us too, please!

2008-01-27T19:29:00.001-05:00

Having the city take this bold step would prevent individual neighbourhoods from having to engage this battle each and every time.

edmontonsun.com - Edmonton News- Drive-thru ban no idle threat

Some green-minded civic politicians want Edmonton to consider closing the window on new restaurant drive-thrus and their idling vehicles.

So Good to Hear

2008-01-26T23:40:00.001-05:00

This is a great example of the kind of thinking that will move us beyond our divisions so that we can work together to solve the challenges ahead of us. This message can be mapped onto any number of efforts. I choose to map it onto the effort for sustainability.

Barack Obama's victory speech in South Carolina

The choice in this election is not between regions or religions or genders. It’s not about rich versus poor; young versus old; and it is not about black versus white. It’s about the past versus the future.

With Fingers Crossed

2008-01-26T13:02:00.001-05:00

Let's hope the end result is as hoped for. I have faith that Adam Vaughan can make this turn out the way it should.

globeandmail.com: Big-box plan on Queen West strip raises alarm

With politicians encouraging a reduction in car use and urban sprawl, Mr. Robins said he hopes the project will end up being a model of how urban densification can work without compromising the character of the downtown.

Stuff that make me say, "Cool!"

2008-01-26T12:48:00.001-05:00

Information on how to find Old Pottery Road and Old Don Mills Road. (Aside: There's still lots of underused space in the city. So get out there and use it as park before it gets bought up to be something else.)

Torontoist: Old Pottery Road

Unlike most abandoned roads that exist only for short stretches of their former selves, old Pottery Road is unique: its entire original route is still open and can be hiked from beginning to end.

If we really want to help the economy ...

2008-01-26T12:19:00.001-05:00

We created this economy with both its "goods" and its "bads". The bads have outweighed the goods for some time now, and the realization of this is only now staring to become common knowledge.

It's time to start building the next economy. However, it's going to take a lot more than buying that new fridge, new house or new car. It's going to take some new thinking.

Community Supported Manufacturing | Post Carbon Institute

Many of the goods and services we currently rely on for our daily needs are almost totally dependent on oil. Not only do our products travel thousands of miles to get to our doors, requiring massive supplies of cheap energy in the shipping process, they also contain oil. Everything from plastics, household appliances, to processed foods is derived in some way from petroleum products.

A Green Economy is a Better Economy

2008-01-25T10:10:00.000-05:00

Friedman left "communities" out of his list of things that need smarter planning, but a good article nonetheless about the way forward.

The Green Road Less Traveled

A fundamental truth about green technology: you can’t make a product greener, whether it’s a car, a refrigerator or a traffic system, without making it smarter — smarter materials, smarter software or smarter design.

Density and Distance: Car Use in the City

2008-01-24T22:51:00.001-05:00

A look by Statscan at the reasons why the people who drive in the city choose to do so. It turns out that most people want to do the right thing, but without the proper planning it just isn't possible. My goal is to support people in their goal to live a better life.

Canadian Social Trends: Dependence on cars in urban neighbourhoods

As much as they want to do something, many people probably feel helpless when confronted with [suggestions such as car-pooling, public transit, walking and bicycling]. One of the underlying reasons for these feelings may lie in the fact that the types of neighbourhoods and municipalities in which people live simply do not lend themselves to modes of travel other than the automobile.

No food for oil!

2008-01-24T22:38:00.001-05:00

A good article about the crazy cycle we get into if we depend too much on biofuels. Again: same old thinking leads to same old (and sometimes new) problems.

TheStar.com | comment | Biofuels could generate extensive food shortages

[T]he truth is that adopting biofuels as a large-scale alternative to fossil fuels to combat global warming could create a whole host of new problems – including widespread food shortages.

Unclear on the Concept

2008-01-24T21:18:00.001-05:00

Richard Branson has got to take the prize for greenwashing. He is trying to cast his quest to develop a rocket for vanity space travel as part of a solution for the end of oil. It sounds like he is suggesting "Solar Panels in Spaaaaaace!"

Don't forget that this is the guy who is offering $25 million for anyone who can develop a machine that will reverse the process of climate change. Last time I checked, it was called a tree! He should spend $25 million planting some instead.

The kind of thinking that is getting us into the problem won't get us out of the problem. And when it comes to that kind of thinking, Richard Branson is a genius!

TheStar.com | Technology | Space odyssey takes shape

"With the end of the oil era approaching, and climate change progressing faster than most models had been predicting, the utilization of space is essential," [Branson] said. "I also believe that someday we'll be able to use space as a source of energy for the planet, using the most sustainable source of energy available, our sun."