Here is a very serious list of people you run into on campaigns since #TOpoli is heating up. To be taken 100% literally:
Phone Call Phantom:
⁃this person is always on the phone and usually walking quickly
⁃never leaves a meeting with action items
⁃they look busy but you’re unsure if you’ve seen them do any work
⁃confident, loves hierarchy as long as they’re at the top of it
Small Favour Salamander
⁃full of seemingly reasonable requests
⁃give an inch, they take a mile
⁃love to go outside official processes
⁃every time you think it’s gone, the favour grows back, just like a salamander’s tale
⁃you know THEY know what they’re doing
Director Baba Yaga
⁃big vision
⁃“Campaign Veteran”
⁃sets up goals impossible to meet with no direction
⁃does not care if you’ve seen your kids this week, you’ll see them after E-day
- will casually drop the most unhinged anecdote of someone kind of famous
Comms Coven
⁃bleed red ink
⁃will kill your darlings
⁃intense about approvals
⁃seem to have a secret language of eye rolls and pointed sighs among themselves
⁃you’re scared of their lighting ability to go from vaguely terrifying to Customer Service Voice chipper
The Go Getter Ghost
- shows up out of nowhere mid campaign
- super eager to help
- just not on canvassing, data entry, phone banking, or anything “entry”
- offer to draft policy (two weeks out from election day)
- disappears as randomly as they came in the first place
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A couple of weeks ago I shared an ambulance bill discrepancy in communication as an example of health inequity; I just found the other bill for a direct comparison.
One gives you a few weeks to pay and info on how billing works, one has no grace period and uses scare tactics.
Doug Ford recently passed a health care bill that many are rightly criticizing for opening up a “two tiered health care system”, but I’d argue we are already there. The question isn’t IF Ford’s government will create inequity, it’s how much further will it entrench it?
The pandemic has shown us a direct correlation between health outcomes and postal code, and the onus is on the state. Some neighbourhoods got testing facilities and vaccination clinics faster than others.
Sometimes it really blows my mind that I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve cried at my current job.
Because the job beforehand…a ‘good day’ was measured by if and how much I cried.
The amount of work and intensity of work didn’t change. The culture did.
Like???? I was really crying after the end of a work day, crying when I woke up and realized I had to work, getting off bullshit calls and crying. I once asked my union steward “I would like to brainstorm solutions so I don’t end up crying all the time.”
And I advocated for those solutions and was completely transparent at multiple levels while always delivering high quality work and just….nothing changed? Then people were mad when I quit? That was not healthy or “progressive”.
Ok so I went deep into the archives for personal examples of “Privileged Politicians and Pundits Can’t Comprehend Community Organizing Existing”. A #TOpoli 🧵:
In early May of 2016, Women in Toronto Politics was still active, a small by-law change from Denzil Minnan-Wong landed on the radar of myself, @ClaireMcWatt, and other activists.
We spent an evening on the floor of an empty office after hours eating cold pizza, while Claire wrote an op-ed and I phoned allies and proof-read. torontoist.com/2016/05/dear-c…
There’s this one rhetoric pattern that Antiv*xers, climate deniers, and right wing debate me types follow that once you see it it’s impossible to unsee:
Intentionally neutral tone + logical fallacy + personal implication + path of righteousness.
Here’s how to (try and) deal:
Example:
I just think it’s curious that I hear so many stories of people who are vaccinated getting sick, and right after the holidays? The timing is odd, if you don’t want to be concerned that’s your prerogative I’m just asking questions to be informed.
After a while it sounds as nonsense as:
I just think before we went to the moon there were more good jobs. But I guess I just support bakers while you hate firemen. That’s the difference between peanut butter and rhododendrons, and I shouldn’t be cancelled for saying so.
Hello all you engaged #TOpoli folks. Overwhelmed by the complex document that is our city budget? Trying to explain it to a friend? Here's a stab at demystifying Toronto's budget; first up: Operation vs Capital budgets.
Someone, I forget who, told me a while ago to consider "operating" as the "keep the lights on" part of the budget and the "capital" as the "ok now let's take care of the rest of the house" budget. Which I found helpful! #TOpoli
They are funded from different sources, but one piece of nuance here is that taxes can sometimes indirectly influence capital funding since city programs contribute to the city's reserves. #TOpoli
The more conversations around the #TOpoli budget ramp up, the more some old misconceptions come around. Here are 5 myths about the municipal budget and what you can say when someone brings them up:
1. There's no such thing as being "allowed" to speak on the budget, it affects all of us
2. Renters not only pay property tax (its part of how your rent is calculated) but they historically disproportionately pay MORE in property tax than homeowners - with less protections! Here's a good explainer: realestatemagazine.ca/do-residential…