Ford, Rob

Born in Etobico in 1969 . Ford is the youngest of four children (Doug, Katie, Randy and Rob) Ruth Diana (née Campbell) and . Ford's father was the founder of Deco Labels and Tags, a company that produces self-adhesive packaging labels and earns about a hundred thousand dollars a year ^[13] . The success of this business allowed the family to buy a house with six bedrooms, a pool and a garden, which can receive thousands of visitors ^[13] .

Ford studied at the ^[14] . Rob dreamed of becoming a professional football player and his father paid for training his son in the professional club of American football " Washington Redskins " and at the University of Notre Dame . After graduating from high school, he studied political science at Carleton University in Ottawa . Ford created his football team, but did not participate in any game. He left the university and returned to Toronto after a year of being there, without completing his studies ^[14] . After university, Ford got a job in his father's company to engage in sales ^[13] .

In 2000, Ford married Renate Brezhnyak, whom he met in high school ^[15] . Now Fords with their daughter Stephanie and son Doug live in Etobiko ^[16] . After the death of Douglas Ford in 2006 , the Fords family retained ownership of the Deco Labels and Tags company , which is managed through Doug Ford Holdings ^[17] . Ford manages the company along with the brothers, mother and directors of the company ^[17] .

He continued his football career as a high school coach. At first, Ford worked as a coach at in 2001 , but was fired due to serious disagreements with one of the players ^[18] . After that, he worked from 2001 to 2013, while the didn’t remove him from coaching at this school and forbade him to hold this position at any of the city’s Catholic schools . The reason was the numerous scandals with his participation, and especially the incident with the video on which Ford uses crack ^[19] .

His father, Douglas Ford, was a member of the from the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario ruled by Michael Harris . After the death of his father, Rob has maintained political ties with this party, as well as with the Conservative Party of Canada . The image of former Ontario Prime Minister Michael Harris and Father Ford is now adorning the City Hall building. Ford himself describes his father as his political hero, business hero and hero in everything ^[13] . Ford worked on election campaigns of several members of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario, including John Tory in the 2005 elections.

Rob Ford had various health problems, the most significant are asthma and kidney stones . In 2012, he was hospitalized twice, in the first case, because of kidney stones ^[20] , and in the second, due to pain in his throat and stomach, aggravating his asthma ^[21] .

In September 2014, he was diagnosed with a rare form of liposarcoma . March 22, 2016, Ford died at Mount Sinai Hospital (Toronto) ^{[22] [23]} .

City Councilor

Ford’s career in politics began in 1997 , when he first ran for membership in the City Council of Toronto. However, he was only accepted in 2000 as a member of the council of the Etobicoke’s second electoral district, and then he was re-elected twice more and was a member of the council until October 2010. Ford repeatedly gave controversial comments on the work of the council and often initiated violent disputes ^[24] .

The second constituency is in the northwest of Etobiko. The population in 2006 was 50,000, of whom 53% were immigrants . The largest group of immigrants are South Asians . Approximately 40% of the population lives in houses , the rest in apartments ^[25] Ford previously lived in this district, but moved in 2000 after marriage to the fourth constituency. In 2003, he was re-elected with 80% of the vote, bypassing two candidates from the local Somali community ^[26] . In the 2006 municipal elections, Ford won again, this time with 66% of the vote.

Mayor

Ford put forward his candidacy for the post of mayor in the municipal elections in Toronto on May 26, 2010 . Among Ford's campaign promises were: tax cuts, timely garbage collection in the city, expansion of the metro , reduction of budget expenditures, an increase in the number of police officers and the sale of unused real estate by the city authorities ^[27] . He also promised to abolish double charges when transferring property from seller to buyer, which were introduced by David Miller, the previous mayor of the city, and to abolish the double tax on car registration ^{[28] [29]} . Mayor Ford was elected on October 25, 2010 and took office on December 1 of the same year.

At the first meeting of the council in December 2010, it was decided to abolish the transport tax of $ 60, which Ford promised in its election campaign, the decision entered into force on January 1, 2011 ^[30] . Later, other campaign promises were fulfilled. In March 2011, Ford, together with Dalton McGinty , the Prime Minister of Ontario, and announced a new plan for the expansion of the Toronto transportation system. According to him, Metrolinks committed to build twenty-five kilometers of light metro . The line will along and will consist of twenty-six stations ^[31] . In the summer of 2013, the city council approved the plan by making some changes to it. Ford approved a new plan and began looking for sources of funding for the project, he later received $ 660 million from the Canadian government. The city council approved the project plan in October 2013. Only Paul Ainsley, a member of the city council, who believed that the cost of construction costs would eventually exceed the estimated cost of three billion dollars ^[32], opposed this.

Ford ensured that a private company, rather than a municipal company, was involved in garbage collection in the city, which should lead to lower costs for garbage collection in the city ^[28] . In addition, in April 2013, he himself participated in the campaign “Clean Up Toronto” in the city council and in the campaign for garbage collection at in Etobico ^[33] .

During his tenure, he was involved in several road scandals. The mayor was accused of talking on a cell phone while driving ^[34] , reading while driving ^[35] , drunk driving, and driving past a tram with doors open, although he had to wait for them to close ^[36] . Rob Ford, as the mayor, was put in a personal driver, but he refused him, saying that he would drive the car, because he did not want the taxpayers to pay extra money for this service. After the reading incident while driving in August 2012, Ford was heavily criticized by the police and media . Toronto police asked Ford to hire a driver and his brother, Doug, promised that the mayor would have a personal driver ^[37] . However, Ford later stated that he still drives the car himself and is not going to use the services of the driver ^[38] .

In November 2012, Ford was suspended from his position for two weeks as a result of his violation of the law on conflict of interest . During his work as a trainer at the Don Bosco school, he donated twenty thousand dollars to the local sports team, as well as donated money to the needs of other schools, but from a charitable foundation for the development of football created by him ^[39] . The city council held a meeting at which the question of Ford’s violation of official ethics was considered. The vote was taken on the recommendation of the Special Representative of Toronto, who monitors compliance by civil servants with the code of conduct of officials. Back in August 2010, the plenipotentiary demanded that Ford return the donations allocated to his foundation ^[40] . During the voting, it was decided whether Ford had to pay from his own pocket for donations that went to his private football foundation, and which he applied for, using the official forms of the city. Ford was accused of not having informed the city council of the conflict of interest that had arisen when he participated in the voting of the city council ^[41] . Nevertheless, the court’s decision was in favor of Ford and he managed to keep his position ^[40] .

In March 2013, a new charge was brought against Ford, this time for sexual harassment . Sarah Thomson, publisher and former rival of Ford in the 2010 elections, blamed him for this. According to her, at one of his personal meetings, he complained to her that she was not with him when he was vacationing in Florida , and after these words he touched that buttocks ^{[42] [43]} .

Restriction of authority

In November 2013, the police handed over a five hundred-page document to the press, which collected allegations against Ford ^[27] . It claims that Ford works four hours a day, abuses official powers and generally appears at work while intoxicated, uses the services of prostitutes , and is also often hard-core and insults people. At the meeting of the city council on November 15, 2013, the mayor decided to limit the powers, transferring part of them to his deputy, Norma Kelly, for the remainder of Ford’s term ^{[9] [10]} . In the course of the new meeting of the Council, held on November 18 , it was decided to deprive Ford of almost all of its powers ^{[10] [12]} . The post of mayor actually became formal, and all the powers of the mayor were transferred to his deputy, Norm Kelly ^[44] . In addition to depriving the government of the decision of the council, the budget of the mayor’s office was also cut by 60%, which now comes under the control of Norma Kelly, to whom employees of the mayoral administration will now report to ^{[45] [46]} . Ford himself called the incident a "coup d'état" and promised a "full-scale war" at the next mayoral election ^[44] .

Re-election as mayor

On January 2, 2014, Ford was the first to register as a candidate for the post of mayor of Toronto in the upcoming elections, which were held on October 27 of that year ^[47] . From May 1 to June 30, Ford suspended his work as mayor and preparations for the elections in order to undergo a course of rehabilitation from alcohol and drug addiction ^{[48] [49]} .

On September 12, 2014, it became known that Ford had a tumor in the abdominal cavity due to which it stops its participation in the elections. Ford will have surgery and a course of chemotherapy that will last six to eight weeks ^[50] . Instead of Rob, his brother Doug Ford ^[51] took part in the .

October 28 were announced the results according to which the seat of mayor will take John Tori who took first place with 40.28% of the vote. Doug scored 33.73%, took the third place with 23.15% of the vote ^[52] . Ford himself said that he intends to participate in the next mayoral elections, which will be held in 2018 ^[53] .

Early years

In 1999, Miami police arrested Ford for driving while intoxicated and possessing marijuana , which became a problem for his election as a member of the city council, as this event received press coverage, the Toronto Zvezda newspaper published the details of the incident. According to the police report, Ford was visibly nervous, he had bloodshot eyes and smelled strongly of alcohol ^[54] . Responding to questions from journalists about the incident, he denied what was written in the police report, saying that he was arrested only because he refused to "breathe into the phone" ^[55] . Later, Ford recognized the truthfulness of the report, but did not admit to the storage and use of marijuana ^[56] . In the end, the charges of possession of marijuana were abandoned and Ford was only fined ^[57] .

As mayor

On May 16, 2013, the administration of the American site Gawker reported that they received a video in which the mayor of Toronto smoked crack ^[58] . John Cook, the editor of this site, said that he watched a video taken on a telephone, in which a person very similar to Rob Ford, holds a glass tube in one hand and a lighter in the second, then heats the tube and inhales smoke ^{[59] [ 60]} . The next day, two journalists from one of the largest Canadian newspapers Star of Toronto reported that on May 3 they watched this video on a smartphone in the backseat of the car, they have no way to confirm the authenticity of the video, but they are sure that Ford was captured on it ^{[58 ] [61]} . The video, according to them, was filmed on a mobile phone by a drug dealer who sold crack to Ford. On the recording itself, in addition to using the drug, Ford captured how he exchanges cues with someone behind the scenes, calling Justin Trudeau , the leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, “fag” ^[62] . This video was presented to journalists by a man who introduced himself as the leader of the local Somali community. He said that he represented the interests of two drug dealers Ford, and demanded one million dollars for this video, but the newspaper refused to buy the video ^[63] .

The mayor himself at first categorically denied any involvement in this video and in drug use ^[5] . He made a statement in which he said: “I don’t use crack, I don’t, and the Star of Toronto is a shitty publication” ^[64] . Later, however, Ford still admitted to using crack. According to him, he smoked crack, but is not a drug addict. Ford said that this happened once during a “drunken zabyty” about a year ago, but he does not remember the exact date ^[6] . Ford also noted that because of this incident, he does not intend to leave politics and will again participate in the next election ^[65] . Later at a meeting of the city council, he also admitted that he had been buying illegal narcotic drugs in the last two years ^[7] .

• CBC staff . The agony of Rob Ford , CBC.
• Keenan, Edward. Some Great Idea: Good Neighborhoods, Crazy Politics and the Invention of Toronto. - Toronto: Coach House Books, 2013. - ISBN 9781552452660 .
• Marche, Stephen. Toronto's Hot Messiam: What Mayor, Rob Ford Knows About Toronto , The New York Times , November 6, 2013, p. A29 (New York edition), and online November 5, 2013.
• McDonald. The Incredible Shrinking Mayor (Eng.) // Toronto Life. - 2012. - May. - p . 40-54 .
• Tossel, Ivor. The Gift of Ford. - Toronto: Random House, 2012. - ISBN 9780345812575 .
• The Unknown Torontonian. The little book of Rob Ford. - Toronto, ON: House of Anansi Press Inc., 2011. - ISBN 978-1-77089-007-7 .

• Rob Ford's profile on the Toronto site