Hello, fellow Londoners! Here’s your Wednesday morsel, a wee guide to recent developments in local government. Welcome to City Hall Notes, and my offering for The Loon this week. Hi - I’m Mike, a local PR guy who talks a bit like Shrek1. Let’s take a look at London’s happenings.
It’s an unusual week, with an election in our recent past and so much work taking place behind the scenes ahead of the first meeting of the new London City Council on November 17. The newly-elected council is being onboarded behind closed doors2, I understand, and of course many of the media peeps who covered the election are now lying in an exhausted heap, recovering from one busy time and getting ready for another. So here, with much anticipation in the air, is an interim update.
Why do this? Well, nobody’s getting rich - that’s for sure. Instead, you have five engaged Londoners and a whole bunch of their pals and supporters, creating London Ontario Online News and sending you new content every day… because it’s in the public interest. This is community in action, making an impact, and we’re glad you’re here for it.
Let’s get to it, shall we?
And I start with a question.
How did Josh Morgan survive that?
As we reflect on the municipal election result, good questions are being asked. Among them is: why did Mayor Josh Morgan get different treatment from other mayors across the province?
Jack Moulton of the London Free Press looked into it, and the subhed on his analysis piece is spot on: “Voting against Susan meant voting for Josh,” one expert said.
Opinion alert: Complete agreement from me. Susan Stevenson, who’s the Ward 4 councillor for another week, couldn’t win for winning. Every time she made one of her bold statements, more people decided to vote for Morgan. London just didn’t have the stomach for her brand of change, and chose the easy option instead. Now we have an incumbent with a strong mandate - how exciting!
Next up, new folks.
Meet council’s four rookies
We’re still in learning mode and here are two neat video packages from Rogers tv introducing London City Council’s four new faces:
Jonathan Sher (Ward 7) and Tom Cull (Ward 4): LINK
Ben Durham (Ward 3) and Jason King (Ward 14): LINK
And I am certain we will hear more from those four voices over the next few weeks. They have arrived with promises to keep.
Hey, let’s have A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR - which always makes me happy to say. I feel like I’m presenting a 1950s game show.
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Reaction, reaction, reaction
Discussion of the muni election’s outcome goes on, including at The Loon. Matt Brown welcomed Skylar Franke to the Buckle Up podcast on Monday, and they touched on the topic, of course. Matt also had analysis with Dr. Martin Horak at the weekend.
Steve Cordes was reflecting on lessons learned from the election in his Friday post, and Cedric Richards was thinking about election turnout for his City column yesterday.
Over at Blackburn News, here’s a panel from Craig Needles’ podcast, with Dr. Shawna Lewkowitz and Dr. Carol Dyck.
What’s next for local government?
In general, the vibe in our local government sector right now is “wait and see”. Here’s a Free Press story about homelessness support and folks in that sector looking to council for what’s next.
Second-placed candidate walks back comments
And there was some unusual reporting from the Ward 13 race, which ended in a strong win for David Ferreira over Andrew Crook in second place. Daryl Newcombe of CTV London reports here on Crook’s post-election social media post, in which he called for repeated integrity complaints, lawsuits, boycotts, civil disobedience, gathering sensitive information, public shaming and forcing councillors or the mayor to resign in disgrace. The same reporter follows up with this story in which Crook admits “My language went too far, particularly the reference to using someone’s own ‘rope’ against them. I should have expressed myself differently.”
He also makes a statement calling for a better debate, including the opportunity to disagree with one another.
Opinion alert: that’s a good call. I totally agree that we should have better political discourse, and that many participants in this election could learn from the experience, and perhaps take a better approach to building partnerships.
The Municipal Lightning Round
Here are some more bits:
Private security in Lambeth? LINK (Hey, I will also totally take your $20 to shine a flashlight at your house some night - just lmk.)
Education: are you following the OSAP-in-private-schools story? Here’s a LINK to the latest on it, in which Ontario’s colleges and universities minister Nolan Quinn says he will keep a government-commissioned audit of OSAP use at private career colleges confidential after preliminary findings prompted a referral to the Ontario Provincial Police.
And the Freeps picked up this story about Sifton Properties seeking to replace row houses in Berkshire Village (that’s near Springbank and Wonderland) with five apartment buildings totalling 643 units.
And a call for feedback
How’s this City Hall column going for you? What works and what does not? What do you think it should look like? I’m giving some thought to service levels and expectations, and I’d love to hear from readers as I take stock and decide what I’m doing next. The election was a milestone, and key to my planning for 2026. I could go in a number of different ways now.
You can email me or comment on this post; I’ll leave comments open for all subscribers. Thanks to everyone who’s been in touch already.
Enough
That’s it from me this Wednesday lunchtime. Sorry to be a little bit late, but life is happening and I’m building another business while The Loon takes flight. Such fun we are having gadding around town - thanks to everyone who is experiencing my blunderbuss approach to networking and joining in with enthusiasm.
I’ll be back with a ROUNDUP on Friday and, along with my four co-owners, I’ll keep thinking about local journalism, public interest and what The Loon is for. Watch this space.
(EDITED TO ADD: five typos this week. I agree that I need a copy editor.)
Thanks for following along, and please remember to look after each other.
Happy Bonfire Night to all who celebrate!3
- Mike
“People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.”
- V For Vendetta
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DONKEY!
Less painful than it may sound, I am sure.