After two consecutive days within earshot of would-be pro wrestling manager Stephen LeDrew, it was a change of tone at a Thursday morning press conference hosted by a more seasoned iconoclast -- John Sewell, now running for council in St. Paul’s, along with five other candidates who want to improve the way city government functions. Huddled around a table in a rustic basement room at George Brown House on Baldwin St. were candidates Amarjeet Chhabra (pictured, Scarborough East), Garry Green (Jane Finch), Ed Shiller (Willowdale), David White (Parkdale-High Park) and, the most familiar face, Adam Vaughan (Trinity-Spadina). Their agenda essentially brings the Sewell-led anti-amalgamation Citizens for Local Democracy campaign into the Megacity era, now that they’re equipped with evidence of how inefficient the system can be. This gang thinks council meetings should be held every second week rather than once monthly, community councils need power to make decisions on local matters, and a task force should be struck to untangle the system. They believe non-citizen residents deserve a vote, more women should be encouraged to run for council, and more strategies oughta be created to increase overall participation from people who aren’t old white guys.

Sewell might have been the oldest white guy in the building, but entered this race to continue fighting the dedicated streetcar right-of-way on St. Clair W., a project whose flip-flop construction process has come to represent everything wrong with local bureaucracy, particularly among those who didn't like the idea in the first place. Sewell has settled into the role of City Hall psychotherapist, eager to dispense his ideas for healing, after a couple decades writing columns about the unfulfilled promise of Toronto failed to achieve the desired effect. Council meetings that last a week or more, filled with more agenda items than the average wonk can absorb, are blamed as a contributor to citizen apathy. A downtown councilor being forced to form an opinion on an issue related to Scarborough isn’t terribly effective, either.

Years of having to hunt down soundbites for the evening news led Adam Vaughan to realize that a council debate dragged out over multiple days results in diluted public passion over time, because "the best clips have left the room". He points to the recent vote to tear down 48 Abell St., a warehouse residence for artists recently put up for condominium sacrifice, despite passionate protests from the West Queen West set. But, the final decision was ultimately swayed by an effort to gain favour with the developer, related to a project in North York, explains Vaughan -- who also despairs that most of the talented architects in town aren’t being hired by the city, and how community projects to improve neighbourhoods are being actively discouraged by a system built to be mistrustful of initiatives from ordinary people. Vaughan wonders if the 123 local agency boards and committees are just too much for 44 councilors: "Maybe, we could use more politicians."

Working together for a more effective council [John Sewell]