TUNE INTO THE TOWN: WERE DEVELOPERS TIPPED OFF BEFORE PROVINCE MADE CHANGES TO GREENBELT PLANS 

Libby Znaimer is joined by David Crombie, Former Mayor of Toronto, Karen Stintz, CEO, Variety Village and Toronto City Councillor James Pasternak, for Ward 6 York Centre.

In the news: Ontario’s municipal and housing affairs minister Steve Clark is denying claims that he tipped off developers ahead of making changes to the government’s Greenbelt plans. Meanwhile, Mayor John Tory says that the Ford government will provide the City of Toronto a third of the $703 M operating budget shortfall that was caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. And, we follow up on the Ontario Auditor General’s report that indicates that almost half of the wetlands in the province were evaluated for their importance which could potentially mean that they could be under threat by development. Our panel weighs in on the latest.

AUDITOR GENERAL ON HER REPORT

Libby Znaimer is joined by Ontario Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk.

Yesterday: the AG released her report and the details were damning especially on the healthcare front. For example, it was found that as many as 3.4 million vaccine doses (or nine percent roughly) of COVID-19 vaccine doses were wasted in the province’s rollout program. Doctors were also getting as much as $170 to $220 per  hour when administering vaccines at a vaccination site compared to the low amount of $32 to $49 per hour that nurses were getting paid to do the same job. Furthermore, as much as $66 M of PPE expired, was damaged or got lost. The AG joins to weigh in on the report in full.

PSYCHIATRISTS CALL ON OTTAWA TO DELAY ITS MAID PROGRAM EXPANSION

Libby Znaimer is joined by Dr. Valerie Taylor, the psychiatric chair at the University of Calgary and president of the Association of Chairs of Psychiatry in Canada.

Canadian psychiatrists are calling on Ottawa to delay expanding its MAID program to patients with mental illnesses, insisting that proper safeguards in the program are not yet in place. Valerie explains.