Toronto police are confirming they interviewed a senior member of the mayor’s staff who had a tip about a video supposedly showing Ford smoking crack cocaine could be tied to a recent homicide.

But police say the interview had nothing to do with an ongoing murder investigation.

The Globe and Mail reported the staffer heard from another member of the Mayor’s staff about the video, and the original owner of the video was murdered because of its possible value.

But police say members of the police homicide squad conducted the interview because they have expertise in areas other police don’t.

Mayor Ford maintains the video doesn’t exist. And he and his brother railed against the media during their weekly radio show. Mayor Ford referred to the media as “maggots.”

The Editor in Chief of the Globe and Mail says his paper stands behind an investigative story it ran on the weekend the said Doug Ford was a drug dealer for several years in his youth.

And a new survey suggests the latest controversy has had no impact on the mayor’s approval rating. The survey taken on Friday shows that, in a one-on-one mayoral race between Ford and potential candidate Olivia Chow, the NDP MP would win 56 per cent of the vote versus 36 per cent for Rob Ford. That number is unchanged from a similar survey taken earlier this month.